Travelling with KenziBox

It’s no secret that I love to travel.  From heady early days with my husband roaming the ancient site of Angkor Wat, discovering the natural beauty of Iguazu Falls, strolling down the Copacabana… having the boys hasn’t diminished our love of travel.  But it’s certainly changed our perspective of it.

Gone are the back packs.  The rucksack hand luggage between us.  In comes the Trunki.  I may be one of a few who loves the Trunki but love it I do, normally inside here I pack my top travel toys for Toddlers but this UK flight was different. This UK flight jostling for space next to the aeroplane and the Play Doh was my secret weapon. The KenziBox on the go bag.

KenziBox are a company based in Dubai formed by 2 innovative mums who spent hours creating and developing crafts to do with their children, taking them away from the iPads and the soft plays, then wondering how they could use the packs of 1000 lollipop sticks they had left. And so KenziBox was born.

“imagination does not become great until human beings, given the courage and the strength, use it to create”

– Maria Montessori

KenziBox works in two ways, the first being that a box of four themed crafts is delivered to you once a month, for you and your child to sit down and do together. The second being the “On the Go” bag which is perfect for planes, trains and automobiles. And we tested it out on all 3.

Not being able to wait until we were on the plane I pulled it all out, pretty much the minute I collected it and spread it all over my friends floor.

I was delighted to discover ten individually packed crafts with instructions, pleased to see a fluffy pom pom toy, thrilled that attention to detail had been made with everything from felt tips to glue and utterly enchanted by the story box cubes.

Each individually packed activity was perfect for little fingers to complete with minimal assistance from big people and included ideas that I hadn’t even thought about before, all in a little people sized bag which they can carry (they won’t). Activities included:

Velvet Colouring

This brought childhood memories rushing back for me as I remembered painstakingly colouring intricate details. While the Toddler is definitely no Picasso and it was a little out of his ability range, I love the fact that it made him stop, think, ponder, and attempt to colour between the lines. It worked well for him practicing his pincer grip as well.

Magic Paper

I LOVED this. Again massive nostalgia moment. We took this on the train as we headed down to see the Gruffalo. Hence the drawing of the train. There was also drawings of planes and lorrys which happened after I took the picture. The toddler had a good go at scratching but then wanted me to draw. So I did. And then refused to give the stick back……..

It kept him entertained for a good 45 minutes, fascinated by the black coming away and colours appearing. Loudly exclaiming about the “lellow”, blue, pink and purple.

People Puppets

This one was completely toddler led. Even though I was itching to draw the mouths on myself…. I didn’t. We had such a blast with this one and it was so simple it deserves its own blog post.

Animal Masks

Again, perfect and toddler led. We did this one back in Dubai while I desperately tried to calm down Baby Boy mid growth spurt and could one handed half help.

No need!

Roar I a tiger

He didn’t quite get that he was in fact, a lion.

Colouring Book

Fairly self explanatory, and choice of coloured pencils or felt tips.

Origami

We’ve haven’t got round to this yet, it’s safely packed away for our flight next week along with…

Plasticine Creatures

It’s like grown up Play Doh!! Remember those oh so inviting sticks of bendy Plasticine? We’re a big fan of Play Doh so I see this one going down well.

Felt Tips

Well, hours of fun can be had here….

The on the go travel bag is a fantastic product, available for 225aed it does work well for Toddlers but I’d say it would do even better for those in school who may follow instruction better than my little Toddler Terror. We haven’t used everything yet and we’ve done two 8 hour flights, two 2 hour train rides and countless long nap-less afternoons. And even when we have used all supplies I intend to refill as the bag is perfect Toddler carry on size. Maybe it’s time to say goodbye to the Trunki…..

Disclaimer; I received a free on the go travel bag for the purposes of this review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.