Marvellous Martians
Although it's four days since I last updated the site, I have only had one new toy to add - Roboter 2 from the "Einsatztruppe Mars" set. That completes my set of three Martian robots, which have been this year's capsule toys (i.e. toys whose capsule forms part of them).

Actually, I did also score a spare of the elusive K01 No. 122, but have offered that to someone, so it's not on the site. However, if that person declines or doesn't get back to me, I might offer it to someone else or even put it on eBay. If I put it on eBay, I'll probably put it on the site as well, with a link to the eBay auction.

That's all for now. Ciao!

Cybertop!
Had a good score from a German Kinder egg today - Cybertop himself, the main "good guy" in the Cybertop series. So was very pleased with that. I now have eight of the 12 Cybertops, and the only ones I need are Cyberluna, Dr Link, Joey Styk and Mr Mouse. So if anyone has these (preferably with German papers), please get in touch!

I've added that to the site. That was the only thing I updated today.

Until next time, remember a Kinder a day helps you work, rest and play! :-)

Woof, Woof
Just one new toy added to the site with the latest update: an Argentine variation of the K01 bulldog on a wheel. It has a sticker for its teeth (the Italian/European version has the teeth painted on). The paper is a generic one for both toys in the set (the other being the pelican on a wheel). Nice to add another Argentine variation to the collection.

I also added a couple of duplicates, but nothing all that exciting.

Moving off topic for a moment: New Zealand has experienced its warmest June on record, with temperatures two or three degrees above average in most places. That includes my home town of Wellington. However, July has started cold (it was only 9 degrees in Welly today) and looks set to get even colder later in the week. So winter is now well and truly here!

Mind you, one advantage of winter is that Kinder chocolate tastes better - it tends to go all soft in the summer heat!

That's all for now. May your next surprise be a Kinder Surprise.

Not Much To Say
Not much to say today, as I'm pretty busy. But I've managed to update the site and have added a couple of duplicates in. Have now got almost a complete spare set of the K01 butterflies with Argentine papers to trade. Am also down to the last five Kinder eggs of my German 72-pack, purchased a few months ago now.

And that's it! May you be Kinder Surprised today.

Playful Panthers
I've added one new toy in my site update today - the Verspielte Pantherfamilie from this year's German series, which I got in a German Kinder Surprise egg today. Verspielt means things like "playful", "frisky" or even "kittenish", so I think a good translation for Verspielte Pantherfamilie is Playful Panther Family. Nice alliteration. It has a good ring to it. Anyway, the toy comprises a mother panther (dark blue or purple) holding a tiny baby (light blue or purple) in her mouth. Very cute.

The paper for this toy has a few interesting tidbits of info about panthers - for instance, did you know that panthers are basically jaguars? But they're called panthers when their fur is black. German Kinder Surprises have some nice animal figurines from time to time, and these usually have papers with interesting info. So if you collect Kinder Surprises in Germany, you can become quite educated!

Non-German Kinder Surprise toys are a lot less educational, because the papers only have pictures and no words (apart from the obligatory safety warnings). Well, the hand-painted figurine papers usually have words, but those for toys in the regular line don't. I think the way that German Kinder Surprise papers are set out, with words as well as pictures, adds to the appeal and collectability of German Kinder Surprise toys.

What do the rest of you think? If anyone reading this has some views about Kinder Surprises, such as whether German, European or Argentine ones are better, or what the best and worst kinds of Kinder toys are, then do post a comment. Don't be shy! The panthers won't bite! ;-)

That's all for today. Until next time, may your next surprise be a Kinder Surprise.

One New Toy Added
Greetings Kinder fans.

I've added one new toy to the site today. With the Kinder Surprise I had at lunch, I got an Argentine version of K01 No. 82 (the variation with green body and yellow legs). It has eye stickers, typical of many Argentine Kinder toys, and of course an Argentine paper. Was pleased to see the paper just showed assembly instructions for the one toy and wasn't one of these rather annoying combo papers for several toys that seem to be rather common in the Argentine Kinder line.

One the down side, the paper has a small tear in it, but I'll have to live with that. These Argentine papers are way too thin, but I hear tell they will be thicker for the K02 series - here's hoping! It would be good to see the Argentine papers resemble the Italian/European and German papers in thickness.

So endeth this entry. May you be Kinder Surprised today!

New Site Update and One or Two Observations
Hi again.

After leaving the site alone for a few days due to a heavy workload, I have now updated it once again, adding five toys obtained since my last update. These are two K01 toys (both duplicates), two German toys (one an original - Gorgh das Brunnenmonster - and the other a duplicate) and a hand-painted figurine (duplicate of the Cybertop Cattivira - I still need five Cybertops to complete my German set).

I have noticed, from the 72-pack that I have nearly finished with, that the most common 2002/03 German series seems to be the "Kleine Giganten". Mind you, it's a pretty nice set: fairly realistic dinosaurs and interesting tidbits of info on each one.

On my Kinder Web site travels, I noticed on Jean-Pierre Comtois' site that Canada is now getting the K02 series with Magicodes and improved Argentine papers (thicker than the ones issued with the Argentine K01 line). New Zealand usually gets what Canada does eventually, so this could be a good sign for us.

That's all for now. Until the next update, may your every surprise be a Kinder Surprise!

Entry The First!
Today is 19 June 2003, Garfield's 25th birthday. It is also now the date of my very first blog entry, anywhere, any time!

The colour scheme of this blog is intended to resemble that of Kinder Surprises, although it is not an exact match. But it was the nearest I could get to the red and white of Kinder Surprise egg wrappers.

With this blog, I aim to post notifications of site updates and other Kinder Surprise-related events in my day-to-day life. To that effect, you may have noticed that I updated the site today. New additions were the Argentine version of K01 No. 106, a giant spider ("Im Netz der Wackeligen Riesenspinne") in the 2002/03 German toys section and a new site (Kindereggs.us) in the Links to Other Kinder Surprise Sites section.

For KS variation aficionados, the Argentine version of K01 No. 106, which I got today from a Kinder Surprise egg dated 15/01/04, is a bit different to the Italian/European variation, in that the flowers are not painted, nor is the tongue on the little critter. I got the version with orange pot and blue critter, which was an extra bonus as the Italian/European one I have has a blue pot and orange critter.

Well, that pretty well wraps up my first blog entry. In case you're wondering, I do have a life apart from Kinder Surprises (like freelance translation for instance, which keeps me pretty busy), but as this is the blog of my Kinder Surprise Web site, I'll focus mainly on Kinder stuff here.

Another reason I have set up this blog is because I'm hoping to interact a little more with visitors to my site. That's one of the purposes of blogs, I think. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed it, but it is my very first blog entry, so please go easy if I've made a hash of it! I'm sure I'll get better at this as time goes on.

Thanks for the read - look forward to hearing from some of you!