CBeebies: The Ultimate Christmas Collection DVD

I will review this rather marvellous dvd with great pleasure as it has kept my son entertained for the past two days, and considering he has been poorly as well, I feel this speaks volumes on the quality of it!!

The dvd is titled, "The ultimate Christmas collection", which in my house translates into a good selection of favourites from my children's channel of choice…..CBEEBIES!!! (God bless the production team of cbeebies, ...
...times over!!!)

~~~~~~ EPISODES~~~~~~

This dvd features 10 of the best loved cbeebies programmes, but all with a festive twist!!

~~~~~LAZYTOWN~~~~~

For anyone unfamiliar with this programme let me try to shed a little light, the general set up is……………… Sporticus is one of the main characters, I have to be honest even after all this time I am not sure whether he is a visitor or resident of ... more

I will review this rather marvellous dvd with great pleasure as it has kept my son entertained for the past two days, and considering he has been poorly as well, I feel this speaks volumes on the quality of it!!

The dvd is titled, "The ultimate Christmas collection", which in my house translates into a good selection of favourites from my children's channel of choice…..CBEEBIES!!! (God bless the production team of cbeebies, without whom I may have lost my sanity , many times over!!!)

~~~~~~ EPISODES~~~~~~

This dvd features 10 of the best loved cbeebies programmes, but all with a festive twist!!

~~~~~LAZYTOWN~~~~~

For anyone unfamiliar with this programme let me try to shed a little light, the general set up is……………… Sporticus is one of the main characters, I have to be honest even after all this time I am not sure whether he is a visitor or resident of Lazytown, all I do know is that he is a superhero who is extremely fit and likes promoting exercise to the other residents. Then there is his arch enemy, Robbie Rotten, who is the crappiest baddy ever, as in true slapstick style he never ever wins!!!!
The programme also features Stephanie a pink haired resident of Lazytown and Sporticuses's faithful side kick! The programme is a strange mix of actors, (Stephanie, Sporticus and Robbie Rotten), and puppets, which makes for an unusual viewing experience but not a bad one!!!

This episode shows all the characters getting ready for Christmas and how Robbie Rotten is determined on ruining it, even going as far as dressing up as Santa to gain entrance to their house to steal there presents. Its not until he has most of the presents in his sack that he realises they have brought a present for him that he wonders if there is more to this Christmas lark than he had anticipated, the question is can he be changed for the festive season?
This is a lovely feel good programme, and with all the singing , dancing and slapstick enthrals my kids from beginning to end!!

~~~~~~ BOOGIE BEEBIES~~~~~~

Again I will give a brief description of the programme for those fortunate enough to not have to watch the Cbeebies channel from dawn to dusk!!!!
This is in short an aerobics programme for children, incorporating dance and exercise with catchy songs and music.
Each episode features a selection of children showing other children how to the do the moves to the songs. This has just been adapted for the festive season and features a song called "I wish it would snow". I have to be honest this annoys the hell out of me, especially the man who does most of the dance moves….. Pete, even the mere mention of him frustrates me!!!! Unfortunately my kids adore this programme and refuse to do anything in a morning until they have watched and participated in it!!!

~~~~~BALAMORY~~~~~

Now I shall assume most of you out there has heard of this one, due to the fact it has been out for quite some time, in fairness it doesn't actually matter if you haven't as it was the special they showed last Christmas day on the afore mentioned channel. It is the cast of Balamory acting out the panto "Cinderella", to an audience, so if you are not to familiar with characters and names they are all playing different parts anyway!!

~~~~~ THE FIMBLES~~~~~

For anyone who is not familiar with this programme….TOUGH!!! I can truly say I couldn't describe this programme if I tried. What I will say is that it is a group of "fimbles", (don't know what they are exactly, can only say they are in the same vein as the Teletubbies, except they talk more!) There is a mother bird and her chick, a frog and a mole called Roly Mo who likes reading stories!!
The storyline is how the Fimbles try to find different objects to make percussion noises and how a group of children at a school uses all the different noises they discover to play Christmas tunes.
My daughter who is 6, thinks she is to old for this programme but my 2 year old still enjoys it!!

~~~~~LUNAR JIM~~~~~

Lunar Jim is another relatively new programme, it is about a group of astronauts trying to sustain life and an eco system on another planet, I know a bit deep for a young child but interesting none the less!
This particular episode is about the team digging for crystals in an un explored cave and how on searching this cave a new life form is discovered. They name this life form the fluffles, and after discovering that can multiply rather quickly, have to find a solution to homing them, could the answer be in the crystals??

~~~~~ CHARLIE AND LOLA~~~~~

This is about the adorable and accurate stories of a brother and younger sister. Every topic covered in this series is described in the way I would expect my children to explain things to me, and in so doing has my children enthralled and me in hysterics!!
This particular story is centred around Lola hearing on the weather that it might snow, and how she drives every one mad waiting for the snow to come!!
On seeing her absolute delight at seeing the first flakes of snow, it reminds me of my childrens first reaction to being in the same situation……. Wonderful!!!

~~~~~ BIG COOK, LITTLE COOK~~~~~

This is another of our favourites, it's a children's cookery programme, incorporating songs, cookery and story telling. The programme is presented by and the café run by big cook Ben and little cook small!! Every episode has one character visiting the café and how they decide on what they will make that individual to eat.
This episode shows Santa visiting the café for a snack and the meal they decide to serve up for him. This is a really clever programme and encourages my children to want to cook, and some of the recipes are so good, I have been known to use them myself!!

~~~~~ THE ROLY MO SHOW~~~~~

This is a spin of series from the Fimbles featuring the old mole, Roly Mo. In every episode his niece Little Bo, visits him, which always ends up with him reading a story to her and Hugo and Mego, the two little ferrets that live with Roly Mo.
This whole episode centres around the fact it's absolutely freezing and their efforts to warm up!!!

~~~~~~ TIKKABILLA~~~~~

This is another episode that we watched last Christmas morning and even though this is not my favourite children's programme, this is my favourite episode on the dvd!
In a normal episode there are two presenters a male and a female and a little purple hand puppet dragon called Tamba. Each programme always features arts, crafts, a sing song, a story and a look at another religion.
This festive version features all the people that star in this programme and covers the nativity and singing Christmas carols, it is the most traditional out of all the programmes on this disc and even left me feeling christmassey!

~~~~~ THE TWEENIES~~~~~

No compilation dvd is complete without the Tweenies, firm favourites of my familys for quite some time now!!
This episode shows how the Tweenies and there carers, Max and Judy, end up spending Christmas day at Jakes house, as he is poorly, and how Jake and the others have the best Christmas ever!!!!!

~~~~~ EXTRAS~~~~~

There is a random play and episode selection and a section on Christmas ideas to print and make!!

~~~~~ RUNNING TIME~~~~~

The dvd boasts of over three hours of festive fun!!!!!

~~~~~ PRICE AND AVAILABILITY~~~~~

This disc cost me £8.97 from Asda, but due to the fact it's only just been released it will probably be available from the usual suspects, Woolworths, Hmv……etc

~~~~~ CONCLUSION~~~~~

This is a wonderful dvd and due to the variety of episodes makes for a great viewing experience, highly recommended!!!!!!!!

THANKS FOR READING MY REVIEW AND I HOPE IT'S OF SOME USE!!!! 

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