Sunday Surprise: Surprizamal Mama and Baby Jamie!

As promised, Sunday has arrived and so it's time to see what's inside of my Surprizamal unicorn's baby balls!  Ok, saying "unicorn baby balls" sounds wrong, I know, but I don't know what else to call them!  As an extra treat, I found another kind of Surprizamal Mama and Baby toy that I want to share with you today, too.

Since I just posted yesterday (and I'm in the middle of working on that Madame Alexander Fan Girl review) I'll keep this short and sweet.

Here's Jamie, my Surprizamal unicorn mama, who I introduced back in February:

Surprizamal Mama and Baby unicorn, Jamie ($19.99).

The Surprizamal Mama and Baby sets are made by the Beverly Hills Teddy Bear Company and they cost $19.99 each.

Here's the set I saw recently at Toys 'R' Us, with the price right underneath:

However, that price is hard to find online right now.  Amazon is selling Jamie for $124.99 and eBay has a single offering (from Australia) for the bargain price of $50 USD (including shipping).

Jamie is packed against a cardboard backdrop and the baby balls are sealed inside molded plastic.  Each of the purple balls is the same size as a regular Surprizamal:

Jamie holding a regular Surprizamal ball.

As an aside, I was confused by this text at first:

First of all, it's confusing that it says which one will you get, since there are three baby balls.  Also, the arrow looks like it's pointing at the seam in the cardboard--as if I could open the backdrop and find a secret extra animal hidden away!  Of course I ripped into that seam, but there's nothing underneath.

One side of the cardboard package carefully explains that each set includes a stuffed mother and three surprise stuffed babies:

Which three will I get?

It also says that there are a total of nine different stuffed animals to collect and that colors may vary. Since there are three mamas in this series (each with three babies) I assume that the "nine different animals" does not include the mamas.  So, I'm either going to find three unicorn babies, or a mix-and-match collection of nine different random baby animals from this series.

The back of the box does not give any clues about which of these things might be true.  There's just a list of all the possible animals in series 1-4:

Here's a closer look at the four groups:

I really like Ella (the aardvark?):

I know Ellie is meant to be an elephant, but doesn't she look like an aardvark?

Aardvarks are such interesting creatures!  I read that they can eat up to 60,000 insects in one night (they're nocturnal) and that they're not-so-distantly related to elephants!

Anyway, back to the Surprizamals.  Here's series 2:

I love Izzy the unicorn and Sasha the seahorse!

Series 3 has Hudson (from my last review) and Ivy, another baby unicorn (who looks a lot like Jamie!).  Maybe Jamie's babies will look like Ivy?

The last group has Penny (again, from my last review) and the awesome Yeti:

The other side of the package just confirms that there's one baby animal in each of the three balls:

Here's everything that was in the package:

Jamie herself is really cute, lightweight, and wonderfully fluffy and soft.  She's a nice size, too, and would be easy to snuggle with at night or carry around during the day.

She has huge pink glittery eyes, a short rainbow horn, and a pink fluffy mane:

Her horn looks like a party hat.

Her tail (and the bottoms of her feet) are a lighter color of pink and are made out of the same type of fluffy fabric as her body:

Jamie is great, but we're here to see those babies!  You guys have been waiting for a long time.  I'm guessing that there are videos or pictures showing de-boxed Jamie sets, and that the most curious among you already know what's inside the balls, but I've been avoiding internet searches because I didn't want to ruin the surprise!

Here's the first ball:

Underneath the plastic wrapping, there are two holes that show a tiny peek of color:

I see pink, and maybe a bit of purple there on the left side?

As soon as I loosened the top of the ball, it popped off and bam!  

I had a great view of the first baby:

Those pinned ears make it look mad!

Oh, my goodness!  What a sweet little face!

I love those huge glittery silver eyes, and from this angle, the flattened ears actually make the baby look newborn rather than mad.  Like a real newborn foal:

Here she is fully removed from the ball.  She has a big hang tag on the left ear and a long manufacturing tag sewn into a back seam:

I wonder...does she have a name inside that big tag?

She does!  Yay!

Dutchess.  That's a good name but an archaic spelling.  I usually spell it "Duchess" (as does the Duchess of Cambridge, by the way).  Dutchess' birthday is October 11 and her favorite color is powder blue.  She also loves to chase butterflies!

She has a tiny little rainbow horn that matches her mama's, and a fuzzy patch of pink mane:

The fabric on the body is velvety-soft and wonderful to hold.  The fuzzy fabric of the forelock looks a little worn on one side, though.  This area also feels scratchy and hard.  The mane must be glued in place, which isn't ideal:

She has a bit of a hard time sitting upright, and tends to pitch forward onto her little nose.

She also has a funny tail for a horse, but it's not a bad representation of a newborn foal's tail.

Here she is with Pam, one of my regular Surprizamals:

Surprizamals Pam (left) and Dutchess (right).

Pam is still one of my very favorite Surprizamals.  I love how it always looks like she's waving!

Moving on to baby #2!  

I'm pretty sure that this will be another unicorn, but there's only one way to find out:

I can see a bit of color through the holes of this ball, too:

Looks yellow or maybe cream colored?

And sure enough!  I cracked the ball open to reveal a yellow (and pink) foot:

At first I thought it was a bay chick!

But then I saw a cute yellow nose:

It's definitely another unicorn.

This baby also has silver eyes and a pink mane and tail.  I wonder if the pink mane means it's a girl?  Maybe they're all girls?

Her horn was so squished, I couldn't event see it at first!

I wonder what her name is?

Oh--my mistake!  

His name is Clyde:

I'm so glad that there are boys in the mix!  Now we have another surprise with each baby: boy or girl?

Clyde was born in August, which is funny because he looks a lot like Duchess' twin.  He likes the color lilac and is hyper and playful.

I straightened out his ears, tried to straighten his horn, and got him to stand up a little better:

Like his sister, he tips forwards a lot!  This gives you a good look at the back tag, at least:

Here are the adorable siblings together:

Surprizamal baby unicorns Dutchess (left) and Clyde (right).

One more ball to go!

Any guesses about this baby's color?

I'd say blue or purple:

Yep!  A little blue baby!

This one also has a pink mane and tail and silver eyes, but I won't make the assumption that it's a girl this time!

This baby's forelock has a defect in it:

The mane is pulling free from the rest of the body (definitely glued in place):

But look at the cute blue horn!  This is the only unicorn so far who hasn't had a rainbow party hat horn.

I really like this baby, but wish that there was a bit more eye or mane color variation in the group.  

I love how the silver eyes look with the blue fur, but the pink mane seems out of place.  Imagine how a dark blue or silvery mane would have looked! 

Still cute, though.

Let's see if it's a boy or a girl, and what its name is!

Oh, look!

It's another boy and his name is Ezra.  His favorite color is "rainbow."  Make up your mind, Ezra.

Yet again, he has a different birthday from his same-sized siblings.  Horses don't have twins very often (let alone triplets), so I guess the different birthdays are realistic in that respect.

It's too bad about the mane defect, because Ezra is probably my favorite of the trio:

Here are all three babies together!

Surprizamal baby unicorns, from left: Ezra, Dutchess and Clyde.

At this point, I was dying to know if all of the Jamie sets have these same three babies with the same three names, so I caved and did an internet search...

...and I didn't find much.  Darn it.  I saw one store photo with the same three colors of baby, but no mention of names.  I'm willing to bet that the names and colors are always the same.  Not much of a surprise, in the end.

The quality of the babies isn't as good as the quality of Jamie, and maybe not quite as good as the quality of the regular Surprizamals.  However, the whole group is very cute together and definitely worth $20.

Here's another family shot that shows off Jamie's sparkly eye a bit better:

The other Mama and Baby Surprizamal toy I want to show you today is easier to find than Jamie and her brood.

These toys are single balls but they have two animals inside--a mother and a matching baby:

These might have been the original Mama and Baby release (the name makes more sense with only one baby) but I didn't discover them until after I bought Jamie.

The balls are quite a bit bigger than Jamie's baby balls:

Jamie's unicorn baby ball (left) and a regular Mama and Baby Surprizamal ball (right).

They're even a little bigger than the Wackys ball that I opened during my last review.  I didn't take a picture of this comparison, but the Mama and Baby balls are almost exactly the same size as a L.O.L. Surprise ball.

The plastic wrap on the ball explains that each ball contains two animals and there are 18 different styles to collect.  I think this means 9 Mamas and their 9 Babies, not 18 pairs:

Most of the options are shown on the packaging, but there's a mystery pair that's not pictured:

These balls have holes, too, so we can get a glimpse of the color and guess about which animal we might get:

That looks white or light pink to me.

These balls are almost impossible to open slowly.  The weight of the animals inside makes the ball roll around and open up immediately after the lid is cracked...

It's a pair of pink something...

They're cats!  That little baby doesn't want to show its face, though:

There it is!  How adorable are these two?

Surprizamal Mama and Baby cat pair.

The mama cat has super-soft fur, pink glittery eyes, embroidered facial features, and shimmery pink accents on her ears and back feet:

She has a hang tag on her left ear and three more tags sewn into her back:

She sits up nicely without any weighting in her bottom.  In fact, her head feels more densely-stuffed than her body, but she still doesn't tip over.

The hang tag actually has information about the baby, too, so we're about the see all the rest of the surprises with this pair!

Their names are...

Joelyn and Rylee!  I assume Rylee is a girl.  I think that the birthday and personal traits are for baby Rylee.  The mother doesn't seem to get any traits, poor thing.

Here's Rylee:

She's a great little miniature of Joelyn, with pink glittery eyes, an embroidered nose and mouth, and pink metallic accents in her ears and on her back feet:

One small difference is that while Joelyn's ears are sewn together from two pieces of fabric, Rylee's ears look like one piece of two-sided fabric that's fuzzy on one side and glittery on the other.

She has a really hard time sitting up!

And she's a bit lopsided.  I find this endearing, though:

Rylee is about the same size as one of Jamie's baby unicorns:

Surprizamal babies Rylee (left) and Clyde (right).

The collector's sheet shows Joelyn and Rylee and the other seven known pairs of animals:

I'd love to know what the mystery pair is!  I bet I could find that on the internet (I won't give it away, though!).

I think that the green hearts around Joelyn and Rylee's names mean that they're ultra rare!  

The only categories are "rare," "ultra rare," and "limited edition," though.  How can none of them be common?  That description is unintentionally implying that some of the balls have nothing inside.  Which is not true, of course.

Well, that was fun!  I enjoyed getting a surprise animal and a perfect miniature of that animal all in one ball.  I love miniatures.

The great news is, I have one more of these balls to open!  This one has some grey peeking through the holes:

That means it's either Kris and Kate:

Jean and Jenny:

Or maybe the special mystery pair??

I knew almost immediately after I opened the ball which pair it was!

It's Kris and Kate!

I was excited to see these two because I love their coloring and I also have Hudson the husky from series 3, so we can do a comparison a little later on.

Kris has a wonderful, happy face and I love her dark blue shimmering accents!

She sits up nicely and is very well-constructed.

We already know the names of these two, but here's the rest of the information inside the tag:

I'm not sure how Kate can manage a snowball fight without opposable thumbs...but maybe she's really good at catching and eating the snow?  That's what my dog loves to do.

Here's baby Kate on her own:

She sits up a little better than Rylee, but still tips over fairly frequently.

Here's Kate with series 3 Hudson:

Surprizamal huskies Kate (left) and Hudson (right).

Oh, that's funny!  Kate and Hudson...like Kate Hudson the actor.  That must be a coincidence.

Hudson doesn't have the pretty metallic blue fabric on his ears or feet, but most of his other features are the same as Kate's.  

One interesting difference is with the eyes.  This could just be a manufacturing glitch, but look at how Kate's glittery irises are almost completely hidden by her fur while Hudson's eyes are much more visible.

Here's Kate's eye up close:

And here's Hudson's eye:

I like being able to see all of the glitter in Hudson's eyes.

That was going to be the end of the review, but while I was searching for my Mama and Baby Surprizamal balls, I found another type of Surprizamal that looked really cute!  This one has nothing to do with the Mama and Baby theme.

It's from the Puchi Gumi series:

The Puchi Gumi animals are more stylized than the regular Surprizamals, with egg-shaped bodies and flat faces. There are a few examples shown on the ball's packaging:

The animals remind me a little of the Pikmi Pop animals that I've been hoarding for a future review, although I haven't seen any of those in person yet.

The plastic sleeve has text in English and in Japanese.

The ball itself is bright blue and is larger than a regular Surprizamal ball...but not as large as a Mama and Baby ball.

I opened the ball and out tumbled...

Something round and brown!

It's a little bear!  He is SO cute:

This little guy has very simple embroidered facial features:

He has a bean bag bottom that helps him stand up straight, but he's amazingly soft and cuddly!

His name is Daniel, which is one of my very favorite boy names:

Daniel comes with a collector's sheet that shows all of the other possible Puchi Gumi animals:

Daniel is probably my favorite (how lucky!), but I also like the white cat and the roly-poly panda, Kai:

Daniel is a bit smaller and lighter than the large Surprizamals like Joelyn:

Surprizamals Puchi Gumi Daniel and Mama and Baby Kris.

*Update 4/10

I just found another Surprizamal Puchi Gumi variation and thought I should update!  Apparently, these toys come in at least two different sizes.  It's really hard to determine the sizes from pictures online!

First of all, here's a lineup of the sizes of Surprizamal ball I've found so far:

Surprizamal ball size, from left: regular (and baby unicorns), Puchi Gumi large, Wackys (same size as Puchi Gumi large), and Mama and Baby.

Here are the two sizes of Puchi Gumi side-by-side:

But, as you can see, when I zoom in, it's impossible to tell which size is which!

Puchi Gumi small ball.

The plastic is a slightly lighter shade of blue on the small ball...

Puchi Gumi large ball.

...but it's too subtle a difference to see when the balls are separated.  Definitely something to watch for if you're shopping online.

I'm sure you want to know what animal was in that little ball, right?  I know I did!

It's the pink pig!

Squee!

She is ridiculously soft, just like Daniel, but she does not have a bean bag bottom, and her legs and ears are cut from one piece of fabric, not sewn together with two pieces of fabric.

Her name is Ayumi and she likes cherry blossoms:

To conclude this update, here's small Ayumi with large Daniel:

Small Puchi Gumi pig, Ayumi, and large Puchi Gumi bear, Daniel.

Bottom line?  My kids would have loved the Surprizamals when they were really young.  They are so soft and cuddly, and their size is just right for little hands to carry around during the day or clutch tightly at night.  In fact, one of my eldest son's all-time favorite stuffed friends was a little hippo that looked and felt a lot like Daniel the Puchi Gumi bear.

As much as I enjoyed revealing Jamie's three unicorn babies, that trio is the least well made out of any of the Surprizamal toys I've owned.  The babies are adorable, but two of them had defects in their glued-on forelocks and all of them looked a little squished and flat, even after I tried to fluff them up.

The Mama and Baby pairs that come together in their own ball are great.  I really love identical miniatures of larger toys, so the babies are appealing to me.  However, I can see how other collectors might not want both animals in the ball to look so similar.  Also, because there are so few of these pairs available, the chances of getting a duplicate are very high.  I recommend peeking into those holes in the plastic balls if you can, to increase the chances of getting a pair you want!

I appreciate that even though there are some animal duplicates between the regular Surprizamal series and the Mama and Baby collection (like the husky babies Hudson and Kate), the Beverly Hills Teddy Bear Company has made sure that there are small differences to distinguish the same animals from each group.

Despite his simplicity, I think Daniel the Puchi Gumi is my favorite of all the Surprizamals I've opened--that or maybe my second favorite next to Pam.  It's hard to decide.  Daniel is so soft and velvety, and I can totally picture him becoming the best-loved companion of a very young child.

The only problems with the Surprizamal line are that there's a risk of duplicates (as there is with any surprise toy) and the prices on the secondary market are way too high.  Jamie and her babies are worth $20, but certainly not $100.  The paired Mama and Baby sets and the Puchi Gumi series are worth no more than $12 and $6 respectively.  If you pay a fair price and keep an eye out for doubles, I can't imagine being unhappy with these well-made cuties.

Surprizamal Mama and Baby pairs Joelyn and Rylee (left) and Kris and Kate (right).