How to make a rainbow pull string pinata

Firstly I have to admit that I have never actually seen a piñata in action. But we are having a little birthday party for Harry this weekend, and I wanted to do something a bit different so I thought I'd have a go at making our own piñata. I wasn't sure about having a piñata to be bashed about with sticks (what a waste of my hard work!) so I thought that I would have a go at a pull string version, with the added bonus that I am hoping it can be re-used year after year! Harry's party is going to have a rainbow theme (all based around a certain pinnable masterpiece of the cake variety, which I am hoping to pull off) so I went with rainbow colours.

I was at a bit of a loss with how to begin, as all the piñata tutorials that I found were very fancy and involved papier mache and balloons. However this pull-string pinata tutorial gave me the confidence to have a go at a simple version using a box.

I used one of the many rectangular cardboard boxes that we have hanging around after Christmas. Harry helped me to paint it red all over, then I made fringed strips from tissue and coloured paper (whatever we had about) in rainbow colours to glue along the sides. I added a loop of string to the top so that it could be hung up.

The bottom of the piñata is one large flap, which we also painted red. I found it best to make the flap open over the entire bottom of the box, so that nothing gets caught inside.

To make the pull strings I used some of that metallic ribbon that I keep for decorating wrapped presents and never use. I made 15 strings. The winning string is knotted firmly in place, with extra tape for good measure. The other strings are just threaded through using a large needle and pull out easily. To uncurl the ribbons, the piñata spent the night on the dining table with the ribbons stretched out and flattened under large books.

I filled it with various sweets and treats. This is a delicate process, as of course the weight of the sweets inside forces the flap open, so you need to secure it in place. After a few experiments, I found that four strips of tissue paper, each about 1cm wide, glued into place around the edges of the flap worked well. Then hang it up (or pass to a tall, responsible adult) and let children take it in turns to pull a string and see who is showered with goodies!

Creating a role play area - Doctor's Surgery

One of the things on my Day Zero Project was to create a role play area for Harry and Mia. I was inspired to make one because we've been looking around various pre-schools and schools lately and they all have one. They look really fun, both to create and play in, and we were able to make space for one in Harry's bedroom.

I used our room divider to mark out the area, and covered the walls with a sheet to curtain it off. Then I asked Harry what sort of role play area he would like to start with. I made a few suggestions, and he chose a Doctor's Surgery. Part of the fun was working on it together, and he really loved helping me to set it up.

The waiting room leads into the surgery

I wanted to bring in some ideas about staying healthy, and so I found some really good posters about healthy living to print out for him to colour to go on the walls. I kept it simple, and chose posters about eating lots of fruit and vegetables, exercise and having a good night's sleep. Harry coloured them in while we talked about what they meant. I also printed out some vaguely medical charts and made him an official looking clipboard using my cutting mat and a bulldog clip.

A good night's sleep is very important!

We have a waiting area outside with a chair and some books to read, then inside the doctor has a table and chair, with a bed for patients to lie on while being diagnosed. We already have a toy medical kit, and I added a few bandages and plasters that were in our own first aid kit.

Ready to receive patients

It didn't take very long to put together, and I was able to improvise pretty well with things that we already had around the house. I'm intending to rotate through lots of different themes - Harry has already requested a dentist which I think would be really good as he has so far refused to show a dentist his teeth. I'm also thinking a shop, restaurant or cafe, kitchen and library.

Firework sensory tub

Since I created my first sensory tub, I can't stop thinking of ideas for new ones. I don't think that Harry would have had the patience for them as a toddler, but now that he is a bit older he has really enjoyed playing with the couple that I have made. Mia loves joining in too, although she does have a habit of splashing her hands up and down in the rice, then losing interest and wandering off, scattering rice about the house as she goes.

This sensory tub has a firework theme, to tie in with Bonfire Night on the 5th November. Bonfire Night, also known in the UK as Guy Fawkes Night, is an annual event which commemmorates the arrest of Guy Fawkes in 1605 as he guarded explosives placed in the House of Lords by members of the Gunpowder Plot aiming to assassinate King James I of England and VI of Scotland. Most of the conspirators fled, some were killed, and eight of the survivors were hung, drawn and quartered. Today Bonfire Night is celebrated with bonfires, fireworks and parades.

I didn't really fancy giving Harry matches and firewood in the sensory tub, nor did I really want to touch on the gruesome history associated with Guy Fawkes night just yet (you can read more about Guy Fawkes night here if you are interested), so I decided to concentrate on the firework aspect, as he will be going to several firework displays over the next few days.

The basis for the sensory tub is rice, which I dyed black. I just buy the cheapest value rice, tip a good amount into a bowl, add a fair bit of food colouring (at least half a teaspoonful) and mix it all about. If I have some, I add a squirt of anti-bacterial hand gel in, as this helps it to dry. I find that it dries quite quickly by itself if it's spread out on a tray. I also had some sunflower seeds around from the garden so I added them in for some variety, I like how the stripes look like clouds in the sky.

Then I added some glitter, sequins and a few pom poms. Harry needs an activity to do with the rice, so I found some star shaped cake cases and chocolate moulds which I bought in the sales last January and he hadn't seen yet. Along with a couple of teaspoons, they were ready to make some firework cakes.

I put the sensory tub out on an old table cloth to try and contain some of the mess, then let them at it. Mia dug in and found a shiny star straightaway - bursting into a rendition of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. Harry spent ages filling up the various cake cases and passing them to me. I was really surprised how long this sensory tub kept them busy for.

If you are looking for some more sensory tub ideas then there are some fantastic tubs over at Counting Coconuts, which is where I first encountered them.

Homemade play food - salt dough and felt pizza

I love making play food. It can be as easy or as difficult as you like (I tend to go for easy) and has hours of play value. We eat a lot of pizza in this household so I thought that it was about time I made some pizza to play with. It's great for lots of different role play - among other things you can use it in the toy kitchen, in the toy shop or in a pretend restaurant.

I made the pizza base from salt dough. I used my favourite salt dough recipe - 1 part salt, 1 part water and 2 parts plain flour mixed together to make a dough. I used about half a cup as my measure and that was enough for a nice sized pizza.

I rolled the dough out into a circle and cut it into six pieces. I smoothed the edges and make a slightly thicker crust around the edge. To dry them out I placed them in the oven on a low temperature, which worked well but I had better results when I just placed them on top of a radiator for a few days. Before painting them I sanded away the rough edges.

I painted them with standard poster paint. To make a colour for the crust I mixed a little brown, a little yellow and lots of white paint. I had enough paint left to paint the bottom too, although you don't need to. I made sure to paint all the way down the sides.

Salt dough pizza with the crust edges painted

Then I used red paint mixed with a little brown to add the tomato sauce into the middle of the slices.

For the toppings I cut pieces from felt. I was going to get fancy and sew each individual item, but it was a lot easier and quicker just to cut out simple shapes. I made large blobs of pale yellow for cheese, then cut out pieces for tomato, red and green peppers, mushrooms, olives, pepperoni and sweetcorn. I made about six of each of the larger pieces.

Looks delicious!

You might also like to see the other play food that I have made:

Realistic play food for the toy kitchen -laminate realistic pictures to add to saucepans and plates
Felt biscuits - Felt party rings and cookies
Felt sandwich - Everything that you need to make a felt sandwich
Cardboard biscuits - Really easy pretend biscuits that children can help to make

My first sensory tub - beach and underwater theme

I have long been in awe of sensory tubs. I first saw them over at Counting Coconuts, and have recently discovered that The Imagination Tree has some brilliant ideas too. Basically a large tub filled with sensory materials - often with a base of rice or beans, then different objects, either for general play like spoons and cups, or themed around a particular topic.

I thought that they seemed like quite a lot of work to put together, and would create a lot of mess. I also wasn't exactly sure how Harry would play with them. But we had some dried rice left over from making our Diwali rangoli the other day. I'd let him dig about with his toy diggers, and I decided it was time to give him a bit more structure. I cannot fully describe my pride when, in just a few minutes, I produced this:

My first sensory tub - I'm so proud!

It's made inside an old, shallow biscuit tin. I used the coloured rice that I already had for the beach, then I dyed some more blue for the sea. I sprinkled glitter into the sea, and made some waves around the beach with shredded paper. I added shells, some beaded bracelets, and a few bits of pirate Playmobil that Harry hadn't seen before. Then I found a couple of little dolls - we even had a mermaid - and a plastic dolphin. There are some random pom poms in there too for a different texture. It was quite a wrench giving it to Harry to play with.

Which bit shall I destroy first?

Can you see that gleam in his eyes? He was so excited, he's never seen anything like this before.

Digging right in, to really mess it up

He was most fascinated by the treasure chest, and he just wanted to bury it in the sea so that the lady on the beach couldn't see it. There was a little spade in there to help with the digging. He played with this for a lot longer than I expected, and he particularly loved it when I joined in and made up little stories with the dollies, which he then copied. In the end it didn't create nearly as much mess as I thought it would, and I loved putting it together. Harry played with it for quite some time too, and I've popped the lid on to keep it for another day. I suppose it could have come off worse! I'm definitely going to have to come up with some more ideas, preferably ones that involve mixed up dyed rice.

 

 

I'm sharing this post with Tuesday Tots at Rainy Day Mum.

A simple helicopter game

Harry helped me to make this simple helicopter game.

I found a line drawing image of a helicopter on Google images and printed out six copies. Then I let Harry colour in each one in a different colour and cut them out. In the meantime, I cut out six circles from white paper to make the landing pads, and cut out a letter H for each colour. Harry glued them into place, then when they were dry I laminated all the pieces (in my household most pieces of paper that sit still for too long end up being laminated, but of course you could just make the cards of stiff cardboard, or cover them with clear sticky backed plastic).

Here are some of the games that we've been playing with the helicopter cards:

Colour matching the helicopters to the landing pads. Even though this is far too easy to challenge Harry now, he still enjoyed doing it.

I placed the helicopter landing pads around the main room while Harry waited outside. Then he brought in each helicopter in turn to find the appropriate landing pad. This is a really good game for getting children to run about, you could increase the area in which the landing pads are hidden, especially if you play outside. It is also a really good memory game, as the child needs to remember where the landing pads are for future helicopters.

Find the helicopters - Harry loves hiding games. He will quite happily play find the helicopter over and over again. I make it more difficult by putting them out of actual site and then doing the 'getting hotter...getting colder' thing, he just starting to catch on.

Colour matching and grouping by finding other objects around the house to place on the landing pads, like Lego bricks, pom poms and so on.
 

Craft - making a campervan from a shoebox

I love making Harry toys out of cardboard boxes. We've made lots of things - a car wash, a bus, a car house...and as he gets older he has just as much fun helping to make them as he does playing with them. I have fond memories of the Playmobil campervan we had when I was little, and so I thought I'd have a go at making a simple camper van for Harry to play with. I used an old shoebox, and it is the right size for his Happyland figures. I cut the lid off so it was removable and made a door in each side.

We painted it pink (Harry's choice) and I used cream card to make the shaped bit at the front. The windows are light blue card. For the distinctive Volkswagen camper van logo I printed one out that I found on Google Images. For the wheels I used our Rolobox Wheel Kit For Boxes (affiliate link) which are brilliant, we've used them to make lots of different things. They are simple plastic wheels which screw into the cardboard, they also come with a pull cord. Otherwise you could just make the wheels out of cardboard.

Unfortunately the lid for the roof didn't really work as it was a hinged lid. A box with a removable lid would have worked better. I stuck the windows to the roof so that when it is in place you can see the windows, otherwise the box is too shallow for them to fit.

I (sorry, we) had a lot of fun decorating the inside. I used little cardboard boxes to make a bed and a sofa, then we stuck a photograph of a television onto a small box and made a fruit bowl and table with bottle lids. We cut out pictures and a mirror from a catalogue to decorate the inside walls.

If you have a toddler obsessed with campervans you can find lots of campervan crafts, activities and resources over on my other blog!

Aquarium in a box

I was about to throw out an old washing machine tablet container the other day, when I remembered a fantastic craft from my blogging buddy Trouble Doubled's blog - a shoebox aquarium. We've also been playing fishtanks quite a lot lately (you don't know how to play fishtanks? Easy, you put all available children into the baby's cot and let them pretend to be fish while you carry on with your business safe in the knowledge that they aren't going anywhere) so I thought that Harry would enjoy this one.

It's very simple, just make some seaweed out of a pipe cleaner, add some small stones from the garden (Mia helped with this bit, she even licked some of the stones to make sure that they were nice and clean) then make and decorate some cardboard fish to sellotape from the top.

Harry was more interested in playing with the fish tank rather than just looking at it when it was finished, luckily we have a few fish lying about that he could put inside. He also asked when we were going to put the water in, actually this container would work quite well for that, so we may well try it at some point!

PinAddicts Pinterest Challenge - I Spy Jar

This month, the PinAddicts Pinterest Challenge is being hosted at My Lovebumps.

This I Spy Jar was one of the first things that I pinned, but I've held off making one until now because I wasn't sure that Harry was old enough to appreciate it. I also wanted to make it in a glass jar, and he needed to be old enough to be trusted with it.

I have pinned the jar here - I Spy Jar, and it comes originally from Meet the Dubiens where you can find detailed instructions and some more ideas for contents. Here is my version:

I Spy Jar

I used an old pasta sauce jar. To remove the label from the jar I soaked it in WD40, and it peeled right off. I like to think that our home is fairly uncluttered, but I found it very easy to gather together tiny items to put inside by raiding the toy box, my craft supplies and the bowl in the kitchen that we keep for keys and other junk. I used brown rice for the bulk of the jar (just what we had in the cupboard) and I found that you don't need to leave much space at the top of the jar at all.

Contents of my I Spy Jar

My contents are - leaf bead, old heart earring, toy handbag, flower bead, heart cutout, nut, marble, butterfly eraser, pom pom, penny, shell, stone, craft flower, paperclip, plastic cow, silver bead, eyelet, googly eye, blue button, star sequin, snowflake brad, yellow button, tiny clothes peg, doll crown, pink drawing pin, safety pin, flat shell.

Harry is fascinated by it and I can't stop turning it around myself!

Make sure to stop by and check out the other entries into the challenge!

Story telling bottle caps

I love reading books to Harry, I really do. But sometimes I do sigh inwardly at the request to read the same book over and over again, or when I'm ready for bed and the story that he chooses is the longest one on the shelf. I'd also love to have the imagination to be able to make up my own stories for him. I've seen lots of ideas lately online (thanks Pinterest!) for various objects that can be made to prompt story telling, and seeing large numbers of bottle caps scattered across the living room floor gave me the final push to put together some of my own, using milk bottle caps. 

Most recently I've seen story stones and story cubes and they are absolutely beautiful. For my take on the idea I've simplified enormously by just using small pictures cut from magazines and greeting cards and gluing them on to the bottle caps. We save the milk bottle caps for recycling, and so we generally have lots about before I get round to taking them. You could also use small pieces of cardboard, wood, tiles, or anything really with a flat surface. The pictures came mainly from free magazines and catalogues.

To make it more personal to your child you could add photographs of family members or pets, or places and objects important to the family such as the house or a favourite holiday destination.

I tried to choose pictures which would prompt some action in the story, for example some pictures of houses and transport. I've also included pictures of children, animals and familiar objects. Some of the pictures could have several meanings, for example a shoe could represent the object itself, or something more abstract such as a journey. A heart could represent not only romantic love, but also friendship or family. I've included a butterfly, which I used as a way to lead a character towards something interesting, and a clock to introduce a concept of time. I made 30, and I could have made many more (and I may yet do so!).

When you are ready to tell a story, choose four or five of the pictures. You can let your child choose them, or choose them yourself at random without looking. Then just make up a story based around the images. You can base your story upon a person or animal that has been drawn out, or make your child the centre of the story. Youwill probably notice that the stories you come up with are repeated by your child in their role play, and if you start giving the characters names make sure that you remember them for the next story (your child will!). While you are telling the story, ask your child to join in and make suggestions.

Harry absolutely loved this activity, and requested story after story. To my surprise I also really enjoyed making up my own stories. I made him select the pictures with his eyes shut, but I could usually see him peeking, especially once he realised that there was a dinosaur in there waiting to be chosen! I'm going to store these in a bag or box on the bookshelf so that they are just as accessible as our books.

Posting activities for older babies

I think that the posting instinct probably kicks in at around 11 months. Harry was a little earlier, Mia a little later (possibly due to my failing to notice it - neglected second child syndrome strikes again!). As for when it loses its appeal, well I can't answer that one as Harry is still having fun posting things at three and a half!

All you need is a cardboard box or similar, and something to put into it. Demonstrate to the baby what to do and then just let them get on with it. For a younger baby make a larger hole and use larger items to post. I've used the shapes that go inside a shape sorter toy with a large square or circular hole. Then as they get older and better at it you can tailor the size of the hole to the object, and use smaller things to post. Finally you can move on to proper shape sorter toys where the object needs to be manipulated in order to post it through the hole.

For a toddler the activity also becomes one of role play, where you can pretend, for example, to be a postman posting letters. It's actually surprising for how long such a simple activity can keep them entertained!

Watch babies with those pom poms, they like to eat them!

Me on the Map book craft

Following on from our flag craft, I wanted to find a way to teach Harry a little bit more about geography and his place in the world. I remembered seeing a brilliant idea for a Me on the Map book at Counting Coconuts and so I thought that we could make one ourselves. I ended up doing most of it of course, but I did have a little bit of help! This is what I came up with:

Each circle is cut from thin cardboard (I used a cereal packet). I used a template (bowl or cup) for some of them, the rest I drew freehand.

My pages are:

House - I took a photograph of our house and glued a photograph of Harry and Mia onto the front (we don't really live in a brown cloud by the way!)
Street - a map printed from Google maps of our street and surrounding streets with a tiny photo of the house (taken from the index sheet when I had the photographs printed) and a compass sticker
Village - I cut some pictures from a magazine to represent the things that we do in the village - swings, baby group, the shops and the post office.
West Sussex - A cutout outline of West Sussex in coloured corrugated card with a couple of photos and logo taken from a free local magazine. The blue tissue paper in the background represents the sea!
United Kingdom - a cutout outline of the UK in felt with the individual flags from each country which make up the Union Flag and a larger England flag.
Europe - Very simple, just a printed outline map of Europe
Earth - A simple outline of Earth (taken from here) which Harry coloured in.

At the bottom of each circle I've written the description, then the pages are held together at the top with a piece of ribbon which means they can be moved apart or flipped over.

I think that this is a really good way to help a child to understand the concept of geography. We've been doing a few more simple games and activities with maps, so I'll be putting together a post with some more ideas very soon!

Euro 2012 and our flag craft

Originally I wanted to do a flag craft to tie in with the Olympics. But, with over 200 nations taking part, that seemed a little ambitious. The Euro 2012 football tournament seems to have crept up a bit, sandwiched between the Jubilee and Olympics, but with a smaller number of countries taking part I thought that making 16 flags would be a lot more manageable.

I had intended to draw out all the flags myself, but a quick Google search found these fab flag printables from Activity Village which were perfect. I printed them all out, and we set to painting them. I used an atlas for reference, which was also an opportunity to have a chat with Harry about the different countries and look at some maps. I'm not sure how much he took in, but I'm laying the foundations! Then we looked at each one individually and I got him to work out which colours they needed to be. He surprised me with his attention span, he actually painted all the flags (he was a bit daunted by Greece, but gave it a good go).

Painted flags, a bit insipid though

They looked nice when they were done, but because we only used watercolour paint they needed to be blinged up a bit. I delved into my craft stash and pulled out the collage baskets, sequins, glitter paint and glitter, and some bits left over from a craft kit that we've been working with. We threw glue about for a bit, and then after an impatient wait for everything to dry I laminated the flags so that they were a bit sturdier (and so that we weren't showered with glitter every time that we took them out).

Blinged up laminated flags for Euro 2012

As for what to do with them now, there are lots of possibilities for games to play with them. I'm not sure that we're quite ready for actually learning the names of the countries yet, but we could try simpler ones like matching flags with the same colours or patterns. I will be talking about the countries as we look at the flags though, just trying to get across the idea that the world is made up of lots of different countries. It's also a really good way for me to learn some of the flags myself, as I am by no means an expert!

We are very interested in travel and geography as a family, so this is definitely a topic that I want to concentrate on with Harry.

The sixteen countries taking part in Euro 2012 are Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, England, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Republic of Ireland, Russia, Spain, Sweden and Ukraine. You can read more about the Euro 2012 tournament here.

The PinAddicts Pinterest Challenge - Water play

This month, the fantastic PinAddicts Pinterest Challenge is being hosted by simplyoutnumbered.

I spotted an idea for a garden water play structure on Pinterest fairly recently, and it stood out immediately because Harry has a fascination with water and pipes at the moment and it looked like a really fun activity that he would enjoy. The one that I have pinned is from Taming the Goblin and is based on an idea from Sun Hats and Wellie Boots. Both are far, far more sophisticated than mine!


Garden water play structure

Luckily our recycle bin was full, so I was able to collect together some plastic bottles and pots. We have a trellis wall leading into our vegetable patch which was a perfect spot to use. I attached the bottles to the trellis using string and coated wire. I began with a simple top to bottom structure as it can be easily changed, and also it was more difficult than I had expected! The water had a habit of splattering off in unexpected directions. I think that perhaps I placed my bottles too far apart.

This was really fun, and I'm looking forward to expanding and improving it over the summer! Make sure to pop by and visit the others that are taking part in the challenge this month.

The PinAddicts Pinterest Challenge - Five Little Ducks

It's time for the PinAddicts Pinterest challenge once again, it seems to come around so quickly! This month the challenge is being hosted by "But why, Mummy, why?"

I've posted before about how Harry loves acting out stories and rhymes using props. I've seen some great ideas online, and one that caught my eye was these felt ducks to use when singing "Five little ducks went swimming one day". I love that these ones from ohsofelty are so simple.



Image source: http://felt.co.nz/listing/23450/5-Little-Duck-Finger-Puppets


 I didn't have much yellow felt left, but I was pleased to make use of some which was rather poor quality (I think it may have come in a reduced children's craft kit). I didn't have enough yellow to make the backs too, so I used a funny coral colour that I wasn't that fond of.

Mine have come out quite large, which does make them a little uncomfortable to hold, but you don't need them all in place for very long! It does mean that they are much too big for Harry's fingers though, which is something that I should have considered. I thought that he would be quite happy to sit and watch while I acted it out, but of course he wants to join in too! Oh, and you won't be seeing any more yellow felt creations for a while until I've had a chance to restock!

I'm loving taking part in such a friendly linky, please visit and have a look at what everyone else has been creating this month.

Homemade WALL-E and Eve toys

I think that Harry is not unusual in going through phases where he just wants to watch the same film or television programme over and over again. Among other things so far we've had Button Moon, Peppa Pig and Dumbo. At the moment it's WALL-E, which is a lovely film, with the important message that it is much better to be out and about enjoying the world than sitting in front of a screen (yes, I do appreciate the irony here).

After the excesses of Easter I was looking at a discarded plastic Easter egg and an idea formed in my mind...a quick coat of paint and we had an Eve! I sanded it first so that the paint would stick, and I used a couple of coats of acrylic paint. The arms are just made from fun foam.

Harry was thrilled, small children are easily pleased, but then of course a WALL-E was needed, and this presented a few more challenges. I googled for images and decided that it was best to simplify and focus on the key parts - the square body, triangular tracks, the eyes and the arms. I found an old tin of nuts and bolts left behind in the garage, and some black screw cover things that I thought made reasonable eyes. They are stuck onto a lollipop stick which is inserted into a cut down cardboard box. It isn't glued down so it can be moved up and down.

The tracks are made from a strip of fun foam with the nuts glued inside, and the arms are more lollipop sticks with fun foam hands. I drew on a few details with black pen. Luckily WALL-E is quite scruffy anyway, so it doesn't matter that the finish isn't great.

Harry loves them, and I've spotted him acting out scenes from the film with them. They aren't that sturdy, and they probably won't last very long, but I'm really pleased with them! If I was to make another one (which is a distinct possibility) then I would try and make the front open up, as this is the part of WALL-E's functioning which really fascinates Harry. He would also like the wheels to go round, but I'm not sure how I could manage that!

Story Sacks and Goldilocks and the Three Bears

We recently joined the toy library at our local Family and Children Centre, and through this we have been introduced to the fantastic concept of a Story Sack. Along with a great selection of toys, for a joining fee of just £2, every couple of weeks we can choose another sack to take home. I can't believe how much Harry has been loving these sacks. They contain a copy of the book, a non-fiction book related to the story, sometimes an audio CD, a relevant game (they've all been good quality Orchard Toys ones so far) and, most importantly of all, some toys, props or puppets to bring the story to life. Some of them are the official sacks as linked above, and others I think have been put together by the centre.

Harry loves getting more involved in the reading of a story. His favourite activity is to take the puppets and props, and act out the story as I read it.

Because I love watching him interact with the story I made these simple little felt bears for him to play with while I read him the story of Goldilocks and the Three Bears, along with a yellow haired doll. I also got him three bowls and spoons in different sizes and filled them with porridge oats, and he was occupied for ages getting the bears to take it in turns to eat their porridge.

Goldilocks and the Three Bears toys

Story Sacks are very expensive to purchase, as I think that really they are aimed at teachers or childminders and so on. But it's really easy to put one together yourself, probably from things that you have around the house anyway. You can also theme some activities around the story, for example you could make and eat porridge, or cut out chairs and beds in different sizes from a catalogue. In addition there are many opportunities to talk about what is happening in the story - how the characters might feel, how you would act in that situation and so on. I'm really interested in ways to bring stories to life, and so hopefully I'll have some more ideas to share soon!

I would love to hear about any ways that you make books come alive with your children.

Jennifer is currently away from her desk...

...but can be found guest blogging at beepbeep designs!

Please pop over and visit my post, How to Make Felt Monster Finger Puppets!

Cardboard box car house

I have fond memories from primary school of making little rooms inside shoe boxes. I can't remember the context, but I loved decorating the inside of a box with pictures cut from magazines, adding in little pieces of furniture and so on. I'm looking forward to doing this someday with Harry and Mia, but I think that they are a bit young for this at the moment.

I have however noticed that Harry has been playing a lot lately with a Mack truck from Cars which we were lucky enough to have handed down to us recently. It's like a little house for Lightning McQueen, with a bed, sink, little rollers and brushes and so on. So when a cardboard box arrived in our house this week I thought that I would turn it into a house for his cars.



Cardboard box car house. The green arrows were Christmas trees
from a Christmas craft pack!

I made a covered section at one end, marked out to form a car park on the top. There is an internal ramp, and a larger ramp up the outside, which folds over for storage. There is a small door at the front and the back, and Harry has stuck pictures of cars from magazines to the outside.

That would probably have been enough, but I couldn't stop there. I used two smaller boxes to make a car wash and drying area in the corner, then I added some pictures for the walls, a mirror from tin foil, a bed and some cushions. In the middle is a little table which they can drive up to, and the cars also have a hot tub and rug.

Inside the car house. Note the table with bowl and food picture
cut from a magazine, the bubblewrap/food container lid
hot tub and rug made from an old sock.

This was a fun project because Harry was able to get involved with the sticking and suggesting things that he might like to add in. I think that he was a little bemused though ("cars don't need chairs, they don't have bottoms!") but he indulged me, and it has had a lot of play!

Adventures with playdough

I’m a bit OCD when it comes to playdough. I like to keep all the colours separate, and one colour has to be put away before another comes out. Our extruder is brilliant, but I do obsess over making sure that every last piece of playdough is removed before we put it away. Playdough doesn’t last forever though, and Harry’s original playdough is starting to get a bit grotty and hard. So I decided it was time to chuck it out and replace it with some new stuff, and before I did that we had one last play with it.

I took a tray and built a road outline with the playdough. Then I filled in the gaps around the edge and in the middle (mixing the colours! The horror!). There wasn’t enough to cover the tray so I filled in the gaps with some pudding rice that I found during the move that was out of date (you could use anything small, like rice or lentils). We had a big lake in the middle, and fields around the edges.

 

We decorated it with the bits of pasta and buttons that we use in the playdough anyway, and a few small animals and trees from the farm set. I even made some very simple boats from cardboard. It doesn’t quite compete with the playdough playscapes that I used as inspiration but we had just as much fun making it as we did playing with it.

It might even keep for a few days before we throw it out!