I received some items free of charge for the purpose of this post.
Oriental Trading asked me to try out a few items, and I eagerly looked through the website to decide what I would choose. I’ve reviewed a few times for Oriental Trading, and I’ve purchased Oriental Trading products over the past several years. I’ve never had any issues with the products until this order. A few of the things I got were just fine, but a few weren’t so fine and only lasted a few minutes before breaking. I hope you will read on through to see which products made the grade and which didn’t.
The Giant Badminton game ($30.00) was a huge hit with the kids. DS11 likes to play, but the normally sized “birdies” are hard for him to see and hit. This one is big enough for him to react to and allows him to play with his sister. This is definitely on my good list!
We also received the “Super Sturdy” Parachute ($15.99) and the Smile Face Beach Balls ($10.00). I thought this would be a good combination to work on eye-hand coordination for DS11. When we went outside with this, it seemed like such a great combination. That is until…
about FIVE minutes into the game. Yes, you read that right… FIVE minutes. The strap let loose. I looked at it closely and determined that it is likely a design flaw or just that somehow the ends of the straps were not “melted” or sewed in a way to keep the material from unraveling. I looked at the other straps closely, and it looked like they would likely come apart, too.
From there, we go on to the Fly in the Wind Wrist Rings ($10.25). We have some ribbons that DD15 uses for exercise, but the strings get tangled all the time! I thought these might be a good option for her. These don’t get tangled like the others.
The last item is the set of Finger Beams ($7.99). Believe it or not, this is what I was looking forward to the most! These are lights that go on the fingers and shine in the dark. The lights are actually very bright!
Doesn’t that look like fun? Can you imagine kids with these on every finger chasing each other through the house in the dark? Well, as soon as I opened these, they disappeared. Well, almost all of them disappeared…
This one came back shortly, and the kids said that it was already this way. I wondered about that, but after seeing a couple of the others have their elastic bands separate, there is no doubt that this one was already broken. I was a little disappointed.
So, as a disclaimer, I didn’t contact them to have these things replaced. Just looking at the items that broke, it looked like design flaws, and I didn’t think calling for a replacement would correct the problem. Some things are just not made as well as others. This doesn’t meant that I will stop ordering from Oriental Trading. No, I’ll just be a little more choosy about the things that I purchase there.
Disclaimer: I received the above items free of charge. I was not required to give a positive review, and I do review honestly, as you can see.
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