Recommended by Good Housekeeping and Me - Curious George Discovery Game and HyperBlast

In October I began to write reviews of products I had seen at the A Time to Play Holiday Showcase. A couple of weeks ago I was in New York again – this time on a mentoring trip with young women from Saint Vincent Academy in Newark, NJ where I went to high school. It was a wonderful day and we visited the Good Housekeeping Institute where they test products from appliances to toys along with Seventeen magazine and Wave Hill park. It was a wonderful day but that’s a whole different story. I noticed that they had some of the toys I had seen at A Time to Play that were being tested for their Best Toy List in the December issue and here are a couple that I personally checked out at A Time to Play that made the Good Housekeeping 2009 best toy list. GH first tested the toys to meet their own safety standards and any claims made by the manufacturer and then had 50 kids come in to choose their favorites. So these toys meet the requirements for safety and kids loved them. You can’t ask for anymore than that.

In October my first product review was for games made by a small company I Can Do That and I featured a picture of their Busytown game. The Good Housekeeping 2009 best toy list includes the Curious George Discovery Beach Game. This game is part memory challenge and part scavenger hunt. It is designed to promote matching and memory skills, and inspire exploration and discovery. I recommend this whole line of games but here’s the picture of the Curious George Discovery Beach Game.

Read my whole review of I Can Do That games here

I Can Do That! website

See Good Housekeeping's whole list of 2009 best toys



A toy for older children that also caught my eye and is on the Good Housekeeping list is the HyperBlast game from Wild Planet. This is a numbers game that gives players a physical and mental workout – a good alternative to computer games. This reasonably priced, $20 game is for ages 6 and up and there is also a version called 1-2-3 stomp for pre-schoolers. Both of these games look like a lot of fun but my guess is that some grandparents will have trouble keeping up with their grandchildren if they try to play this one together. I mean physically of course not mentally – of course.


I hope you enjoy your holiday shopping and get to play with whatever you get for your grandchildren. Having someone to play with is part of the fun of being a grandparent – Isn’t it?

Don’t forget to add your comments if you get any of these items - I’d love to have your review added to this post.