Need emergency help to avoid disappointed 6 year old!!

[xmascaroltygirl]

dd1 (6) in her letter to Santa asked for "an oven of her own".

Not knowing any better, we ordered her a Junior Ready Steady Cook oven. It has arrived and we opened it, intending to wrap it out of its box.

It is the biggest load of CRAP I have ever seen. Absolutely tiny for a start, and within that tiny box the cooking area is only big enough to cook TWO FAIRY CAKES. In thirty minutes.

There is no way on this earth that I am giving this to my daughter as a present from Santa. It would be embarrassing. She would be so disappointed.

Does anyone know of anything better? Anything at all? She wants it to "really cook" but that was her only specification. If you know of anything please, please let me know because we only have a day or two to get hold of it. Another problem is that we live in N.I. and lots of shops aren't available over here and it's too late to mail order it now. AAAARGH Bl**dy Junior Ready Steady Cook - apparently their other products are rubbish as well but we didn't realise this.

can you get her loads of baking stuff of her own and free reign of your oven for a day? recipie books, tins, etc.

It's a bit boring-looking and not very safe for her to have on her own, but is it worth thinking about something like this ?

Thank you!

Misdee, we thought of exactly that, and thought we had it sorted until we remembered it was meant to be from Santa.

Tinsel, we are now seriously tempted by that one and are going to ring around some local places to see if they have anything similar in stock. It will mean going way above our budget for dd1 but fortunately dd2 is only 3 and won't notice, and also as far as they're both concerned all the presents come from Santa!

I can see there's going to be a lot of frantic activity over the next couple of days...

Good luck! I am sure it would be quite easy to get proper ones like that- we've got an old one we used when our kitchen was out of action. I think places like Comet and Currys would do them. Maybe you could customise it with a few stickers??

I'm a member of another site and a lot of them talk about a Hasbro Easy Bake Oven:

www.hasbro.com/pl/page.viewproduct/product_id.14501/dn/easybake/default.cfm

I have searched and searched and have not been able to find a UK supplier but you might have more luck.

Good luck!

This one's only £90.

This one's £99 but looks nicer.

Can you get your money back on the crap one?

Can't you get her the baking trays, recipe book, etc for your oven and do a lovely letter from Santa saying that he's had asked you if it's OK to use your oven?

This is great - thanks for the links as well!

We certainly hope to get our money back, or at least vouchers, from Argos where we got it. It really is the crappest thing imaginable - dh (a.k.a. Santa) is also steaming mad and composing his snotty letter to JRSC/the BBC at this very moment.

Fortunately she hasn't seen an advert for the JRSC one - although I intend to look out for them myself to see exactly what claims they make for the damn things!

Have also been told that the milkshake maker can just about stir water, and the marshmallow maker involves holding your thumb on a button for 5 minutes and waiting ages to get a teaspoonful of soggy goo.

The awkward thing is that - thinking she was getting something more approximating to the real thing - my sister has got her a recipe book and apron, etc.

I'm pretty definite that we're going to go for one of these mini-kitchen things. The main thing is trying to find something in time - if not we might have to write the Santa letter explaining that the elves are still making it!

Once again, a curse upon Junior Ready Steady Cook. I'm a bit cross about this, can you tell?

Can't your DD just use your oven?

She could indeed, ChicPea, and I said that to her several times as she was preparing her letter to Santa! But no - she wants a "real one of her own".

Having slept on it, however, dh and I have decided we just aren't happy with getting her an actual adult-sized "real" one. What we really need is a decently-made child's one, but the only one available (especially at mega-short notice) is the JRSC one. So Santa is going to write her a letter explaining that she isn't quite big enough for a real oven yet, but to get lots of practice in at cooking with Mummy, and in the meantime here's something she can make yummy food with... and her present is instead going to be a popcorn maker. (Not JRSC, having seen some of the MN threads on that subject!)

Thanks for advice,

SG