LeapFrog, How Do I Love Thee?

I first realized the depth of my affection the moment I saw the email's subject line: "LeapFrog loves your site!" I'm not proud about it, but I squealed. It was just a little squeal, but still.

A LeapFrog representative wanted to know if I would review a few of their new toys. After jumping up and down a few times and yelling "woo-hoo," I told her that, certainly, I would be willing to do that. I guess it's kind of pathetic that I got so excited about a toy company. Thank God people don't send luxury items for me to review. I might, like, blow a tube.

The rep was kind enough to let me choose which toys to review. I chose the LeapStart Learning Table for Ava, and a Leapster L-Max for the boys. Mostly because we already own every other LeapFrog toy in existence. Seriously.

Learn & Groove Musical Table: We own two other activity tables, so I never considered buying LeapFrog's version. What I didn't know about this table is that it's more of a musical toy than a typical baby/toddler play table. Ava became immediately enthralled with this toy. When either of her brothers came within 3 feet of it, she would screech until he backed away for fear of his ear drum exploding. This marked the first time she ever showed an inability to share. So, thanks, LeapFrog, for setting that developmental stage off so nicely. Also, just yesterday she picked the entire table up off the floor in a successful effort to get it away from John, giving her some muscle toning as well. I think what they call that is "multi-fine-gross-motor-musical-sensory-development." Or something.

In the center of the table, there's a book with one page. Turning the page switches all the buttons and doohickeys from singing and chatting about colors, numbers and the alphabet to playing music, with piano, banjo, trombone, drums, bongo and other traditional music box sounds. There's even a box that contains a tiny, invisible and talented jazz singer. It's truly amazing.

In fact, the first few times Ava played with it while I was in another room, I thought a jazz singer had popped over for afternoon warm ups, or that Reading Rainbow was featuring Charlie Parker Played Be Bop. What I'm saying, not so eloquently, is that much of the music has a jazz bent and it all sounds great. If you have other LeapFrog toys, you may think you know what I mean. But this sounds even smoother than, say, the Fridge Phonics and the Phonics Radio, which both sound pretty good in their own right. If you want to buy a baby a musical, educational toy that won't cause her parents to hate you, this one's hard to beat.

Leapster L-Max: What can I say about the Leapster that you don't already know? Does every person on the planet under age 10 own one already? Well, I held off getting Leapsters for my boys because I didn't yet own an MP3 player myself, and it would have just been wrong for them to have more take-a-long technology than I did. However, Brian bought me an MP3 player and then of course Leapster sent me one free of charge, so I sprung for a second one at 20 percent off and now the boys can Leap with the best of them. The thing that sold me on the Leapster is that the games are educational and the graphics are pretty spectacular, especially to someone like me who was so impressed with her Little Professor as a youth. Leapster also has plenty of games to choose from for all different ages and skill levels. If your little one has a favorite superhero or three, Leapster has those as well. Except Leapster Land, the bad guys mispell words rather than trying to kill off the human race, and BatMan fights crime using long division and multiplication. Also, I've noticed the Leapster games go on sale at half price a few times a year.

The other thing I will tell you, but not my husband, is that our Leapsters have been dropped. So far, no loose parts flail about inside when we move them and, most importantly, they still work. Although don't drop yours to test my theory. They are sturdy, but they're not bouncing balls.

Finally, owning a few Leapsters has given Brian and me the power to make our boys sit down and be quiet. Statue-like, even. There are certain pivotal life moments during which we either have to tie the boys up and gag them or give them a coma-inducing drug so that we can accomplish something. For instance, during a two-hour car ride when the whining and the fighting could cause Brian or me to have a coronary event. Or during a recent night wedding where the kids' meals arrived 20 minutes before the adult meals, so that without the crucial 15-minutes of Leapster play at the table, Brian and I would have had to take turns eating our chicken cordon bleu. I wasn't crazy about letting them play Leapsters at a wedding reception but, hey, I was hungry, and wanted to have a civilized meal despite being in public with my boys at 9pm. What I'm saying, again not so eloquently, is that the Leapsters give us the flexibility of a handheld gaming toy, without having to submit to the mindless and often violent Game Boy genre, which we want to delay for as long as humanly possible, like, forever. (Yeah, I know. It's invevitable. Don't tell me.)

LeapFrog gave me these toys several months ago, and I feel kind of bad that it's taken me this long to post a review. However, having owned the toys for .... um, gosh .... six months, allows me to give you a more valuable review, because every new toy's great for the first few weeks! The play table has been in my family room for the entire time, and John and Ava still play with it. The Leapsters, like I said, have withstood my boys' abuse and held their attention at pivotal moments of MY life, turning hellish parenting moments to peaceful ones. I heartily recommend both toys.