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Welcome to the Thinking Toys Sept newsletter!
Hi there ,
If this is your first newsletter... Welcome! If not, then welcome back!
Greenfest Southbank 10 - 12 October
Thinking Toys is proud to announce that we will be exhibiting at the inaugural Greenfest event. This is an event bent on improving awareness of more environmentally friendly products and ways to live. There will be over 150 exhibitors, 50 music acts, 50 speakers and low CO2 emission cars. This event is totally FREE! For more information please visit www.greenfest.com.au
And the Samford Show Quoridor/Quoridor Kid competition Winner is.....
Catherine R. from SA. Congratulations!
Quoridor Kid recently won the "Best Childrens game 2008" award from Boardgames Australia and is a firm favourite in our household as well as all our friends. It's always requested when children visit.
Free giftwrapping!
By popular demand, we've now added a free gift wrapping service.
Paul huffed and puffed a bit about doing it because he wanted to 'do it properly' but its done and he did do it properly. You can add free gift wrapping to any item in your order at the checkout and specify a gift tag that will be hand written and attached to the gift. We use very tasteful recyclable coloured kraft paper and paper raffia ribbon to top it off.
We've also been reviewing and looking at a lot of toy puzzles and games over the past few months. We've added a few of the very best ones to our selection. We love picture jisgaw puzzles but wont be stocking any traditional puzzles (although I was very tempted by some of the wooden ones). The trouble is that the fun they provide is just too short lived. Once you've done a puzzle it tends to get put away and forgotten... But we do love doing them that one time so we've come up with a solution...
Free jigsaw puzzles!
We're doing our very own jigsaws as free downloads that you or your child can do on your computer! We looked at a lot of online puzzles and have chosen what we think is the best way to give you a puzzle that is not too big to download but that looks great and is easy for anyone of any age to play. The easy puzzles are great for young children and they are a big help in getting used to moving a mouse around. Our first theme is mostly Australian animals (they are all our own photographs) and we'll be adding more soon.
They really are free jigsaw puzzles with no strings attached and no nasty adverts or banners getting in the way of the fun.
Let us know if you like them and what themes or content you'd like to see in future!
Growing pains...
We had to move our online service to a larger server system to cope with increased traffic to our site. Unfortunately our web hosting service mucked up our security certificate in the process so quite a few people got an 'invalid security certificate' error when using our membership or payment services. This has been fixed.
Sorry if it affected you!
PayPal lets you pay without an account!
A few people have asked us if we can let them pay directly using a credit card. You can! We use PayPal because its very secure and has great facilities and you do not need to have a PayPal account - you can pay with your credit card just like you would at any other online store. We do not store your credit card details so there is absolutely no risk of theft of your information from our databases. Just click on the Pay now button and follow the instructions. Read more...
Soon to arrive....
Lots more Quadrilla!! Finally!
After a long period of unavailability, our favourite marble run Quadrilla is finally coming back!
We have available now on our site - Quadrilla Kindy sets. These are another great Quadrilla product that differs from the popular 'Twist' set by having a marble storer and 3 different sized 'twist' elements and straight rails instead of curves which allows expansions to be added that horde marbles and let them go all at once to shrieks of delight from the kids (and the dads too!). It also has robust, laminated instruction pages for durability.
The good old 'Twist' and 'Basic' sets will be back at the beginning of November and new to Australia the 'Twist and Rail' set will be making an appearance too!
Musical instruments...
We have all heard that listening to and playing music helps develop a childs intelect. That is why we have a great new range of Musical instruments that will be arriving next month. These are actual tuned musical instruments, not just toys so are a good progression from the musical toys for the child aged 6+.
The guitar is made by the famous 'Washburn' guitar manufacturers and is specially designed for little people.
There will be a xylophone, recorder, acoustic guitar and a six piece percussion kit. All the instuments have the added appeal of being able to personalise them with the painting kits that are included. This gives children a greater sense of ownership of their instrument and the incentive to use it more often!
Of course there is still our fabulous range of wooden board games, great for a sweltering hot day (they're back around here already!)
New brain teasers
We now have in stock for the older child to adults a range of plantation teak puzzles made in Thailand and metal puzzles made in Australia. They range in level from 2(easy) - 8(very hard) and make great gifts for those hard to buy for parent/ grandparent or teen. I've watched many a teen at stalls I've held over the past 3 months totally engrossed in these puzzles for up to half an hour!
The benefit these puzzles have are to inhance your observational and memory skills, and they're just great fun too!
There's something for everyone at Thinking Toys!
If you like what you see on our website please let other people know! Some great parenting forums are available at www.naturalparenting.com.au/ , www.kidspot.com.au/ and www.theparentingsanctuary.com.au.
- Think Fun - for all the family
- Think Smart - exercise for the brain
- Think Environment - sustainably made products
Play is the best way to effectively learn and train your brain!
Keep having fun!
PS: I hope you have enjoyed this news letter. If you don't want to receive any more, just reply to me with 'unsubscribe' in the subject and I'll take you off the list.
PPS: Please forward this on to anyone you know who might be interested!
