Kiwi Crate is a subscription box for kids ages 5-8 from parent company KiwiCo. It arrives every month with all the materials and instructions needed to complete 2-3 crafts centered on a theme, plus additional materials to help educate young learners!
KiwiCo offers boxes for different age groups:
- Panda Crate for 0-24-month-olds,
- Koala Crate for 2-4-year-olds,
- Kiwi Crate for 5-8-year-olds,
- Atlas Crate for 6-11-year-olds,
- Doodle Crate and Tinker Crate for 9-16+-year-olds,
- Eureka Crate and Maker Crate for ages 14 and up.
There really is something for every age with this company!
This box was sent to us at no cost for review. (Check out the review process post to learn more about how we review boxes.)
About Kiwi Crate by KiwiCo
The Subscription Box: Kiwi Crate
The Cost: $19.95 per month + free shipping
The Products: Crafts and DIY projects for kids, with supplemental learning kits, booklets, and activities. Crates are filled with materials and inspiration to encourage creativity and curiosity. Projects cover a number of developmental areas through art, science, and imaginative play.
Ships to: The U.S. for free, Canada for $3.95, and worldwide from $4.95-$6.95
KiwiCo Kiwi Crate "Physics Carnival" Review June 2020
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Our theme for this month is Physics Carnival and we received this booklet which contains the directions for our activities. This includes detailed, colored illustrations and clear instructions that are easy to follow. They broke down our project into various sections that simplified the process for us. On the back of the booklet, they include their social media links and a sticker for this month’s project.
This is the little sticker chart that we received in our first Kiwi Crate along with our welcome note that we can add our sticker to!
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Each month you also get a Kiwi Explore! magazine with a letter from Steve the Kiwi and a little comic to go along with the theme starring some cute characters. There were some great ideas for activities at the back that really piqued my daughter's interest such as creating a balancing sculpture. We will definitely be revisiting these ideas for some more fun!
Act 1: Stamped Carnival Scene
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Our first activity was to make our own stamps to create a carnival scene. They provided the carnival scene background, a stamp pad with blue and red ink, some foam stickers, and a short wooden dowel for our stamp stick.
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My daughter added a foam shape to either side of the dowel.
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Then she tested it out on some scrap paper. So simple, and it's a tool we can reuse again and again!
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Making a stamp roller was a bit more involved. She had to add some foam stickers all around the edges of these wooden circles and then put them onto the longer dowel.
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Then it was time to test that out, too.
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With all of her stampers made, it was time to decorate her carnival scene. She may have gotten a little bit messy with this, but it wasn't too difficult to clean up.
Act 2: Balancing Acrobat
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Next, it was time to prepare the acrobats! They provided 3 different outfit options for each of our 2 acrobats. My daughter decorated the outfits with stamps and then placed the sticker over their bodies to dress them.
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Then she added two green foam shapes to the bottom of the acrobats before sticking them onto the top slot of this wooden shape
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We tested it out by placing the center of the shape on our fingers. It was not balanced at all and wouldn't stay so we added these two weights, which felt like heavy erasers, to either side.
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Balance was achieved! So then we tested out what happened when we moved the acrobats back and forth or side to side. This was a fun lesson in trying to keep the balance in the center!
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Then we tried it out by placing the center onto the longer dowel. She had some fun testing it out and was impressed when she could lift it high without it falling. We also did some races around the house with the acrobats balanced on our finger which was pretty fun and trickier than it sounds!
Act 3: Dancing Tumbler
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Our next act was to make a dancing tumbler with just a few items.
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This was very easy to make. She took the paper off of the ends of the green foam shape and then added one of the cardboard pieces to the bottom, put the metal ball in the center, and then placed the other cardboard piece on top.
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Then she added the stickers to either side and it was ready to test out on our green foam board.
Since the ball created some weight inside our shape, it would easily tumble back and forth.
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Then we made it a game seeing how many times she could tumble it back and forth.
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They also provided some rubber bands for us to add to our tumbler so that it would work on other surfaces besides our foam board. We had fun testing it out around the house!
Act 4: Carnival Catapult
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Our next activity was to make a carnival catapult. First, my daughter used one of the little green stickers from the sticker sheet and secured one end of the white and orange strips to the board before putting it through the slots of the wooden piece with one of the orange straws underneath of it. Then she used the large orange rectangle sticker to secure it all.
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Next, she added the two wooden pieces with holes into the larger slots of the orange foam piece. Using the short dowel she stuck it through the hole and then added the first assembled piece and stuck it through the straw and out the other side.
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Then she added stickers to the two wooden arches and placed those next to the arches with holes to hold everything in place.
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At the other end, she placed the other two wooden pieces into the slots and placed the other wooden piece in between them by slipping the ends into the holes.
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Then she placed the yellow foam square with the circle on top of that. This hole is where the foam rainbow ball they provided would sit to be catapulted.
Here you can see how easy it was to operate!
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With our catapult ready, now it was time to make the balancing target. We folded the orange piece along the creases and my daughter used her stamper to decorate both sides of the target. Then she stuck it into the slot in the center of it.
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Then she added these wooden squares to the squares on the bottom of the target to make it balanced. These had adhesive on them so this was another simple task.
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We tested it out to see if it was indeed balanced by trying to knock it over.
Then it was time to play! She set up her target on the floor and began trying to launch the ball at it with her catapult.
Once all of the carnival games were done, the best part was seeing her teach her little brother how to play with everything. They had so much fun running around and trying out all of the different activities she had created. Plus, it kept them busy while I prepared dinner, which is always a great thing!
Verdict: What a fun box! This month's Kiwi Crate was so educational and unique. I loved seeing my daughter learning about balance as she played with the games in our box. The best part was how it really struck her imagination and she shared her games with her brother as they pretended to have their own carnival. I was a little wary at first because I saw that there were so many different little activities within this box, but my daughter was able to complete most of this independently and since everything was so well organized and planned out, the focus was really just on learning and having fun, as it should be!
To Wrap Up:
Can you still get this box if you sign up today? It is possible you might get this crate, but it is not a guarantee. From KiwiCo:
Crates are assigned each month based on availability and your crate history - not all subscribers receive the same theme each month.
Check out all of our Kiwi Crate reviews and more boxes for ages 5-8 in the Kids Subscription Box Directory!
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