Smithsonian Triops Kit Honest Review

Update July 2024: This was originally posted in December of 2010, and since then it has been my most popular post ever (I'm not sure why ... maybe I accidentally did some badass SEO). My kid is now 21 and headed to his sophomore year of college to become a mechanical engineer and he is rocking life. And if you're looking for a fun triops kit, check out this Deluxe Triops Kit on Amazon!

Do Not Buy Smithsonian Triops Kit (aka Sea Monsters)!

We bought one at Michael's for Michael (haha) when he was going through a hard time with his OCD. He was so excited to watch these things hatch and to care for them. We tried both batches and nothing happened. The kit was over 10 bucks, which is a lot of money for a little kid to save up from an allowance.

I wrote the company asking if these are for real. They sent me a new set of eggs with a set of instructions with typos that looked like a 7-year-old had written them (no offense to 7-year-olds).

We cared for these two different sets, making sure we followed the instructions and kept them warm, etc. Nothing happened again. Sure, I was skeptical ... how do you freeze-dry something or however they come and then put them in water and they come to life? Let's do that with humans, wanna?!

Too bad for the Smithsonian Institution that they put their name on a crappy product. Too bad for Michael's that they sell this piece of crap product. We're hoping Santa brings sea monkeys for Michael ... I've heard better things about those!!!

Do Not Buy Smithsonian Triops Kit (aka Sea Monsters)! They are sold under many different names in all sorts of stores and online. UPDATE: I do recommend Sea Monkeys ... they always hatch for us and are SUPER CHEAP. Ours came from Toys R Us but I'm sure you can get them all over the stinkin' place.

Good luck, and let me know how yours turned out. I enjoy your comments, even the ones calling me a moron because I couldn't get them to hatch :-)

Updated April 2013 ... I always love reading the comments on this post and wonder why it is one of most popular ... why are so many of you Googling this topic?! Anyway, the reason I was so upset about this product not working (and we did everything right TWICE) was because my kid was disappointed, and am a Super Mama Bear.

I hope you'll forgive me for being a Triops Moron and check out some other fun stuff on my site ... my kids and husband can be QUITE entertaining!!!!!

And if growing triops makes you hungry, check out my book The Tater Tot Casserole Cookbook ... maybe I can't grow a triops very well, but I can make dinner and dessert and live to write about it! And my kids and their friends even like the stuff!

The 2010 McLoughlin Family Christmas Letter

CHRISTMAS SEASON 2010


Dear Family, Friends, Neighbors and the Blogosphere,

Merry Christmas! Here’s what’s been going on in our McLives:



Joel's Zoo

 Joel (4th grade, 9 years old) started the year out right by winning 2nd place in our Scouts Pinewood Derby race, then moved up to Webelos I in the summer after he and Daddy went to Scout camp. He loves his gymnastics class, socializing any chance he can get, and took a class on making sushi. After Lilly the Hamster died (soon after he got her and within hours of spending $60 on a vet bill!), he got Daisy the Hamster, and she’s doing great. He enjoyed volunteering with Meals on Wheels and at Harvester’s with Scouts and would go back every day if he could. Over the summer he started going down the massive wicked huge straight slide at Young’s Pool, something Mommy is afraid to do because it would probably make my swimsuit split me in two.

Michael orchestrates the putting up of the tree

Michael (2nd grade, 7 years old) won 1st place in our pack in the Scouts Pinewood Derby for siblings. Like Joel, he’s in a gymnastics class, but unlike Joel he isn’t in love with socializing! He does, however, trot across the street to the school for his Lego Robotics class. As far as swimming prowess, he now goes off the diving board and hit all the slides at all our pools. The kid can make ANYTHING out of paper and recently made a flying ambulance (#42, OPFD, the one that took me and Sam to the hospital!) complete with angel wings!

Daddy made Cal's closet polka dotted!

Callie (kindergarten, 5 years old) did gymnastics for a while this year but is more of a singing, dancing, drama kind of girl. She loves makeup and swimming and being a girly girl. There’s also a broken-down, worn-out dress she loves that is getting all holey, and it’s been worn so much I think I just saw it walk out the front door. Her nickname is “Grandma Wrinkles” because of her selective hearing and, yes, I have taken her for multiple hearing tests. She honestly doesn’t hear you calling her until you say, “Hey! Little Grandma!” She also loves her new room with 3 turquoise walls and 1 purple (finger-painted on by everyone) wall. She got Rose the Hamster as a 5th birthday pet because we have commitment issues with getting a dog! She’s also turning into a little artist like her brothers.



Eva loves her 1956 baby doll crib

 

Eva (3 on December 6th) continues to be a happy and crazy girl. You can find her making messes with things like honey, chocolate syrup and soap, and then you can find her washing dishes, recycling and “sitting on the pot” all by herself. She has a perfect round belly that I just want to bite! I nursed the girl for almost 3 years and now you can find her in her Drunken Bottle state sacked out on the couch with her bottle of chocolate milk hanging out of her mouth (yes, I know I’m a bad mom, and I brush her teeth often to make up for the copious amounts of sugar). She is always caring for her babies, and if the girl doesn’t grow up to have 10 kids I will be shocked.



Safety first in the woodshop!

 Sam turned 1 in October and is walking and talking, climbing stairs and recently learned to go down. He likes to climb the boys bunk bed ladder and hang out in the woodshop with his dad and wishes he could carry around scissors and a screwdriver all day. Mommy sees many problems with this, though … which leads to him throwing himself down on the floor in the cutest little fits! What little hair he has just may turn out to be reddish … we love us some gingies (Ginger-haired kids).

3 boys and 3 girls!

I have to give a nod to our extra named Jordan. She is 13 and goes to Holy Cross Catholic School and has been invaluable as a helper to our family. She plays the flute and piccolo, volleyball, and helps out at a vet’s office. The kids are in love with her and wish we could adopt her. Aron and I don’t think she’s so bad, either! 

Aron is Den Leader for Cub Scouts, a Religious Ed teacher, Lego Robotics coach, Master Fisherman and superfine dad and husband. I know it sounds pukey, but when you still dig someone 15 years after meeting him, you have to tell the world! As usual, he traveled some for work. His poor wood projects gathered (saw)dust as he put our 3rd bedroom to use, turning it into a room for the girls to sleep in their bunk bed. His reward was to get a shiny red HUGE truck which gets about 2 miles to the gallon, but it's cool!

I’m still homeschooling, writing, scrapbooking, cussing and mothering. My life consists of going to the pool, parks, field trips, indoor play areas, etc. We made it to Branson with my dad’s family this year, then went to Colorado to visit Garden of the Gods, Focus on the Family, the North Pole, Cheyenne Mountain Zoo, Rocky Mountain National Park for some hiking, and Grand Lake. Field trips this year for “school” (it’s so much fun I hate to call it that!) included Channel 5, Overland Park fire station, Downtown Airport, Harvester’s, a recycling center in KCK, Lakeside Nature Center, and multiple trips to the zoo.

We’re praying everyone has the best year ever in 2011. Take care of yourselves and of each other.

Love from Aron, Kerrie, Joel, Michael, Callie, Eva and Sam McLoughlin

The Mac Family Update Part Five (A Routine)

Just when you thought I was the strangest combination of Type A meets Hippie, I go and tell you that I’m working on a FAMILY ROUTINE. Yes, the crazy finally got to me and I ordered a couple of books called Managers of Their Homes (the writers are from Leavenworth, Kansas, which isn’t too far from my neck of the woods) and A Mother’s Rule of Life.

Both of these were written by homeschooling moms with big families, so they know my special circumstances. They know how to fit everything into their day, including homeschooling, cooking, cleaning, chores, errands, time with their spouse, time with their kids, time with their friends and other family members, time for special projects like sewing or scrapbooking or writing and yes, even time with God. It’s an awesome concept that works for many, many women.

You'd die laughing if you could see me cutting up tiny squares to put into slots for every half hour of the day for all 7 members of my family.

Now let’s see how it works for me. Hmmm.

The Mac Family Update Part Four (Mr. McLoughlin)

MR. MCLOUGHLIN

Aron just finished Callie’s room (a.k.a. “The Girls’ Room”). He is such a perfectionist, which is a mixed blessing. It’s nice to have everything just so, but it takes the poor guy a long time to get everything done since he kept encountering issues, like outlets being wired wrong. Then he had the whole thing painted (3 walls turquoise, 1 wall purple, then let the kids fingerpaint on the purple wall, God bless him) and Eva took a screwdriver to one of the small walls. Grrr. Such is life with naughty children. Then the bunk bed was too LONG for the mattress, which drove him nuts so he had to fix that.

Anyway, now he can move on to his 500 other projects. It’s really not funny, but there are about 20 things that need to be done or are broken in our house. No big deal … you learn to live with them and move on. So this winter here’s his short list (honey, feel free to print this out):

Finish making medicine cabinet for main bathroom so we can finally put all the medicines up after 10 years

Make another medicine cabinet for the other bathroom

Build or buy a swingset before someone gets Tetanus on ours and sues us

Type up a waiver for guests to sign before getting on swingset

Fix my garage door so I can lazily use the remote opener again

Fix the blinds in our bedroom that we just bought and are already jacked up

Re-hang the shelf/hooks by the garage door

Fix the huge FAMILY picture frame that fell off the wall when some kid was playing ball in the family room

Fix pedals on Michael’s bike

Fix the front storm door so our tinier of kids can't escape

OR ... he can just forget about most of that and just hang out with us ... we'll make do with all the broken stuff as long as we have our favorite guy around!

He celebrated his 44th birthday recently by playing at the park with the kids over his (long) lunch hour, working and going to Papa Keno’s for dinner, followed by a nice brownie sundae at home. He got a bunch of small gifts from the kids and lots of cards.

And good news:  he got the patches all sewn on the Scouts uniforms (with help from his mom) ... this is a pic of him sewing ... right after I took this picture he showed me with one of his fingers that I'm "number one" ... if you can read between the lines (or fingers).

Next update after Wordless Wednesday on the 8th: A ROUTINE?!?!?!?!?! What is that?!

The Mac Family Update Part Two (Homeschooling)

HOMESCHOOLING A BIG FAMILY

Nope, not tired of homeschooling yet, and the kids still love it, too. Joel’s doing his multiplication, cursive, English, history and more plus earning his Scouts religious emblem, helping out at Harvester’s, and earning badges, pins and loops for Scouts in things like Swimming, Traveler, Fitness, Forester, Good Manners, Fishing, Reading and Writing, and Gymnastics. He’s crazy about Black Beauty right now (TV show on DVD and the book).

Michael is always making something out of all sorts of materials and comes up with games and puzzles of his own. He’s reading Flat Stanley and getting ready for his First Communion in May.

Callie is doing typical kindergarten stuff at a slow pace, which is how we like to take things sometimes. She’s doing great with her numbers and I read to her all the time. She writes letters all the time and is starting to see how they go together to make words. Sometimes she’ll read a word out of the blue and freak me out!

Eva and Sam putter around and make messes while we do school.

Homeschooling also includes things like days at the zoo, Lego Robotics for Michael, gymnastics for the boys, Religious Ed class for the boys, trips to the grocery store, and magazine deliveries. We’re big on life skills learning around here. They do their chores, and learn how to cook (who learns how to make a chocolate raspberry torte with their dad at SCHOOL?). Sure, homeschooling isn’t for everyone, but it seems to somehow be God’s perfect plan for us so far. Working on an ebook about homeschooling, so ask me any questions you like!

Next update: Writing