Disney On Ice presents Frozen comes to Manchester

The latest Disney On Ice spectacular will be coming to Manchester this October and will be bringing the Academy Award^® winning and number one animated feature film of all time, Disney’s Frozen, to life!

 Disney On Ice presents Frozen is set to mesmerise audiences of all ages when it opens at the  Manchester Arena tonight! Fans will be able to see their favourite characters, including Anna, Olaf, Kristoff, and Sven come to life on the ice! And of course young and old will get to sing along with the familiar musical masterpieces including “Let it Go,” “Do You Want to Build a Snowman?” and “Fixer Upper.” (You know you know them word for word!)

  Anna, a girl with an extraordinary heart, embarks on an epic journey to find her sister, the magical Elsa, who is determined to remain secluded as she finally feels free to test the limits of her powers.    Rugged mountain man Kristoff, his loyal reindeer Sven, the lovable and hilarious snowman Olaf and the mystical trolls help Anna along the way in this story about love conquering fear. 

 Plus, attendees can warm up for the show and learn the snowman dance, during the Fit to Dance pre-show. Disney On Ice’s Fit to Dance is a family programme, which aims to inspire families to have fun and be active through storytelling and dance.

Frozen directors Chris Buck and Jennifer Lee add, “Seeing audiences around the world embrace Frozen has been the experience of a lifetime.  And to now have the chance to consult with the talented team at Feld Entertainment and watch their creation come to life on ice, is thrilling.”

Fans of traditional Disney characters Mickey and Minnie won't be disappointed as they still have a part to play, Mickey Mouse and Minnie Mouse take the audience through the magical story based in Arendelle, with special appearances by beloved Disney princesses and favorite characters from Disney•Pixar’s Toy Story and Finding Nemo and Disney’s The Lion King, who come together to prove that true love is the greatest power of all.  

As you are probably aware my family are huge Disney fans and not just the children! We have been lucky enough to attend Disney on Ice the last few times it has visited Manchester and this show looks to be the best yet, especially for my Frozen mad five year old! I'll be sure to come back and update you once we've seen it!

Disney On Ice presents Frozen is appearing across the UK from today, 13th October to 30th December visiting Manchester, Newcastle, Birmingham, Nottingham, Glasgow, Liverpool, Aberdeen, Sheffield and London. Tickets for the show are on sale now.

Find out more information, including a full list of tour dates, and stay up to date on the Disney On Ice website, Facebook page and Twitter @DisneyOnIce.

We have been offered tickets to tonight's show in exchange for this post.

Making Frozen Snowflake Jewellery

My daughter loves anything Frozen themed at the moment (show me a four year old that doesn't!) so when we were sent the Craft Box Snowflake Jewellery Kit from Interplay to review I knew she would be delighted! This simple jewellery craft set is aimed at children aged four and above and contains everything you need to make ten pieces of sparkly child friendly jewellery that looks great with an Elsa dress for fun dress up play.

As with all Interplay kits, the box contains everything you need to get started, with an easy to follow illustrated instruction booklet, over 300 colourful beads, 10 beautiful snowflake charms, plastic stretch cord and 5 plastic clasps.

Elizabeth was thrilled when she saw the kit and couldn't wait to get started. Although the set is not Frozen branded as such, the colours and snowflake theme, immediately make you think of the hit Disney film and my daughter declared she was making an Elsa necklace and bracelet to wear with her Elsa dress when we go to see Disney on Ice later this month!

The beads included in the set come in a variety of shapes and colours, all with an icy feel to them. Elizabeth carefully chose the beads that she wanted to use and then settled on one of the ten metal charms to finish it off. I measured and cut the thread for her and after that she didn't need much more help until it came to tying the knots at the end. 

She really enjoyed the activity and was proud of herself for being able to create something that she really liked. I was impressed at her threading skills and would recommend a set like this for any child to practice their fine motor skills with. 

Elizabeth has decided to make some more bracelets for her friends and has promised one for me too!

The Craft Box Snowflake Jewellery Kit from Interplay offers great value with a lot of  play for the price and at the end you get a lovey keepsake. It is available for just £7.99 from Amazon
 and other good toy stores. This would make a great gift for a Frozen fan and a few kits would make the ideal activity at a Frozen themed birthday party!

The lovely folks at Interplay have given us another kit to giveaway to one of our readers, so if you think your little one would love to make some Snowflake bracelets then follow the instructions below.

Good Luck!

Win a Snowflake Jewellery kit

LEGO Frozen Disney Princess: Elsa's Sparkling Ice Castle Review

Our family love LEGO and we have become rather engrossed in Frozen fever too so when the lovely folks at House of Fraser asked if we would like to choose something from their extensive toy selection to review, it's no surprise that we quickly decided on the one thing that encompasses both of these! The LEGO Disney Princess 41062: Elsa's Sparkling Ice Castle set has a suggested age range of 6 - 12 years and has a recommended retail price of £34.99. 

We have a frozen mad four year old daughter, but also a LEGO crazy seven year old son who was also very interested in this set, (not to mention two 30ish year olds who can often be found singing along to Let It Go and playing with minifigures... ) This is hopefully going to be a set that the whole family enjoys together. 

When the box arrived I admit I was surprised at how small it was, the set contains just 292 pieces and I would compare the size to other LEGO sets we have that have retailed at around £24.99, however this is the first Disney Princess set we have owned and I guess that branding does come with a price tag. Hopefully it will also come with some extra special pieces!

What's in the box?

On opening the box we found 3 bags, two instruction books, a shiny sticker sheet and a 8x16 base plate.

Instruction book one 

Instruction book two 

Anna, Elsa and Olaf Minifigures

My daughter loves these and would quite happily play with these Disney Princess mini dolls and their LEGO snowman friend for hours even without the rest of the castle set. I have to admit even as a 30 year old woman, I think they are pretty awesome! The detail in their dresses, the fabric cloaks and even the freckles on Anna's face just make them that extra bit special. Olaf is constructed rather than a minifigure as such but still rather cute and very distinctively Olaf, buckteeth and all! I would have loved to see Kristof and Sven included too but maybe them being left out means there could be another LEGO Frozen set to come? Or that could just be wishful thinking on my part!

Constructing Frozen...

Following the instruction sheet the first section you put together is Olaf's picnic blanket, which includes a sandwich and a cookie and makes reference to the 'In Summer' song from the movie which Olaf, Anna and Kristof sit on a red checkered blanket!

The next part to construct is the Sleigh. The Sleigh also has a cute little ice slide, together these form their own little playset which my daughter loved! The are also some adorable accessories including a pair of ice skates that you can fit on to the Anna minidoll to play ice skating.

Elsa's Sparkling Ice Castle

It's difficult to know where to start when describing the castle, the. re is just so much attention to detail and beautiful finishing touches including special blue glittery pieces that I've not seen in LEGO before.

The Sparkling Ice Castle itself took us around 30 minutes to build, working together a family, although it may take a child on their own longer. 

The suggested age range for this set is 6 - 12 years and I would agree with that for putting it together as we did this as a family but once it was constructed my four year old has had so much fun playing with it that I would say that it would be a suitable gift for Frozen fans aged four and above as long as an adult is happy to help with the construction.

LEGO Disney Princess 41062: Elsa's Sparkling Ice Castle has an RRP of £34.99 which is high for a LEGO set of this size but is justified in play value and I can see it becoming a very popular and sought after set.

We love it!

Like this? Check out our other Frozen posts:

Disney Frozen Anna Dress

Singalong with Sing-a-long-a Frozen

Frozen Elsa's Magic Snow Sleeve Review

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Frozen Elsa's Magic Snow Sleeve Review

We love Frozen in our house, we recently went to see Sing-a-long-a Frozen and are very excited about the planned sequel in a few years and of course the special short; Frozen Fever that will be in cinemas alongside the new Cinderella Film from 27th March 2015! This bite sized follow up  will see our favourite characters; Anna, Elsa, Kristoff and Olaf reunited to celebrate Anna’s birthday and it will also feature an exclusive new song that i'm sure my children will soon be singing along to!

My daughter Elizabeth loves to dress up and although she can often be seen dressed as her favourite Marvel superheros she also loves to play princesses. She has had a beautiful Anna dress for a while and you can see some lovely pictures of it in our review, so she was delighted when we were sent a stunning Elsa dress from Rubies along with Elsa’s 2 in 1 magic snow sleeve from Flair!

The Dress comes with a detachable lace cape covered in snowflakes that is really very pretty. The dress itself is great quality with lots of detail including long transparent sleeves, sequin trims and a Queen Elsa motif on the front. Elizabeth usually wears age 4 - 5 clothes and the 5 - 6  (M) fitted her really well. Although not too baggy or loose it had plenty of movement for running round and playing in!

Of course as soon as it arrived we had to have a play!We added a tiara from our dressing up box and Elizabeth insisted I plaited her her 'just like Elsa's!' I even treated her to blue glittery nails to match... (she *may* have insisted I had coordinating nails too!)

Elsa's 2 in 1 Magic Snow Sleeve is the perfect addition to an Elsa dress up outfit to make princess play even more fun! In the box you get a stunning fabric sleeve with lace trim, a can of Frozen Snow Spray (essentially white silly string), a blue plastic water bottle decorated with snowflakes and the snow snow sleeve contraption itself, which is decorated with pretty patterns and the name Elsa.

The snow sleeve has two functions; the magic snow can can be attached and squirted out to create fun messy play or alternatively the pump action water bottle an be used in it's place for water spraying fun, perfect or hot sunny days!

We started off with the snow spray. The can fitted easily onto the mount which strapped on to Elizabeth's arm without any trouble, with the combination of the plastic and the can I worried that it may be heavy or uncomfortable on her arm, but it wasn't at all.  She was soon running around the front garden singing Let It Go at the top of her voice and lifting her arm to spray snow into the air!

It was lovely to see how excited she as to 'be just like Queen Elsa', all she had to do was lift her fingers and out came snow!

When the silly string runs out or if you'd rather have some water fun, you can easily replace this with the blue bottle provided filled with water. This has a pump action release so the water squirts out in short bursts rather than the longer streams of the silly string. Elizabeth did need to use more pressure to make this work than the can but she didn't mind and had great fun soaking me! I can see some interesting battles between Queen Elsa and my son's super soaker water gun coming up this summer! 

This set is aimed at children between 5 and 8 years old and I agree with that age range. Elizabeth will be five in a few months time and I would say that children younger than her may struggle to lift the 'trigger' with the back of their figures while children older than eight may find the straps tight on their wrists. (I *may* have attempted to try it on my own wrist to find this out...)

At an RRP of £29.99 this is a toy that is definitely worth it's price in play value, it will be the ideal gift for a little Frozen fan who would love to spray snow out of her fingertips just like Elsa! One thing I would mention is that the Snow spray runs out very quickly (around five minutes of continuous play) so you may want to factor in the cost of a few more cans of Silly String.

You can see the Elsa Magic Snow Sleeve in action in this two minute video we made:

 


Like this? Check out our other Frozen posts:

Disney Frozen Anna Dress

Singalong with Sing-a-long-a Frozen

LEGO Frozen Disney Princess: Elsa's Sparkling Castle

These products were sent to us for the purpose of this review. Contains affiliate links.

Singalong with Sing-a-long-a Frozen

Like most children, my two are huge fans of Disney's hit movie Frozen, they especially love the songs and we can regularly be found singing along to the sound track CD in the car!

You can imagine how delighted they were when we were invited to the attend the Singalong Frozen show at the Lowry Theatre this half term.

I wasn't entirely sure what to expect from the production, I knew we would be watching the movie and joining in with the musical numbers, but what we actually got was so much more!

When we arrived the theatre was rather predictably full of very cute little Annas, Elsas and Olafs, we were shown to our seats where we each found a free 'prop bag' containing a variety of goodies to help us enjoy the show.

The performance started with an introduction and warm up from our lovely host who gave us instructions on using our props and introduced two very special guests: Princesses Anna and Elsa of course!

The movie was shown in two halves with a twenty minute intermission ( ideal for toilet trips for little ones. ) As well as the song lyrics being shown on the big screen, the hostess and princesses would also come on stage for the songs to encourage everyone to sing along. The whole thing was really interactive and children were encouraged to boo, hiss and cheer as the different characters came on. It was far from the atmosphere of the cinema where we first watched Frozen, this is the ideal way for young frozen fans to see the movie on the big screen and be as noisy as they like!

Sing-a-long-a Frozen is aimed at children aged 5 + however I would say it is fine for younger frozen fans. I would warn though that the show does last a total of 2 hours 40 minutes including intermission so little ones may get a bit tired by the end...

Both my 4 year old daughter and my seven year old son thoroughly enjoyed the show from start to finish and have been talking about it none stop since! I would highly recommend the Sing-a-long-a Frozen showing to any Disney loving family as a really fun treat, ideal for half term! The show continues at The Lowry until 8th March and tickets start from just £12 per person when booking for a family of four. The show is also touring the country, find out when it comes to your nearest town on the Sing-a-long-a Frozen website.

Like this? Check out our other Frozen posts:

Disney Frozen Anna Dress

LEGO Frozen Disney Princess: Elsa's Sparkling Castle

Frozen Elsa's Magic Snow Sleeve Review

We were invited to attend the show as guests of the Lowry.