CONTEST CLOSED!

We have our two winners!  Congratulations to Lynn Matthews and Michelle!  Please send me your mailing address within 72 hours, and I’ll get these in the mail for you!

The My Little Pony franchise is one of the recently resurrected ‘80s-era toy lines that seek to capitalize on fond memories of parents who grew up with stables full of brightly-colored plastic ponies with wild, multi-colored locks. I am one of those parents. My sisters and I would spend hours parading our ponies through the living room, brushing their hair, and even dressing them up.

When ponies hit the toy market again I was happy to show my daughters the simple joys that they’d brought to my life as a child. It’s no great surprise that I was excited to watch My Little Pony – Twinkle Wish Adventure with my daughters to see what animated adventures the next generation ponies were up to. When confronted in-store with the pearly-pink and ever so twinkly box design, parents of girl-children will have a hard time resisting this latest pony release.

Twinkle Wish Adventure finds the ponies preparing for their winter festival where the Wishing Star will wake from it’s year long slumber to grant each pony a special wish. However, everything goes wrong when a huge dragon kidnaps the Wishing Star. The ponies are off to recover this vital ingredient for their festivities. In the process of this voyage simple lessons about friendship, reconciliation, and honesty are conveyed.

I was a bit surprised to find that the pony’s seasonal festival closely resembles the secular-consumerist holiday of contemporary Christmas celebrations. When I think winter festival my thoughts turn to Quebecois celebrations of snow, ice, and maple syrup – the ponies do go skating and participate in other outdoor activities, but their celebration is centered on mainstream Christmas traditions – baking cookies, making ornaments, and a huge evergreen that they adorn with their handmade contributions and the Wishing Star himself. If like us, you don’t celebrate in this way, you’ll likely want to pass on this title despite the pony-goodness. If you do go in for light-hearted, secular holiday celebrations – read on for details.

The pony’s adventures are punctuated with songs that get my girls up and dancing every time they watch the movie, including the restyled My Little Pony theme song. The animation is bright and fun, filled with flowing multi-colored pony hair and plenty of pink, sparkly moments. Some of the teaching moments are handled too briefly and without much depth – for example, the moment in which an apology for lying is made is incredibly short and there is no real remorse shown in the character.

Shout! Factory goes all-out with the bonus features. Our family’s favorite is the six “Sing-A-Longs”; drawing from the My Little Ponytheme song, four songs from the movie, and a bonus song, the lyrics show along the bottom of the screen and turn pink as they are sung. A short prequel to Twinkle Wish Adventure “Waiting for the Winter Wishes Festival” is included along with “Elefun andFriends” is a 22-minute vintage-primitive animated cartoon that also focuses on the theme of friendship. The DVD also contains four holiday printables in .pdf format, and access to downloadable pony activities. No scene selection navigation is found on the disc however.

At 81 minutes running time My Little Pony – Twinkle Wish Adventure contains all the pink holiday party fun a little girl could hope for. Something I’ve discovered is that you can’t go back in time – in all honesty I found the film a bit inane – my children love it though. This is one to pop in and head while you tackle some overdue chores, it’s not at all appealing to adults (no matter how much we loved My Little Pony as kids), but it’s a fun, light-hearted movie for the little ones.

CLICK HERE TO BUY NOW AT AMAZON.COM!

CONTEST DETAILS:

Thanks to Shout! Factory I have 2 copies of My Little Pony: Twinkle Wish Adventure to give away to two blessed winner sin the U.S. or Canada!  To enter, simply leave a comment and let me know why you’d like to win!.

For additional entries:

1. Subscribe to this blog for updates – see the left hand sidebar. Leave an additional comment letting me know you’ve subscribed (or if you already subscribe).

2. Write a post on your blog promoting and linking to this contest. Leave an additional comment with a link to your post.

3. Add the Quiverfull Family button (see the code box in the right hand sidebar under BUTTON UP!) to your blog’s sidebar, or let me know if you already have the button displayed. Leave an additional comment with a link to your post.

4. Digg, Stumble, Tweet, Facebook or otherwise share this post on a social networking site. Leave an additional comment indicating how you shared this post.

5. Follow me on Twitter or let me know if you are an existing follower.

Each additional step taken counts for 1 additional entry. A total of 6 entries are available if you complete all of these steps. Please leave a separate comment for each entry!

The contest will close at 12 a.m. MST on Wednesday, December 09th, 2009. Two (2) winners will be randomly drawn for a copy of My Little Pony: Twinkle Wish Adventure on Thursday, December 10th, 2009 and notified by email. Please fill your email address in the comment form when you are completing your comment so that I can contact you. The winners must respond with a mailing address within 72 hours of my email, or a new winner will be chosen. This contest is open to those living in the US/Canada.

I look forward to seeing God bless a reader with these DVDs!