Rarely do I get excited by any products designed for kids or for their parents. Usually they are cheap, poorly made, really badly implemented or just plain a waste of money. I can’t count the number of things we thought we needed before Wesley was born that we can live without. Or things that seem like a good idea, but just don’t pan out. The ear thermometer fits into that last category. It seems like a great idea. A thermometer that registers almost instantly. What they don’t tell you is that it hurts like crazy when you use it properly and even if you do jam it in there far enough you’ll get different results every time you use it. So basically its painful, expensive and a waste of time.
Now Amber and I have been looking at this Frog Pod thing by Boon, Inc for a while. It is cute, but not cutesie and we both like it. Basically it is a plastic frog that hangs on your bathroom wall. It holds your kids’ bath toys. Lots of painful plastic toys in the bottom of a tub is a problem all of the time. But when you work really early in the morning like I do it is worse. Wesley and I share a tub so that I don’t wake Amber and Jillian in the morning. I’ve spent the last couple of months at the new house and the last couple of years at the old houses stepping on and kicking out of my a ton of toys that “float or sink”. The Frog Pod is just a beautifully designed, well executed, relatively affordable and practical piece of equipment.
It sticks to your wall in one of three ways. Using either the included suction cups, the included double sided tape, or optional screw mount. The frog is made of three pieces. A mount for the wall, a frog body that slides onto the wall mount and a basket that you use to scoop up the toys. and forms the frog’s back. The mounting is easy and they even include an alcohol wipe to clean the area first. I started with the suction cups assuming that it would fall off, but wanting to give it a shot before using the tape which would have been a ton of work to remove. I assumed it would come crashing down in the middle of the first night sending me flying out of bed like this fellow. Instead it has been on for better than a week even with Wesley’s help picking up the toys.
Once you have the your mounting bracket in place, you just slide the frog’s body on. Nothing but gravity holds them together, but it seems to work pretty well. The body has never fallen down. The frog’s head is away from the wall making a hidden shelf you could use for shampoo or cups or whatever. Very nice. The toes also stick away from the wall. We use it to hang wet wash clothes so they get dry and not smelly. Also very nice. See what I mean? This thing is very well designed.
Finally you have the basket. It doesn’t seem that large, but actually holds all of the standard toys Wesley plays with. If he had any more toys in the tub we wouldn’t need water it would just be a ball pit like they have at Chuck E. Cheese. The basket has some nice large holes in it to quickly drain the water out and a good sturdy handle. You can actually scoop up most of the toys in one go by herding them around the tub a little. The only problem that I’ve encountered is that the basket is a little difficult to slide onto the body. If the scoop is full it usually takes me an extra try or two, but it always go.
We bought the Frog Pod for about $25. Worth every penny.
Boon, Inc: http://www.booninc.com/frog.html
Amazon.com: Boon Frog Pod
