I first bought Color Wonder markers for my daughter when she was about 3 years old. She had been using regular magic markers and making a big mess. When I heard of this product, I decided to give them a try and I was pleased with the results. She had several sets over the years and finally grew into being able to use regular magic markers again. Now, I have a 2.5 year old son. He wants to color with the magic markers his sister is using but I sure don’t need that kind of mess! So, I remembered the Crayola Color Wonder Markers and I went out and bought him a set.

The Set

I bought him a set that came with a coloring book and the special Color Wonder Markers. The coloring book has 24 single sided pages to color. The set that I got had a travel theme so there were pictures of cars and trains among other transportation pictures. My son really appreciated that as he is very interested in these things right now.

The set also came with a box of six special Color Wonder Magic Markers. The markers are: red, yellow, green, blue, purple, and orange. Each one looks like a regular magic marker and has a white body that says “Color Wonder” on it and the appropriate colored cap. The caps snap on tightly so that the markers won’t dry out. My son sometimes has a hard time getting the tops off but he can usually do it himself. The tops sit neatly on the opposite end of the marker while you are using the marker and my son has learned to do that!

The tips of the markers look completely color-less. And, if you color on any surface other than Color Wonder paper, it is color-less. However, when you use the Color Wonder markers on the Color Wonder paper or coloring books, the appropriate color will magically appear!

My Experiences

I have not yet found a surface that my children can write on with these markers that leaves a stain. My son especially likes to color on the sliding glass door and it does not leave any traces there. (I have been trying to discourage this anyway but at least it does not leave a mess!) My son also has a tendency to color on walls and carpeting and neither of these seem any worse for the wear. I am pleased about that. It is so hard to keep up with my son that I never know what mess he will get into next. When my daughter was this age, I only let her color at the table and that really did help with some of the mess. Now she is older and my son sees her coloring in the play room and he wants to do the same so it is nice for him to at least have these markers that will not make much mess! I still try to make him sit at his little table and to clean up the markers when he is done!

The coloring pages in the Color Wonder coloring books are only one sided and this seems kind of wasteful to me. I wish that the opposite side were at least coated with whatever it is that makes the colors appear so that children could at least make their own creations on the backs but this is not the case. The twenty four pages get colored on pretty quickly. Luckily, my son does like to go back and color some more on pages he has previously colored so that is good.

The only other problem I have with the Color Wonders is their price. It is about $7 for the set with the coloring book and the magic markers. I have looked all over and have not been able to find a coloring book that does not come without the markers. As we remember to put the caps on after using them, all of our markers are still in good working condition so we don’t need more markers. Nonetheless, we have to pay the price for the markers and book just to get a new book to color on. This seems so wasteful to me and I wish that we could get just the books or at least plain paper

Recommendations

I would recommend this set to others. It has proved popular with my children and we have gotten a lot of use out of it. Although there are some things that I feel could be better, it is still a worthwhile set to have for toddlers who would otherwise just make a huge mess out of regular magic markers. I will continue to buy these sets until my toddler is old enough to color with regular magic markers and not make a mess!