3rd & Bird The Muffin Express & Other Stories Audio CD – Unabridged, 8 Jan. 2009

thank you

This is probably ideal for most younger toddlers. Even if they don't know the TV programme then they'll like the bouncy cheerful nature of the whole thing and split into 10 minute sections you won't, or hopefully won't, have to endure it for too long because, let's be honest for most adults this is quite gratingly annoying.

There are 50 mins of storytime and singing on this CD split into 10 min segments.It is all together too loud, chirpy, shrieky and annoying for me to listen to for long BUT (as is typical) my toddler nearly 3 clearly enjoys it. So it does seem to entertain and appeal to the target audience even though there are other CDs she likes better than this one which is why I've not given 5 stars.Perhaps she would have liked it more, seeing the actual TV show (on CBeebies first) but she came to the CD not knowing any of the characters so it took a few goes before she really liked listening to it. I've found this with a lot of CDs/DVDs that even if your child says they don't like them initially, put them away for a little while and re-introduce them a little later. Many my toddler didn't like at first (Maisy, Bagpuss) are firm favourites now.I would say a good buy especially if your child likes the TV show.

My little three year old quite enjoys Third and Bird on the TV. It's not a favourite but he likes the songs and bright animation. As a grown up, I'm not so sure what I make of it - it's certainly not Charlie and Lola, or dare I say Peppa Pig... but if it makes him happy.We've tried a few Audio CDs in the past with mixed results including Teletubbies and In The Night Garden (which we didn't like) as well as the forementioned Charlie and Lola (My Extremely Good Story Collection and Charlie and Lola's Favourite and Best Music Record - including Bestest in the Barn - which we did like).Judging this on it's own merits, I thought it was very good. You get five happy stories full of songs that are fun to sing along with (rhyming trousers and houses is worthy of some praise). The transition from TV to audio CD, largely on account of all those chirpy songs, seems quite effortless - in fact I almost prefer the audio CD version! As a grown up I didn't find it too annoying to listen to and the little one now asks for it quite regularly when we're driving along. Frankly, anything that give me five minutes break from the Cars Soundtrack has got to be worth Four stars of my money.

My wife and I read to our children in bed most nights. They love the third and bird series on television and this seemed to be a good way to save my voice as it is a little sore as I write this. I let the children listen to it in bed in the hope that it would settle them down.The CD is well made and features a large number of songs from the series. The recordings appear to be sound tracks from the television series and the script lacks some detail for what you might expect for an audio production, for this I have deducted a star. If your children know the characters from the television series then the voices are distinctive and there is no problem, but for me who has not really watched it, it was difficult to understand what was going on until I had listened to three of the five ten minute stories featured on the disk.The format is fairly similar in that there is a small bit of chatter from the main characters surrounding some nice songs with a well played and recorded jazzy sound track. Rather than settling the children it it kept them wide awake and we got the story books out and read those instead. All in all it makes the disc ideal for long car journeys, where it can keep the children entertained for about an hour. It is good for this because being mostly song based and with little spoken dialogue you don't have to concentrate to hard to get the gist of the episode.In summary, a well produced disc for fans of the series. If you haven't watched it on TV there is not enough of a story to understand what is going on.

3rd and Bird is a lovely colourful, musically driven program that has run on Cbeebies until fairly recently. It features the adventures of three small birds and is just wonderful to get little ones interested in music. It runs for around 9 minutes and is highly addictive for adults too.This is a collection of 5 stories in audio form which I was a little cynical about working as it misses out on the beautiful visuals of the cartoon. However, the music is fantastic and it's proven addictive for my little two year old who loves the songs and adventures of the three friends.What this does over the DVD is to allow your little one to play with other toys whilst listening to the stories, so tearing them away from constant TV viewing, a god send in my view!

I'm sure that any young fan of the TV series will love this - and those who have never seen it will also enjoy it I'm sure.Five delightful stories peppered with cheerful songs make it really good fun to listen to and all the charachters are there - Muffin being a particular favourite in our house and I personally love the bird references - 'Come on everybirdy' etc...It drops a star because, to me, the narration at times sounded stilted and patched together rather than the natural flow you would achieve from having all the characters recording it together but, hey, my 3 year old loves it and is utterly hooked (it goes everwhere with us at the moment!) and I'll allow him to be the judge...

I love 3rd and Bird. It is seriously cute without being too annoying and the theme songs are really catchy. This took a while for my 3 year old to take to and I think it would have been better with a book to accompany it. Now however she is listening to it at bed time and enjoys it almost as much as me! Has 5 stories of 10 minutes each so just the right length to keep a little one's attention.