I loved playing with mold-able, colorful dough as a child, and still do (how could you not?), and while my job as a toy industry journalist makes it socially acceptable for me to continue to do so, it is even more enjoyable when I can bring that fun home and share it with my daughter. Lena, the Toy Insider Kid, had a blast with Rose Art‘s Princess & Ponies Magic Fun Dough. SO much fun, in fact, that it has been out on our kitchen table because it’s all set up with the characters she created and she plays with it several times a day. So we eat dinner around it. No big deal.
There are a lot of factors that go into making this a lot of fun for her (and for me) to play with. The first, is that it comes with 35 Magic Art Transfers, which are basically temporary tattoos. Lena loves the simple process of “tattooing” a piece of dough and turning it into a princess, or a frog, or a jewel, etc. You simply apply water with the included applicator, press it gently, and then peel the paper away to reveal the art. You can then cut it out with the included dough knife and shape cutters. It comes with four display stands so that you can stand your new characters up and play with them on the castle play set, which features dough molds. Lena loves the spinning feature on the castle, where you can place a character and turn the crank to spin them around. It also includes a wishing well dough extruder, which keeps Lena very busy making us various shapes of dough. (Which shape do you want next, Mom?!) The set includes four containers of dough in purple, blue, pink, and white.
RoseArt also offers a offers a Fairy Tea Party play set, as well as a similar style play set geared more toward boys, called Volcano Valley.