KiwiCo Solve With Me Review 18-24 Months
The KiwiCo Solve With Me box is a comprehensive collection of activities designed to help little ones develop shape recognition, problem-solving, and fine motor skills between ages 18 and 24 months. In our experience, while the sheer variety of included items is impressive, the broad age range of the box means some components might not feel perfectly targeted for a child’s specific developmental stage.
What Does the KiwiCo Solve With Me Box Actually Include?
The box contains several components designed to hit different developmental milestones. The kit includes:
- Squishy Shapes: These soft, fuzzy shapes are intended to help little ones learn shapes and stimulate their senses through touch.
- Beanbag Shapes: These are meant for children to throw around, again focusing on learning different shapes (circle, triangle, square).
- Poppy’s Shape Search Book: A book designed for reading with a child that focuses on identifying various shapes.
- Beyond the Crate Activities: These cards suggest activities using items not included in the box, such as:
- Pipe Cleaner Party: Requires pipe cleaners and a colander for play.
- Lacing Beads: Uses wooden pieces and a string to practice bilateral coordination.
- Peg Puzzle: Wooden pieces that fit onto pegs, presented in a sequence of one, two, and three.
The kit also comes with a magazine detailing how to use each toy to its full potential.
How Well Did These Toys Hold My Son’s Attention (At 21 Months)?
Since my son was 21 months old when we tested this, it was helpful to see how the toys played out in real time, as he falls in the middle of the 18 to 24 month range.
- Squishy Shapes: My son didn’t show much interest in these soft shapes on their own. They were more engaging when he wore the circle piece like a hat.
- Beanbag Shapes: Similar to the squishy shapes, these didn’t keep his attention for long; he threw them around maybe once or twice just for reference.
- Combining Shapes: A more interesting play pattern emerged when we combined the squishy shapes and the beanbag shapes, using the beanbags to fit into the middle of the squishy shapes for matching games.
- Peg Puzzle: This was a huge hit and my son’s favorite toy from the box. It is great for learning shapes, color, and problem-solving, especially because each peg only fits a specific shape, reinforcing matching.
- Lacing Beads: This is noted as a great way to start developing bilateral coordination. It requires holding a bead steady with one hand while threading a string, which takes focus.
- Poppy’s Shape Search Book: This book is fun to read aloud. We noted that books using real images to teach numbers, colors, and shapes might be better for education than the Poppy’s specific book.
What Alternatives Are Available on Amazon?
To see if we could recreate the experience without the box, I researched alternatives.
- Sensory Shapes: I found water beads sensory shaped toys on Amazon for $11.99, which covered a sensory aspect similar to the squishy shapes.
- Beanbag Alternatives: I found an alternative on Amazon for $18.99 that offered more shapes and, interestingly, recommended an age of 3 and up—suggesting beanbag toys might be better suited for older kids.
- Peg Puzzle Alternatives: While I found a couple of different peg puzzles on Amazon, none had pegs that matched the shape of the puzzle piece. However, I did find a peg puzzle for $12.99 that featured different amounts of pegs for different shapes.
- Threading Toys: As an alternative to the lacing beads, I found a threading toy for $10.99.
If we bought all the Amazon items mentioned to recreate this box, the total cost would be $60.95, which is about 1.5 times more expensive than the cost of the KiwiCo box itself.
The Final Verdict
The KiwiCo Solve With Me box offers good overall value, and the inclusion of the peg puzzle was a definite highlight for my son (see also our review of the older KiwiCo Number Play Crate). However, the major drawback is the wide age range (18–24 months), which makes the toys feel a bit too broad. A child playing with this box at 18 months will likely have a different experience than one at 24 months.
The box is worth the price for the variety, but the items could be significantly better if KiwiCo narrowed down the age range of each specific box to perhaps just three to four months.
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