My daughter loves colouring and I have always tried to encourage her "creativity". However over the years, I have become fed up with buying box after box of wax crayons which, after a few hours of general use, end up either broken, melted or on one occasion, trodden into the carpet. So whilst shopping in WH Smiths I bought a pack of Crayola Twistables in the hope that my daughter could still enjoy colouring without the waste and mess.

The pack of 12 Twistables cost £2.49, which initially seemed quite expensive when compared to the price of standard crayons, but having tried them out I feel are well worth the extra outlay.

The pack I bought contained a good selection of vibrant coloured crayons which can be stored in the re-useable vinyl case they come packaged in. The crayons themselves consist of a thin stick of wax, about the same length as a pencil, encased in a protective plastic tube.

To use, simply twist the end of the barrel to propel the crayon and begin colouring. The wax stick is about three times the size of a normal crayon and lasts for quite a long time, with the transparent barrel allowing you to see how much wax is left inside. After use, the wax stick can be retracted inside the tube to preserve it.

In my opinion, Twistables are much better than ordinary crayons because they don't break during normal use, there is no waste due to sharpening them, no annoying peel-off paper or cross-contamination of the colours inside the storage box and best of all, there is no mess.

My only criticism lies in the fact that during use, the tip of the crayon becomes quite flat and rounded making detailed edging and precision colouring quite difficult. An ordinary crayon would simply be sharpened to a point, but this doesn't appear possible with Twistables without over-propelling the wax stick, which could result in it snapping.

In conclusion, I would say that Crayola Twistables are very practical, good quality crayons which represent excellent value for money.