Have you seen those infomercials on TV for Wuggles? They are little stuffed pets that you “bring to life” by stuffing them with a special stuffing machine.
The theme song gets stuck in my head everytime I hear the commercial.
Here is the commercial I am referring to. If you are reading this via e-mail you can see the commercial here, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6jpB4KsIp14.
Whenever I saw the commercial I was a bit skeptical about the fluffing machine (for lack of a better description). It’s actually called the Fun Filled Factory, but stuffing machine seems better (more descriptive). From the commercials it just didn’t seem like the fluffing machine would work like it does in the commercial.
I was sent a Wuggle Pets kit to try out and review. Now I could put the fluffing machine to the test.
The Wuggle Pets kit comes with two plush animal “skins” (dog and unicorn), the Fun Filled Factory (aka “fluffing machine”), baggies filled with little paper stars, birth certificates, two bags of stuffing and paper personality “charms”.
To make a Wuggle Pet you first need to open up the Fun Filled Factory (stuffing machine) and put 1/2 of a bag of stuffing inside of it. Next you open up a bag of the stars and sprinkle them on the stuffing in the machine. Top them off with the remaining stuffing.
The next thing you do is take your Wuggle Pet and put the opening on it’s back onto the nozzle for the machine. I had a hard time getting the dog to fit. It turns out the zipper in the back was not down far enough. I took the zipper tool (included) and pulled down the zipper. It then fit on the nozzle OK.
While holding the Wuggle Pet skin in place, slowly crank the machine. You’ll notice the stuffing being “grabbed” by the spiral piece inside and move the stuffing into the pet.
You are suppose to keep turning the dial until all the stuffing come out into the pet skin. I found that some of it became stuck so I had to open the lid and push it down a bit with my hand. Then the spiral piece caught the rest of the stuffing.
After you Wuggle Pet is stuffed you are to carefully remove it from the machine. Both times we did this stuffing came shooting out the back of the pet. What we ended up doing was putting that stuffing aside until we were ready to close up the Wuggle Pet.
Once you remove the Wuggle Pet from the machine you are to move the stuffing that is inside of it around until it’s shaped the way you want it to be. Next you take a personality “charm” and insert it into the back of the Wuggle Pet. This is suppose to give your pet it’s personality.
After we put the personality charm into it’s back we took the stuffing that fell out of it back into the plush skin. We then took our fingers and moved the stuffing around until it was stuffed the way we liked it (my kids were helping me to make these).
Once your pet is the way you like it you take the included zipper tool and zipper up the back of the pet to close it up. There is no sewing required.
The first Wuggle Pet took several minutes to make because we weren’t sure what we were doing. The second Wuggle Pet literally took just a couple of minutes. Once you know what you are doing it’s really easy to do.
Each Wuggle Pet comes with an attached clip so that your child can attach it to a backpack, tote bag or any place else they would like to clip it to. You can also cut the clip off if you want with a pair of scissors.
The Wuggle Pet Starter Kit sells for $19.99. Additional Wuggle Pets can be purchased separelty. I’m not sure of their retail price but I have seen them selling for $5.99 – $14.00 on Amazon and $9.99 on the Toys R Us website.
I don’t think you necessarily need the Fun Filled Factory to make the Wuggle Pets. You could easily stuff them by hand. They are not hard to stuff at all. Even a small child could stuff them by hand. I think the Fun Filled Factory just makes it more exciting for little children.
Overall I think it’s a cute idea. Children love to make their own little plush friends. You can easily add to this experience by having your child do things like kiss the personality charm before putting it in the Wuggle Pet, or make a wish on the bag of Magic Stars before adding them into the stuffing. The possibilities are endless.
A very young child might need help with this. I think a child 5 or 6 and older should be able to do it on their own, but they might need a parent’s help with the first Wuggle Pet they make.
Making Wuggle Pets would be a fun birthday party idea. It’s a party favor that guests can “make and take” with them. I like that idea. If my kids were younger I’d certainly consider it.
For more information about Wuggle Pets visit www.WugglePets.com. You can also find them on Facebook (www.Facebook.com/WugglePets) and Twitter (www.Twitter.com/WugglePets). They also have a blog (www.WugglePetsBlog.com) and a YouTube page (www.YouTube.com/WugglePets).
Kimberly
*I received a free product sample in order to do this review. There was no compenstation. The opinion expressed is my own.
This is a cute idea. But you’re right. I’ll probably get the pets only and set out a few choices of confetti shapes and scrap book tags and stuffing and let the kids stuff away for my daughter’s 4th birthday. I love the horse and unicorn.
im soo glad you decided to review this, i’ve been seeing the commercials and was skeptical and i actually thought i would have to sew the back of it. good to know its worth it before i purchase thank you!
I love this…this be so good for kids going to school for the first time. then if the child gets lonely it can squeeze it and hear a positive message!