Review: Wicked Uncle

What do kids like, anyway?

8 years ago if you’d have asked me that question, I’d probably have come up with the answer ‘train sets and whoopee cushions’. Because, kids do like those don’t they? I know I did as a kid. But the ‘hello, happy birthday, here is a whoopee cushion’ thing does get a bit tired once you’ve done it three years in a row.

As a person with children of my own, I now know better. But what if you are that person I was 8 years ago? How do you know what to get for a child that they’d really, really like?

Wicked Uncle wrote to me and suggested they have the answer. A website filled with wonderful, fun filled things for children of all ages – with the ability to sort them by age, category, gender, or a mixture of the three. ‘Would you like a bit of money to spend on the site?’ they said ‘so you can see how it works for yourself?’.

Well, hell yes I would! There are some things on there I would like for me, never mind the kids! But…as I said earlier, I do have kids now, and now I know better.

So I sent the gift voucher code to my brother, ‘Uncle Star’ instead. And asked him to see what he could come up with.

I had absolutely NO idea what he would come up with.

We awaited the arrival of the postman, and I was as intrigued as the kids!

Uncle Star is in his twenties, with no kids of his own and absolutely no intention of having kids of his own at any point in the near or probably even distant future. It took him several years to even go near mine – every time my Mum cajoled him to give his nephew or nieces a hug I recognised in him the horror I myself felt 8 years ago when presented with a small wiggly child. The horror mostly borne out of the ‘what the hell do I do now’ reflex that comes from having absolutely no idea about or nothing to do with kids, since you were a kid yourself.

He accepted the challenge, anyway, and I asked him (once he told me he had successfully chosen and sent ‘something’) how he found the whole experience. And this is what he said:

Have an Add to Basket as well as Buy it Now option
Very easy to use, search and select toys for the right gender, age group and style of toys.
Good selection. A couple of things I would have liked! Good options with gift wrap and greeting card on checkout. No option to use voucher if you click Pay with Paypal initially. Had to go back and click pay with debit / credit card to find the voucher code option.

I’m guessing from that he was pleased with how it went. (and also, now I have a couple ideas of what to get him for HIS birthday! So perhaps it isn’t even just a site for confused Uncles!)

Then…a couple of days later, the parcel arrived.

As you can see, the kids were pretty happy!

I don’t think Uncle Star could have got it more right.

Seb kept saying ‘you told him I wanted a rocket, didn’t you? You must have, how did he even know?!’

And D was so pleased with her rainbow projector that she fell asleep hugging it. It also comes with a crystal you can attach to the window so that when the sun shines, you get little rainbows dancing around the room in the daytime too!

As an added bonus, the rainbow projector has stopped D from being scared of sleeping in her room with the lights off. She has refused to sleep with the lights off for quite a while now, so we are really pleased that the rainbow projector has helped her to feel safe and secure as well as being something that she absolutely loves generally.

Wicked Uncle really has ticked all the boxes for us – great website, awesome choice, well packaged, and the kids and Uncle Star are all very happy with how everything worked out. The parcel even came with a little postcard that the kids could fill out and send back to him to thank him for their presents 🙂

In fact, all the grown ups are happy – it turns out that the gifts Uncle Star chose aren’t just fun for the kids!

 

Disclosure: We were given £40 to spend at Wicked Uncle in order to allow us to write this review, which was not required to be positive, include rockets or result in adults acting like big kids. I passed the £40 on to Uncle Star, who spent it for us and gave me no clue as to what he had chosen – aside from the feedback from him all thoughts and opinions are my own.