I really enjoyed making Bingo overall! I bought both the Bluey and Bingo kits for my 10-year-old daughter, who is almost 11, after she asked for them. She started Bluey but found herself needing my help quite a bit and ultimately wasn’t able to finish it on her own. I completely understand that she is younger than the recommended 12+ age, but as someone who occasionally crochets myself, I could tell pretty quickly that I wouldn’t really consider these beginner-level projects.
There are quite a few individual pieces to crochet, position and attach, and some of the assembly requires more patience and experience than I would expect from a kit marketed specifically toward beginners. I’d personally put this closer to an intermediate-level Woobles project, or at least an advanced beginner project.
I also wish all of the instructional videos had been created specifically for Bingo. Some of the videos are recycled from other Woobles projects. They still teach the necessary technique, but for a character with this many details, having every step demonstrated directly on Bingo would have made the experience feel more polished and easier for a true beginner to follow.
That said, I had a lot of fun with it! I decided to customize my Bingo rather than follow the finished design exactly. I added legs, changed the tummy and inner ears, added eyebrows and made a different tail to get her a little closer to the look I wanted.
One thing I really appreciated was how generous the kit was with materials. There was enough extra yarn for me to make all of those additional pieces and still have yarn left over. Aside from the woven inner ears, I was able to use skills taught in the original instructions to create my additions simply by adapting the stitch counts. I think that says a lot about how useful the techniques are once you understand them.
Overall, it was a fun project and I’m really happy with how my Bingo turned out. I’d definitely recommend it — I’d just go into it expecting something a little more involved than the “for beginners” label might suggest.