A review of the Hey Doodle reusable colouring mat. For full disclaimer please see the end of the post.
Any parent of young children who enjoy drawing and colouring will know that you always seem to end up with a mountain of paper in your home that you’re simply not allowed to throw away. Half drawn masterpieces. Colouring sheets that aren’t necessarily good enough to hang on the wall, but that the youngest members of the household insists you hang on to. There’s a bookcase in our kitchen that seems to collect paper like this. Paper that frequently ends up causing an avalanche across the kitchen table. Usually just as we’re about to sit down for a meal. I was therefore intrigued when asked to review a new solution to this problem from Hey Doodle. A reusable colouring mat.
Hey Doodle Mini Mat
We were sent an A4 sized mat which Hey Doodle refer to as their “mini mat”. There are several different designs available and we received the Sugar and Spice one which features fairies, unicorns and mermaids. There are also the numbers 1 to 5 on the mat next to the names of things to spot in those quantities. The set also comes with three pens – in this case coloured, red, yellow and purple.
The mat and pens come in a sturdy cardboard tube with the mat rolled up inside.
Cleaning the mat
The Hey Doodle mats are made of silicon meaning that they sit really nicely and flat on a table surface and don’t move around when a little one tries to draw or colour on them. To clean the mat all you need is a damp cloth. I found that you need to apply a little bit of pressure when wiping for all the pen to come off, but the mat does go back to being completely clean and there is no evidence of any residual marks or colour staining. Also, when the pens are used on it they don’t rub or smear at all, which is a real bonus over drawing on a whiteboard or similar.
Limited colours
Our four year old daughter loved colouring on the mats and when she’d finished turned it over and started drawing herself on the reverse side of it. The only negative that we found was the fact that the mats only come with three coloured pens. My daughter was really keen to use some other colours, especially as the pictures on the tube it came in were in more than three colours, but I simply didn’t know what type of pens I should be looking for to add to her colour collection. I wonder if it might be better to add a couple more pens to the set and up the price by a pound or so to cover it?
Hey Doodle – what we thought
We really liked the Hey Doodle colouring mat that we were sent to review. As a parent I liked the fact that it didn’t slip on a table surface and was easy to clean afterwards. I also really appreciated the sturdy cardboard tube it comes in which is easy to slip into a rucksack or day bag when out and about. My daughter enjoyed colouring the pictures on it and her only real gripe was the limited pen colour range.
Where to buy Hey Doodle Products
Hey Doodle is an Australian brand, but they have a UK website that you an order from if you’re in the UK with free shipping. There are also some of their products available via Amazon here.
Disclaimer: We were sent a Hey Doodle mini mat for the purposes of this review. All opinions remain my own. Some of the links in this post are Amazon affiliate links. If you click through to Amazon from any of these links and make a purchase it will cost you no more than if you went there yourself, but I will receive a small amount of commission. Thank you for any purchases you do make.
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