Don't Forget - Last Day of 'August 2010 Squishy Photo Contest!

This 4th of July photo is from our 1st place winner from our July 2010 AlyssaSays.com Photo Contest. This is to give you an idea of what we are looking for! We look for orignality and creativity! DON'T FORGET - Today is the very last day to enter our August 2010 Squishy Photo contest. You could win a fabulous and free packages of all kinds of cool AlyssaSays.com goodies! Here are the rules for our August 2010 Squishies Photo Contest. We can't wait to see your entry! August 2010 Squishies Photo Contest! Back to School! Yes, it is Back to School Time! For our August 2010 contest, please create photos of your Squishies and/or Japanese Erasers in a "Back To School" Theme! Be creative and enter as many times as you want through August 31, 2010! We will announce the winners approximately September 2nd. Please send all photo entries in .jpg format to larissar6@hotmail.com. Please include your name, age, mailing address with your entry. Winners will receive a www.alyssasays.com prize package full of cool squishies and other merchandise! GOOD LUCK! And don't forget to check out our past winners! If you are already back in school, we hope you are having a lot of fun! SquishiesRule.com Alyssa Says Squishies Rule!

Check out Squishy Neighborhood

Squishy Neighborhood!

Check out this awesome squishy neighborhood made by a http://www.alyssasays.com/ customer! It is super awesome! It is made out of cardboard, duct tape and paint. Each squishy animal has its own unique house! Do you have a photo to share with us? E-mail it to larissar6@hotmail.com and we can post it here or on our website http://www.alyssasays.com/

Thank you, Sophia, for sending us this great photo. You have great artistic abilities!

Sophia said that she started off by making individual homes for each of her squishy animals. But then somebody suggested to her that she just make an entire neighborhood! That's what she did - she made and entire squishy neighborhood.

SquishiesRule.com Alyssa Says Squishies Rule!

Now Selling Halloween Silly Bracelets

Set of 12 Includes 2 of each design: Cats, Pumpkins, Bats, Witches, Spiders, Moons Get yours before they sell out! Mixture of orange and black silly bracelets! $2.99 per set of 12 Fun to Collect and Trade your Shape Rubber Bands! Wear these shape bracelets on your wrists as bracelets, collect them or trade them! SquishiesRule.com Alyssa Says Squishies Rule! http://squishiesrule.com/sillybands.html

Squishies Rule!

We Love Hearing from Our Customers!

We just received this great note from one of our customers:

"Hello Alyssa, THANK YOU sooo much we received the deluxe package today!! It made our daughter VERY happy and it was the icing on her cake!! All she asked for was squishies for her birthday!! Once again THANK YOU and keep rockin' the GREAT WEBSITE!!!"

Thank you for your letter. We love to hear from all of our customers at http://www.alyssasays.com/!

P.S. Don't forget to enter our AUGUST squishy photo contest!! Tomorrow is the very last day to enter. We will be introducing our September contest soon! SQUISHIES RULE!!

http://squishiesrule.com/entermonthlycontest.html

SquishiesRule.com Alyssa Says Squishies Rule!

Say Hi to Microhyla

Microhyla Nepenthicola is probably the world's smallest frog. It's been discovered recently in a national park in Malaysia. When fully grown, it's about the size of a pea.

SquishiesRule.comAlyssa Says Squishies Rule!

Only Two Days Left to Enter August Contest!

Only 2 Days Left to Enter Our August Squishies Photo Contest!

Check out the details at http://squishiesrule.com/entermonthlycontest.html

Magic Water Beads Now Available!

Magic Water Beads Photo Beads http://squishiesrule.com/magicwaterbeads.html Magic Water Beads (rainbow water crystals) are the newest rage among grade school children today! Soak in water and they grow in size. They are soft, squishy, and bouncy. Each one of these Magic Beads grows to the size of a marble or larger. They are much larger than those you can find at a store! We feature Magic Water Beads in 7 different colors. Since these are special photo beads each water bead will have a unique 3D marble effect. They are fun to collect and trade. Other uses for Magic Water Beads include: •Great for collecting and trading! •Fun to bounce around (like a bouncy ball) •Can be used to create your own air freshener - just soak in your favorite fragrant oil and the smell will last up to 3 months, and then just resoak them again! •Decoration (use them in your favorite vase or flower display) •Use in place of stones or marbles. •They make great birthday and holiday gifts for kids (and even the grown ups like them)! •Use them for watering your indoor or outdoor plants (they retain water to keep your plants watered) •Collect them in jars or containers to play with (they are soft and squishy) Soak them for 8hrs get 1/2gal, Soak them for 24hrs get 3/4 gal Remember, these can be grown larger than the store bought kind!! SquishiesRule.com Alyssa Says Squishies Rule!

We love to hear from you!!

We love to hear from all of our squishies fans and customers! We really love your stories and hearing about your favorite squishies and toys. Here is a nice letter we just received from one of our fans! "I just got the squishies yesterday, and my dad showed them to me last night. im sooo happy and excited that they came so fast. ill try to send a picture but i make all of my squishies houses out of cardboard jewlery boxes. they each have a bed, a table, and 2 chairs. ive already started, but im making a neighborhood out of a flattened cardboards tv box. i spray-painted it green for grass and the roads are duck tape. its gonna be amazing I hope!" We can't wait to see your photo of your homemade Squishies Neighborhood!! We will post the photo as soon as we get it. Thank you so much!

SquishiesRule.com Alyssa Says Squishies Rule!

Yikes!!!

This is one scary looking creature! SquishiesRule.com Alyssa Says Squishies Rule!

Coming Soon to AlyssaSays.com! Photo Water Beads

Coming Soon to www.alyssasays.com! Photo Water Beads! Photo Water Beads offered in various colors! Soak these little things in water and in 8-10 hours they magically have a cool 3D design inside! It is amazing and incredible! These are known by several names - Water Beads, Photo Beads, designer water beads, flower water beads! The beads absorb over 100 times their weight in water to form glass-like pearls. Remember as a kid you used to play with the glass marbles? Well, these water marbles look exactly like glass marbles except that they contain mainly water. Like water crystals they swell in water, but instead of a solid color, the magic water marbles are transparent with colored core or colored inner swirl. The water crystals expand to nice spheres was completely soaked. After eleven hours the water crystal volume has expanded by 14100%. SquishiesRule.com Alyssa Says Squishies Rule!

Sqwishland.com

(Scottsdale, Arizona, July 2010) – Sqwishland.com® is taking the online world by storm with 29 million units sold and it’s just out of Beta – making the iPad sales look sluggish. With its very simple concept, it’s hard to know why it hasn’t been done before. Think vending machine meets virtual world. Is it an affordable Webkinz® or the new Club Penguin®? In fact, it’s both – it’s a world first and for as little as 25c, every kid can afford to be part of it. It is democracy in a capsule – for parents of the global financial crisis, it’s a social equalizer. SquishiesRule.com Alyssa Says Squishies Rule!

This is Nora, a Rothschild giraffe, and her newborn baby boy. Rothschild giraffes are endangered and there are only a few hundred giraffes living in the wild. Rothschild giraffes are distinguishable from other giraffes by the coloring of their coat, also called a pelt. It looks like they are wearing white stockings as they do not have markings on their lower legs. Rothschild giraffes are born with five horns. Two of the horns are at the top of the head, the third is in the center of the forehead and the fourth and fifth are behind the ears. They are also much taller than other giraffes, up to 20 ft. tall. SquishiesRule.com Alyssa Says Squishies Rule!

Barnyard Squishies

Barnyard Squishies! Sqwishland is proud to announce the latest world in the Sqwishland game: Barnyard!! Sqwishland has developed a whole new set of characters that are the best yet! Sheep, Bull, Rooster, Horse and Goat are already in the game, and will be avaiable at SquishiesRule.com Soon! SquishiesRule.com Alyssa Says Squishies Rule!

And They Lived Happily Ever After!

This picture should remind us that we need to look out for all animals. Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission says the black bear cub can finally enjoy a good meal and get a drink of water. The clear plastic container was removed from the 6-month-old cub's head after being stuck for at least 10 days. The cub poked its head into the jar when digging through trash in a neighborhood in central Florida. SquishiesRule.com Alyssa Says Squishies Rule!

Pettoos Series # 3 Now Available!

Pettoos Series # 3 Pencil Toppers - Set of 10! Get all 10 Cool Pencil Toppers - Octopus, Bumble Bee, Lion, Dinosaur, Seal, Fox, Tiger, Polar Bear, Killer Whale and Camel! Only $2.99 for all 10 Toppers What a great way to get back into the school spirit! Perfect for decorating the tops of your pencils and pens for back to school! http://squishiesrule.com/newproducts.html SquishiesRule.com Alyssa Says Squishies Rule!

Check out our Friend Bella's Kids Cooking Blog!

Bella Bits Blog

http://www.bellabits.blogspot.com/

With kid-friendly recipes and tips, I want to inspire other kids to cook and their parents to join in on the fun. I plan to explore cooking and life in general, blogging all the way!

Here is just one of her great recipes to check out:
Tonight, after swimming, my mom wanted us to make a healthy dessert. She suggested baked apples, which we have never tried before. We made them with diet cherry dr.pepper, and they were quick and delicious

Easy Recipe for 2 apples:.

1. Remove 3/4 of the apple core (leaving bottom in tact so the fillings stay in the apple) and all seeds, using apple corer.

2. Fill the apple with Diet D. Pepper, top with a sprinkle of brown sugar and cinnamon, and a dab of butter..

3.stick it in the microwave for up to3 min.

Now you have a nice healthy dessert and this is also good for a yummy afternoon snack.

Sqwendy's Yummy Food!

The Squishies are enjoying their Sqwendy's Hamburgers!

Sqwendy's Hamburgers!

Sqwendy's Hamburgers

Home of the Famous Hamburgers

The squishies are having a great time eating hamburgers at Sqwendy's!

PETTOOS Series # 3 Coming Next Week to SquishiesRule.com

PETTOOS SERIES # 3

The newest series of squishy pencil toppers... will be available at SquishiesRule.com approximately August 11th! 

Pettoos Series #3 are the newest series of Pettoos.  They will be much more detailed than the previous series!  Including a polar bear, lion, dinosaur and more!!!  Stay tuned to SquishiesRule.com for more details!  These squishies are guaranteed to be the coolest!

Isn't She Cute?

This is a photo of the first baby California Sea Lion born at the Wildlife Conservation Society’s New York Aquarium.  She is pictured with her mother, Clarice, but no word yet on her name.  She is so cute!  If you happen to go to the aquarium and see her, get a picture for us and we'll post it!

August 2010 Squishies Photo Contest!

August 2010 Squishies Photo Contest!

Back to School!

http://squishiesrule.com/entermonthlycontest.html

 

Yes, it is Back to School Time! For our August 2010 contest, please create photos of your Squishies and/or Japanese Erasers in a "Back To School" Theme!

Be creative and enter as many times as you want through August 31, 2010! We will announce the winners approximately September 2nd.

Please send all photo entries in .jpg format to larissar6@hotmail.com. Please include your name, age, mailing address with your entry.

Winners will receive a www.alyssasays.com prize package full of cool squishies and other merchandise! GOOD LUCK! And don't forget to check out our past winners!

SquishiesRule.com

Announcing the Winners of the July 2010 Patriotic Contest!! SquishiesRule.com

Announcing the Winners of the July 2010 Patriotic Contest!!

In celebration of our country's Day of Independence, we asked our customers to send in photos of their pencil toppers and/or erasers in a 4th of July/Patriotic theme.

Our first place winners were Sierra and Kara from Colorado! Their photo was 99% homemade! It featured a family reunion, camping and picnic for the 4th of July! Way to go, Sierra and Kara! The outhouse is too funny!

Our First Place SquishiesRule.com Winner!

Our Second Place Winner was Aleah, Age 9, from Indiana! She made an awesome photo of squishies watching the 4th of July Fireworks Show! Great Job, Aleah!!

Congratulations to the SquishiesRule.com Winners! 

KEEP UP THE GREAT WORK!

Thank you to EVERYONE who entered!  Choosing the winners is always tough! 

Game play reinvented for children! Sqwishland.com

Game play reinvented for children

http://www.philstar.com/Article.aspx?articleId=598782&publicationSubCategoryId=71

By Eden Estopace (The Philippine Star) Updated August 02, 2010

MANILA, Philippines - Much of the known world has turned turtle when the world turned digital from books to music and movies to gaming. What is it like now to be a kid born in the Internet era with all the gadgets and technologies at one’s disposal?

Children still make trips to the toy store and even the mom-and-pop shops in the neighborhood. But most kids in the United States and much of the developed world also get scratch cards that dish out random codes entitling them to a round of play on the toymaker’s website.

That’s how it goes, at least for two very popular kiddie games in the US - ActionJetz and Sqwishland.

ActionJetz is an educational online airplane game for kids and the young at heart. But to enter this virtual world of aviation, one needs a pass code provided for free when one buys an Actionjetz airplane at the toy store.

The plane is not your ordinary plastic or rubber plane, though. It’s die cast metal and a collector’s item in itself that sells for $19.99. The pass code entitles the kid to navigate the Actionjetz world, select an avatar, play mini games, and talk to other players in the true marriage of the online and offline worlds.

Another game, Sqwishland, takes off from the popular fun pencil toppers that school children love. Like Actionjetz, Sqwishland sells sqwishes or soft collectible animal figures that could be used as pencil toppers at vending machines in the US for 25 cents and carries a pass code that entitles one to join the Sqwishland world online.

Sqwishes are very much like the candy, bubblegum and small toys we find in vending machines in groceries and hypermarkets.

Though the jets and the sqwishes are not available in the Philippines, the design team of the game development company that brought this innovative game play, Funguy Studio, is based in Manila and has a manufacturing base in China.

It’s one thing to develop a killer app and completely another thing to find the elusive business model that will bring in revenue. But Funguy Studio somehow found a way to connect the missing, often invisible dots between game creation and sound business strategy.

Specializing in casual massively multiplayer online (MMO) game and creating platforms for high-quality games available through premium content subscription, free-to-play and micro-transaction models, Funguy Studio is headquartered in Scottsdale, Arizona and a partnership between Filipino game developer Darwin Jerome Tardio and Graeme Warring, a 20-year veteran of entrepreneurship and building youth-oriented brands.

Niche gaming market

It was a niche gaming market and the combination of skills of Tardio and Warring that proved to be the potent brew for the market success of Actionjetz and Sqwishland game plays.

In an interview, Tardio said that as of April this year, around 30,000 Actionjetz had been sold in the market, only two years after the game’s inception. Sqwishland, on the other hand, has sold millions of sqwishes in vending machines through Brand Vending.

Tardio disclosed that hardcore gaming for teenagers and young adults is already an overcrowded market that he and partner Warring decided to focus on educational online games for children, taking also into consideration their respective professional expertise.

The idea of the vending machine as a retail outlet for small toys is ripe in the sense that it is widely deployed in convenience stores, movie theaters, gas stations, malls, train stations, airports, bus terminals, arcades, theme parks, and even pizza parlors in America.

There are actually around 3.7 million vending heads in the US and the potential market size of this retail space is around $465 million a year. Between May 2010 and April 2011, it is estimated that 58 million Sqwishland characters will be sold by Brand Vending.

Tardio said Funguy Studio, which now has a staff of 50 in Manila, expects to launch in other markets in Europe and Asia in the near future, and possibly in the Philippines when vending machines for small toys becomes more widespread in the country.

In the meantime, the company is expanding at a rapid pace in the country. From only four game developers with Tardio at the helm, the Manila team is now composed of 50 staffers.

Bright future

Tardio, who sits in the board of the Game Development Association of the Philippines (GDAP), said the future is bright for game development in the Philippines, considering the talent that abounds in the country.

In the US alone, game development is said to be a $90-billion industry and still growing. It is just a matter of continuously attracting young people to take on game development as a profession, Tardio said.

Tardio is himself a classic example of a veteran hardcore teenage gamer who transformed his youthful passion into a profession and made it big. He said he played the stuff most gamers in his generation were into - from Atari to Counterstrike to War Craft – before tucking in a Computer Science degree and eventually crossing over to coding and action scripts.

From tech to business and the continuous, ever-evolving loop of the online and offline worlds, Tardio is right at the center. Long after he coded his first program, he could very well say again, “Hello, World.”

GET YOUR SQUISHIES at SquishiesRule.com!