[Review] Janod Wooden Toys (With My Miracle Baby)

Janod - a French brand which you would likely see in Motherswork, Early Learning Centre (ELC) Singapore and Mothercare Outlets. Janod is a brand specialised in wooden toys for over 40 years. They are recognised for their striking range of children's wooden educational toys, each beautifully designed with bright bold colours with children's learning in mind.

I love wooden toys myself more than anything and personally preferred wooden toys over plastic toys. In my opinion, wooden toys can last much longer than plastic toys. I am still keeping the wooden blocks which I bought for Xav 8 years ago and Vera is now playing with them whereas, I had just discarded a plastic kitchen set which lasted less than 8 years. The plastic fruits that came along with the set started to crumble into pieces.

Just then, My Miracle Baby sent over two sets of Janod wooden toys , a set of Janod - Magnetic World Puzzle for Xav and a set of Janod - Mademoisella Maxi Cooker, for Vera.

Thank you, My Miracle Baby

My Miracle Baby - an online distribution website which sells accessories and toys for mummies and babies, carrying Janod as one of the brands that offers good quality wooden toys.

The box came with all the little parts bubbled wrap to prevent any scratches.

Since Don was away on an overseas trip, I got my hands busy to set up the kitchen set. No hammering is needed, all done and set up with the alan key provided.

Alan Key was provided to screw the nuts and bolts.

There was an instruction sheet included, so it was kind of a breeze to set up but I did struggle with unscrewing and re-assembling a few times when I got to the top part, likely that I could have read the wrong instruction or saw the wrong illustration ?

This area below actually have a plank in the middle to divide the space into 2 tiers. On the left (exterior), there is a door designed to look like an oven while on the right (exterior), it is the door to  cabinet to store the utensils. But once you open the doors, it can serve as a storage space for the cutleries and utensils.

Halfway through, Missy came for inspection as she could not wait to start playing!

We fell in love with this sweet, pretty pink set! Sweet enough for little girls!

In the mornings, when I am busy in my kitchen, Vera will be spotted at times keeping herself busy at her kitchen. She has creatively placed the wooden beads (purchased by me) into the pots and pretended to cook them.

She, too, loves to fill the sink with the wooden fruits (bought by me) and pretended to wash them.

What drew her to stay longer at the stove? The dials on the stove actually make clicking sound when turned. Am sure this sure does spark up the imagination in Vera to cook like how I usually do in the kitchen. The Mademoisella Maxi Cooker comes with the following as well:
- Some starter accessories includes three pieces of cooking utensils that can easily hang on the back wall, frying pan with egg, pot with lid, and an oven mitt, just nice for her little hand.

2. Janod - Magnetic World Puzzle (English Version)

I love to get anything with world maps that are beautifully illustrated. The spinning globe from ELC which can be lited up was the first world map toy I introduced to him. They are never too young to be exposed and be taught on what are the countries around the world and their geographical location and sometimes, we do talk about which countries we would love to visit while we recollected memories of those we have visited.

They got the whole world in their hands with just 92 magnets! Learning Geography with Janod - Magnetic World Puzzle (designed in France) is made more fun!

The board measures 77am by 46 cm and came with a protective plastic sheet covering it.

The colourful world puzzle differentiates the different continents by using bright, bold colours.

Xav can learn the names of the continents and countries and their capital. The magnetic pieces were "colour coded" by the continents. It makes it easier for the child to self correct themselves if ever they place the wrong colour into the wrong continent. Having said that they can first sort out the colours of the pieces.

Since we had been travelling wih Xav since he was younger, he is able to remember some iconic landmarks for certain countries. I got him to place the toobs (landmarks) on the specific countries on the board.

On the other hand, Vera can learn basic things like colour recognition and do colour sorting before giving it Xav. In my opinion, this set of magnetic world puzzle is not just for 7 years and above. I love how the shape of the puzzle piece fits onto the "perforated" printed shape on the base. In another words, young kids can match the shape of the puzzle piece, in a way they can train their fine motor skills by piecing the pieces together as well as their eye hand coordination.

Being an animal lover, Vera was delighted to see the beautiful illustrations on the base of the puzzle, she pointed out and named me the animals she knew and I did name out a few animals and got her to spot and point out to me on the world map!

To make it more interesting, I gave her some marine toy creatures (bought by us) and match with the animals she can find on the base. Infact, there are many ways  to play with this set if you do think out of the box.

It is safe for younger kids to hold the pieces as the puzzle pieces do not have not sharp edges and the edges are nicely smoothen.

I have no complaints about the puzzle, just that it is really heavy. I have yet to find a place to hang up as I intend to give our walls a new coat of paint. Hence, at the mean time, the puzzle will be rested against the wall.

It is less than 2 months away before Christmas. If you are planning to get your christmas shopping for kids, am sure these quality toys make great choices to gift to the kids. And the best of all is, there is an at least 20% discount for all Janod items at My Miracle Baby online store, starting from 15 Nov - 31 Dec 2016 ! Don't wait because I hardly see Janod toys on discount! So make full use of the discount, save while you shop! Get your Christmas shopping list ready ! 

You can check out on the following too if you plan to shop online:
Website: http://www.mymiraclebaby.com.sg
Facebook: My Miracle Baby
Instagram: My Miracle Baby Sg

Thank you for reading and if you would like to stay tune for future updates, do follow me on Facebook, Pinterest and Instagram !

Disclaimer: We were sponsored with the above sets for review purpose only, no monetary compensaton is involved and all opinions are of my own.