BenSpark Family Adventures

  Photo-A-Day 2.0 #01384 I received a new shipment of products from Funko to unbox. I am very excited about them all but most about the G.I. Joe one because there are 7 mystery items inside that box. Marvel pocket Pop figures are cute but why two Groot figures? One would suffice. And I am a big fan of Letterkenny and the two pack with Stewart and Roald is awesome! I just have to find the one with Jonesy and Reilly to have all of the characters that have been released. Unboxings on the way.

  Photo-A-Day 2.0 #01377 We celebrated Eva’s birthday today at King Richard’s Faire. When I told her that we were offered tickets again this year, thank you for the free tickets King Richard’s Faire!, and I suggested her birthday would be the day we could go she was very excited. she began to work on a costume right then and there. she decided that she would be a pirate for the day. When we arrived there was a tall wizard in the entrance and I had the kids take a photo with him. We also took a photo for a guy dressed as a wizard for him. We then watched the King and the court talk about the things that were going on in the realm today. Our friend Ryan is the Town Crier and he introduces different acts who then go and do a little plug for their respective shows. while we were waiting there my cousin texted me to let me know that he was in the parking lot and we let him know where we were. Then, we never saw him all day. I got a text or two but the internet there is terrible so we ne...

  If you are a teacher of kids from grades 4-6 or 6-8 Wizards of the Coast has created a new initiative to provide educational materials for teachers so that they can incorporate Dungeons and Dragons into their lesson plans. This is very exciting and so useful, too. It also comes out to coincide with a brand new starter set being released.. Dungeons and Dragons is very popular with many celebrities playing it and it being featured in some very popular TV shows. Kids are learning more and more about it but they may have never played before. There are many benefits from playing and many educational moments to learn from while playing. This initiative will even provide schools, libraries and community centers and enrichment organizations with D&D Afterschool Kits that will include everything to start D&D clubs and meetups. I have a full press release below with all the information on the initiative. I would also like to point you towards the website where you can download many...

  Photo-A-Day 2.0 #01358 I received a free copy of The Art of the National Parks: Coloring Book to check out and review. Opinions are my own. I am a big fan of coloring books. I love having some colored pencils or crayons to use to just put color on paper and enjoy losing myself in the activity. I also like nature and have been to a few National Parks. This is one fantastic coloring book, not only in the content but the physical book itself. When I first opened it up I was immediately impressed. For one thing when you open up the book the spine lays flat and the pages lay flat so you do not have to keep the left side down with your hand like you normally do with most books. The back cover it a thick hard cardboard, too so you have something firm to color upon. This is perfect. The content is also phenomenal. There are 63 pages to color and 63 pages of information on the parks. So you have the coloring page on the right side and a description of the park on the left side. It is real...

  Photo-A-Day 2.0 #01338 I was given a free Twinkly Line starter Kit (affiliate link) to review. Opinions are my own.My Office is full of all sorts of fun lighting effects. I have two of my LEGO sets lit up, I have a light up Game Over sign, I have a bookshelf that I made specifically for my Skylanders that has special lighting in it as well. When I was asked if I’d like to check out a Twinkly product I was more than happy to give it a shot. The Twinkly Line is a 5 foot long sleek, premium, all-black smart LED strip with an adhesive and magnetic back. I could affix it directly to my wall under some of my Funko Pop figures or I could create something new with a blank wall. I decided to create something new. My office has this sloped wall that was unused. I decided that I would take my Hot Wheels character cars and put them on the wall using Command Strips. I’d also place a length of Hot Wheels track on the wall as well. Then I’d put the Twinkly Line on the track, sort of like the mi...

  Photo-A-Day 2.0 #01326 Playmobil sent me a free Knight Rider set to unbox and review. Opinions are my own. When I was a kid I was huge into Knight Rider. I never missed an episode and loved the stories of Michael Knight and his intelligent car, K.I.T.T.. Their adventures each week were such fun where the good guy took care of the bad ones to protect innocent people. There was a big theme of this to the 80’s shows like Knight Rider and The A-Team. And now I have Playmobil toys from both of these shows. Amazing. My 10 year old self would be so jealous! I made an unboxing video of the set that you can see below.

  Photo-A-Day 2.0 #01314 I was sent a BEZGAR RC Truck for free to check out and review. Opinions are my own. I love Remote Control toys. I love flying my drone and also playing with remote control cars and trucks. I recently got myself a really fast one for my birthday and it is so much fun to run around. well, the folks from BEZGAR must have known what I like because they offered me a remote control truck to check out and I jumped at it. Now I can race along with Andy or Andy and Dylan can race each other with really fast fun vehicles. I took this truck to the Cape and made a review video. You can see that below. If that looks like something you would like then please consider using my Amazon.com affiliate link below to order one for yourself. I am very pleased with mine.

  Photo-A-Day 2.0 #01310 I received the Wood Cabin Retro House for free from Funwhole. Opinions are my own. I’ve been building this Wood Cabin from Funwhole for the past few days. It was very relaxing to build such a nice set. I made little videos at different points of the build and put that all together in a full video below. Overall this was a great build. The instruction book is full color and while I did find a few errors I was able to work through it to complete the entire build. I loved adding in the lights and seeing how nicely everything looked lit up. From the soft red glow of the wood stove to the warm lights on the front porch. It looks incredible in its complete form. You can see it in the video below. If you wanted to pick one of these up for yourself you can go to the FUNWHOLE website to find the Wood Cabin.

  Photo-A-Day 2.0 #01304 For my birthday I bought the LEGO Optimus Prime set 10302 because I am a lifelong Transformers fan. I’ve been working with the folks at Lightailing and asked them if they could send me their Lightailing kit for this LEGO set. They did and so I assembled Optimus throughout the week and then I was able to add the light kit to that assembled figure. Lightailing has two different variations of lighting kits. They have the BriksMax one that has several lines of lights that you attach into one strip and then attach to a power source. The Lightailng kits are all in one line and measured out precisely to add the lights to the LEGO set. For Optimus Prime the Briksmax set has two additional lights at the feet of Optimus Prime. While that is cool I did not really need the extra lights and I wanted to try the Lightailing set this time. I really liked it. You can see how everything came together in the video below. If you want to pick up the sets for yourself you can ge...

  I received and advanced copy of A Perfect Mistake by Melanie Conklin (Little Brown and Company) which goes on sale today. These are my honest opinions on the book. I get pitches to check out books all the time. I read things from kids picture books to YA fantasy and Graphic Novels and everything in between. I got the pitch for A Perfect Mistake and reading the quick synopsis of the book made me very interested in reading it. The book deals with family ties, ADHD, toxic masculinity, responsibility and friendship. It was one of those books that when I began reading it I wanted to read the entire thing right away to get to the resolution of the mystery within the book. We have our main character, Max, he’s 11 years old but has the height and size of a kid in high school. So a lot of responsibility and unfair expectations get put upon him because of that. Max is also dealing with ADHD, he is seeing a therapist and this is helping him come up with strategies to manage his experiences....

  Photo-A-Day 2.0 #01276 The fine folks at Funko sent me one of the Leonardo Pop! figures for free to unbox and review. Opinions are my own. I have slowly been working my way through reviewing the special Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles figures from Funko. These are figures that were made to look like they jumped off the comic book pages from the original series in 1984. I already have two of the Donatello figures, one a chase figure is in black and white. The other is in color like this Leonardo one. I also have the black and white Casey Jones one. These are some very fun figures in my collection. I am hoping to finish the collection at some point and get all of them in color and in black and white. We’ll see, though. I have a video review going up next week of this figure.

  Photo-A-Day 2.0 #01275 The Fine folks at Funko sent me a free 2-Pack of Pop! Games figures. Opinions are my own. Back when I was a kid Street Fighter was a huge game and a social game that people played on consoles with each other and on stand up cabinets in arcades. It loved playing and mashing the buttons to try and beat anyone I played against. I won and I lost but always had fun. Now Fortnite is a huge game that people play socially online. Fortnite is also a game where you play as different characters and Fortnite is pulling in all sorts of pop culture characters including Street Fighter characters. Funko is also huge into Pop culture and they have put out a new two-pack of Pop! Games figures. The set has Ryu from Street Fighter and Brite Bomber from Fortnite. I picked up the Ryu skin in the Fortnite Game but have yet to actually find Brite Bomber in the item shop at the same time when I have some V-bucks to spend. I’ll have to jump at the chance next time she comes to the i...

  Photo-A-Day 2.0 #01271 Funko sent me another round of fun new Pop! figures. One of those is an exclusive Kool-Aid Man figure that is very sparkly. I am going to do a full review of the figure for my YouTube channel. I’ve got to pick up a few supplies first to really make a go of it. A very cool. figure in my opinion.

  I had the pleasure of interviewing Samantha San Miguel about her book, Spineless, is being released out today. I received an advanced copy of the book to read and I thoroughly enjoyed it. The book is about a young boy named Algie Emsworth who dreams of becoming a recognized naturalist. He does have a few things stacked against him, though. He has asthma in the early 19th Century. This can be severely limiting to his activities. However, Algie find that he has more strength than he ever imagined. His adventures take him to Florida where he meets new friends and confidantes who challenge him and help him. I don’t want to give too much away but here is the official synopsis of the book. Dive into the beautiful, surprising, adventure-filled world of The Grand Hotel of Gilded Age South Florida with Samantha San Miguel’s debut middle grade, SPINELESS (On Sale June 7, 2022 | Union Square Kids), where twelve-year-old aspiring naturalist Algie Emsworth stumbles upon a brand-new species. D...

  Photo-A-Day 2.0 #01219 I received a free download code for the movie Uncharted. The movie came out on Digital on 4/26 and will be on Blu-ray 5/10. Opinions are my own. I have never played the Uncharted games but I am very sure that I would enjoy them. I love figuring out puzzles and clues and all sorts of fun things like that. So, when I was asked if I wanted to participate in a scavenger hunt as a promo for Uncharted I said yes. I was sent an envelope that contained four clues that would lead me to my own digital download code of the movie so that I could watch it. The movie stars Tom Holland and Mark Walhberg and looks like a wild ride. the envelope contained a few things. There were some maps, some postcards, a key, a pen, a flashlight and some bubble gum. I used the clues to solve the puzzles in order to find my download code and it was really fun figuring everything out. Eva helped me and we had everything figured within a could of minutes. The puzzle was a challenge but I h...

  Photo-A-Day 2.0 #01217 I was given a free sampler of Opopop Gourmet Popcorn Flavors to try out and review. Opinions are my own. It is no secret that I love popcorn. I am a huge popcorn fan and I like everything from popcorn at the movies, to target to making it at home on the stove, in a n air popper or in the microwave. Microwave popcorn has fallen out of favor at our house because the whole chemical taste and smell. I thought that Microwave popcorn would be gone forever for me but along comes Opopop. Opopop is different and much better than regular microwave popcorn. This is a small company out of Devner Colorado They grown all of their own corn for their popcorn. They also flavor wrap each kernel so you get the most flavorful mouthful ever! The sample I received came with 12 of their Pop cups. These are peel and pour popcorn cups. The sampler also came with a few of their shareable size popcorn packets. These included flavors like Maui Heat, Cinnalicious, Vanilla Cake Pop, Sal...

  Photo-A-Day 2.0 #01192 Funko sends me some of their Pop! figures for free to unbox and review. Opinions are my own. I’m a big fan of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. The Turtles have an ally named Casey Jones. He is a vigilante who uses a golf bag full of sports equipment to fight the bad guys in the Foot Clan. This figure is one of the special PX Previews Limited-Edition B&W Chase figures. My primary knowledge of Casey Jones is from the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie and Casey Jones was played by Elias Koteas. He was one of my favorite parts of the movie. I love the whole Casey and Raphael dynamic. The two play off each other so well. I’m happy to now have Casey Jones as part of my collection. The figure is awesome with his two baseball bats, he’s ready to clean up the sewers alongside his turtle pals.

  I was given a free digital copy of the new comic book, Season of the Bruja that was written by Aaron Durán and illustrated by Sara Soler so that I could read and review it. Opinions are my own. Here is the description of the book that was sent to me: “ Althalia Cabrera might seem like any other witchy Portland hipster whiling away her days behind the counter of a freaky occult museum, but there’s more to her whole deal than a trendy pursuit of the craft. Althalia is a bruja by blood-the youngest in a long line of powerful magic users from a long-ago culture indigenous to Mexico. In her twenty years, Althalia has studied with her loving abuela by her side, supporting and mentoring her use of the family magic, and protecting her from the darkest parts of their practice’s history. But just as Althalia’s inner light and power begins to shine, the darkness of the past finds its way into her world and strikes a tragic blow, testing Althalia in ways she might not be prepared enough to s...

  Photo-A-Day 2.0 #01166 Funko sent me some of their new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles figures from their Pop Comics Line for free to review. Opinions are my own. Donatello is my most favorite Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle. In this collection there are both full color and black and white versions of the characters. The black and White is a chase version. These are PX Previews Exclusives and the series has all four turtles plus Casey Jones and Shredder. The style is a comic book one and each figure looks drawn and shaded as if by Eastman and Laird themselves. I love the two versions but I think the black and white is my favorite because the original comic was in black and white. I will also be making a video review of the figures before they get added to my wall of Funko figures. Here is my video review.

  Photo-A-Day 2.0 #01163 The folks from Super Impulse sent me three boxes of their series 3 Wacky Packages 3D Puny Products for free to unbox and review. Opinions are my own.I am a fan of puns and play on words humor. That is probably why I find Wacky Packages amusing. They 3D Puny Products based on the stickers from the past 60 years at this point. Wacky Packages were a sticker series that started back int he 60s and there have been so many of them created over the years. Super Impulse has created those stickers into tiny physical product boxes recreating the humor of that sticker series. I was sent three package to unbox and I did so in the video below. You can find Wacky Packages all over.