Moon Sand Ice Cream set

We love Moon Sand in our house ! I was amazed recently to see on twitter that lots of mums were slagging it off so I went to see why and the criticism was, it's messy. Well, I have to disagree - you just need to be organised. The girls know that Moon Sand is either played with on the patio or they have to first lay down a plastic sheet which can be shaken outside and tidied up in a second. (We always use the Camouflage Company duffel carrier - reviewed here - which doubles up as a great playmat but any plastic sheet or even a blanket would do.) I have honestly never had any Moon Sand to vacuum up ever !

The girls have the Moon Sand Sand Castle set which I love because it can be played with in the inflatable sandbox then instantly closed, folded up and put away until next time. If you haven't got a garden or a nearby park with a sandpit, it's an absolutely fabulous way to let your children experiment with playing in the sand, with the added advantage that you know no dogs have been using it as a toilet. Unlike normal sand, Moon Sand also magically stays permanently moist so you can mould things and even gently move them around once moulded without them breaking. I am constantly amazed to see that whenever I let Juliette play with her Moon Sand on the pavement out at the front of the house, all of the neighbours' kids, both boys and girls, aged between 4 and 10, ALL end up coming over for a play !

I was therefore really excited about receiving the Moon Sand Ice Cream set. It contains various moulds to create ice cream scoops, cones, soft-whip ice cream and fruit (bananas and cherries) as well as three different colours of Moon Sand (white, red and yellow) to allow your kids to create funky, multicoloured, realistic-looking ice creams and desserts. It also has a themed playmat but we still put our really big playmat underneath to make tidying up afterwards a breeze.

The girls had great fun making desserts and playing shops and I even let 15-month-old Pierre have a little play, safe in the knowledge that if he decided to try eating some (don't all kids ?!) it's totally non-toxic and, unlike the sand in the sandpit in the park or at the beach, totally free of doggy doo or broken glass ! (I should point out that it is recommended for children aged 3 years and up.) The colours will probably end up getting all mixed up together (you can avoid this if you're really careful and delicately separate all the moulded shapes before they break) but that's no worse than Play-doh or Plasticine and at least the sand never dries out so it can be reused over and over again.

It's a bit more expensive than other modelling clay-type products but if you take into account the fact that they always end up in the bin when they dry out, invariably get yucky bits of dog hair rolled into them and take ages to get out from under nails or scraped off the carpet, Moon Sand is actually a good value and relatively parental nightmare-free creative play product that the kids will love.

star rating : 5/5

RRP : £9.99

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Moon Dough Barn