My youngest daughter was bought this by her Great-Grandmother for her first birthday and as soon as I saw the box displaying Fisherprice I expected this to be a great educational toy.

Availability

I haven't actually seen the toy in many places and with it being a present I don't know where it was purchased from however I have looked it up on the internet for the purpose of this review and you can buy the toy for £15.99 from Amazon which I think seems about the right price for a childrens educational toy like this.

Packaging

The toy came packaged in a cardboard box which was open at the front which means you can have a play with it before you buy it, personally I always think this is a good idea as you can get an idea of what the toy can do. The toy was secured from the bottom with plastic cable ties so it was simply a case of untwisting them to get the toy out which is easy enough to do, inside the box along with the toy was an instruction manual although instructions are not really necessary.

The Toy

The toy is made to look like a lantern hence the name of it, the main body of the lantern is green in colour and there is a moveable carry handle which is purple, on the side of the lantern is an orange little butterfly which can be moved up and down the side and makes a clicking noise as it moves. The top of the lantern has a bright orange button which is used to bring the lantern to life when it is turned on and the front of the lantern is bright yellow and lights up once it is turned on, the yellow has a big smiley face on it which to me looks really cheeky and fun. The final bit of the toy is a roller on the front right at the bottom which shows night time pictures on one side such as the moon and stars and daytime pictures on the other which are the sun and a couple of bright butterflies.

The toy is aimed for children who are aged 6 months and up over which I think is probably about the correct age as a child this age would be able to play with the toy although your child will probably get more from the toy the older they get. The toy has two different volume levels which is a great option in my opinion especially as I have two young children who both like to have noisy toys going at the same time so our house is always full of noise. The toy requires 3 AA batteries which we haven't had to change since September so I think the battery life of this toy is pretty good, when you do need to change the batteries they are under a panel at the back of the toy which is secured with a screw so a screwdriver is required which generally all disappear in our house as soon as one is needed.

Functions

There are three different functions for this toy which are controlled by a small sliding button at the bottom right hand side of the toy, the button is small and in a place that a young child wouldn't realise it was there or even be able to use it of their own accord. The functions are night time, learning time and music time and when you move the button along it will tell you which function you are on in a really cutesy voice.

When on the night time function the toy is quite calming, when you spin the roller you get some little animal noises which are a frog which my daughter tries to copy which I find really funny, a cricket and an owl. When you press the bright orange button the toy will play Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star, play a snoring sound and the voice says night night and plays the sounds of night all together. This setting is really quite soothing although I haven't let my daughter have this toy to sooth her as I don't want to encourage her to need something for soothing as the dummy is going to be bad enough to get rid off. This function doesn't seem to be my daughters favourite which I think is because it is too calm for her as she is a pretty hyper noisy toddler.

When you turn the slider to learning time and roll the roller at the bottom the toy plays four songs the first is called Hear the Cricket which I had never heard of but is basically about different animal sounds that you may hear, the second song it plays is peekaboo I see you which again is not a song i've heard before, there's a third song encourages your child to count to ten and the fourth song is about colours and points out that the sky is blue. All the songs are sang in the same really cutesy voice from before which I find annoying after a while although the songs are all pretty catchy and my daughter dances to them. When playing in this function the orange button on the top is used to turn the lanterns light on or off, when you are pressing it it tells your child the opposites of what is happening so when the light comes on you have hello, lights on or simply on and when the light turns of you get goodbye, lights off or simply off. I think this is quite a sweet idea but don't feel my daughter has learnt anything from the button.

The final function is music time which as you would expect is different music, the roller at the bottom plays the tune of Home on the Range and Do Yours Ears Hang Low which I find to be quite strange tunes for a childs toy but my daughter loves the tunes and dances along with them, it is easy for her to set the songs off herself too which is great as I am not getting a toy flung at me every ten seconds when the song ends. The orange button on the top plays a song about all the little animals you may see if you go outside such as dragonflies and butterflies, there is a second seong which explains the sun is up in the morning and in the afternoon but when the night comes you see the moon. I like how this toy teaches your child through song and they don't even realise they are taking in new information.

Our Opinions

I would never have expected there to be a toy which teaches your child about what they will find at night time but this toy does just that, I like the look of the toy as it is friendly and has little extra such as a frog hidden at the bottom front and little caterpillar hiding on the back of the toy. The toy has catchy tunes and songs and my daughter enjoys dancing to them, I'm sure she will sing them in time but she is slow at speaking so singing may be a little too advanced just yet. Emily is able to select the toys she wants to play with from the way her toys are set out and she will often select this toy and she likes rolling the roller at the front and she likes to cuddle the toy although I have no idea as to why. This toy is very durable and has been dropped and thrown many time yet there is no damage to the toy and it still works perfectly. Emily loves the fact that she can carry this toy around by the handle and will walk around with it for ages putting it down to do something else and then picking it back up again when she is finished. I will rate this toy 4 stars out of 5 as I find the voice and songs a little annoying after a while and feel there could have been further scope with this toy with numbers and colours.