Well it was supposed to be for the children – an installation called “Tangle” in the forecourt of the Arts Centre here in the heart of Melbourne. It has been entertaining the public here in Melbourne before heading over to Adelaide for a session in February and is put together by Polyglot Theatre.

We arrived half an hour before the session began and families were already lining up.

By the time 2.30pm arrived there were so many people in the queue that they had to run two 30 minute sessions instead the usual 70 minute one!

When the hordes were let in they were given a big squishy ball of soft elastic each.

Then they raced over to a grove of wooden golden poles and wound that elastic around and around.

It went round poles and people’s bodies. Everyone ducked under and over the quickly growing mat of elastic. They swung from it and pulled it out as far as they could – it was frenetic, but controlled.

There were youngsters, and oldies and all those in between.

They also catered for babies with a mini version …

and entertained the people patiently waiting on the street for their turn.

When it was time for a change over, everyone was invited to push the elastic right down to make a mat, probably to make it easier to get out as many looked seriously tangled up in there.

Before the next group came in excitedly clutching their ball of elastic, the whole mat was pushed up to join the mats from the other sessions to create a thick, multi coloured roof.

We didn’t go in but rather were observers and photographers on the edges, and as the families went past us the ADULTS were saying, “WOW, that was SO much fun!!”

 Adults love to play too – seriously!

We can’t resist a challenge, and when we had the opportunity to have fun in the DOT MAD challenge, with our U.K. friend and freelance play consultant Marc Armitage, well we were there with bells on!

We needed to find something white ….

and we were lucky enough to find an abandoned basin.

Then we needed some spots and …

some children and we were away!

There was a lot a talk between about who should stick where and what patterns they wanted to make.

They made round shapes …

and lines.

It was a fabulous fine motor activity, creative, caused lots of discussion and involved good solid team work.

The big children finally let the littlies have a go near the end …

and they loved joining in too!

We ran out of stickers eventually, but we reckon the finished product is pretty fantastic – well done guys!!!

Are YOU up for the challenge?

At the end of October, we travelled interstate as we had been invited to present at a conference in Canberra. We were lucky enough to be sharing a big working space with Harriet Goodall, a basketry artist from near Sydney.

Naturally enough, given the opportunity to join in with her class, we jumped at the chance to learn a new skill, something which is just as important for adults as it is for children!

It was a challenge for Harriet as she had to try and teach as much in an hour with the conference participants as she would normally do over a full day workshop!

She did a fabulous job. We had a brief run down of the history of basketry and her journey towards these beautiful ‘random weave baskets’.

We were keen to get going ourselves so we were soon putting together a frame using dyed rattan cane…

and then weaved randomly through the basket frame …

before adding the finishing touches with a wide variety of natural and recycled materials …

such as plants, feathers, string, and bark.

What beautiful creations emerged …

and what a wonderful opportunity we all had to sit and weave and chat.

We were getting along like old buddies in no time flat!

We have been discussing Treasure Baskets lately on our Facebook page and thought we would put together some for our littlies as they are ideal to help enable them to explore their world. We found these photos here. Pretty well anything can go into these baskets but preferably nothing made from plastic.

We have some beautiful suede hearts given to us by one of our kinder children a few years ago. They feel very tactile with the soft smooth material and cute little knobbly glass beads sewn onto them.

We decided to introduce these first, simply nestled together on a beautiful piece of wood just to see what the children would do with them. Gradually we will include additional objects.

The girls felt them and shared them.

They took them off the wood and put them back on.

They counted them with our help …

and they posted them into their pockets!!

Quite a challenge for little fingers and tight pockets!

Then retrieved them again … Woohoo!!!

How wonderfully simple and versatile is this type of open ended play for babies and toddlers!

Kim from Chifley Preschool in Canberra, challenged her children to make a self portrait with a difference.

First, looking in a mirror, the children were invited to draw their faces.

The instruction was to just do their faces and what they could actually see, but the instructions didn’t get in the way of a good time!

When they had drawn their self portraits, they were then encouraged to choose from a range of collage materials to make a second self portrait.

This time they were restricted to use only collage materials and glue with no drawing implements.

The resulting portraits are just wonderful!!

Look at those gorgeous earrings (which she wasn’t actually wearing that day)!

We really like how they were displayed side by side.

Creativity using the children’s favourite person as the basis - themselves!

Another irresistible  idea to complement these Self Portraits and these Self Portraits and even More Portraits, which we have posted about before!

We taught preschoolers for a long time, and when you have the same age group year after year, you get to know the developmental stages very well!! One we noticed (and which sometimes had us pulling our hair out!) was the urge of the younger children to post!!! Anything and everything, anywhere that was big enough to fit things into, or in some cases, not big enough! Fortunately as they matured we found this urge dissipated.

When we were having a play with a one year old and a two year old last week, we had a chuckle to ourselves as posting was back on the agenda with these two!!!

They were playing out on Sherry’s newly jazzed up back porch and the two year old started popping a collection of goodies onto the top shelf of the dolls’ house.

The one year old liked the look of this game …

and started doing the same thing on the bottom shelf.

It was great team work and such a lovely social thing for the two little ones to do.

They then moved on, of course …

transferring everything from the dolls’ house into the pram.

Then transferring them from the pram …

into the beautiful egg box …

which a long time ago …

the children claimed as a receptacle for more than just eggs!

Toddlers and babies don’t need anything too complex to keep them engaged, just the opportunity to explore their worlds and to do it over and over  …

and over!

Take one little girl …

just over one year old.

The baby of her family …

with a brother four years older.

Sit back and watch …

as she cares for her ‘baby’

Where does it come from?

Is it Nature?

Or Nurture?

We believe it is both …

but the debate still goes on!

Our weather is still a bit of a mix at the moment, so when the sun comes out and things warm up for a while we like to seize the moment and and spend as much time as possible outside.

We have seen lots of gorgeous mudpie kitchens, particularly those brought to us via Jenny Kable at Let the Children Play, so thought it was about time we got one happening with our children!

When we talked to the children about creating a mudpie kitchen they began referring to it as our “Mudpie Cafe” … It must be a reflection of the Melbourne cafe culture in which our children today are growing up!

Again, we tried to use what we could scrounge up either from our houses, road side rubbish or Resource Rescue. It is so wonderful being inventive and at virtually no cost!

With help from the children we dumped everything in the yard and let them decide where they wanted things to go.

They had made some mini tables another time, so we popped an old metal trunk (which had been abandoned under Sherry’s house) on top of them.

We had two drawers from the roadside rubbish and a rudder from an old yacht which was made into a table …

and an assortment of plastic cable spools …

which, with along with some wooden logs the children made into tables too.

They declared they were going to make pizzas …

as we had found an old oar and they thought it looked like a pizza peel, the utensil used to put pizzas in and out of the big ovens.

Of course they needed toppings, so they grabbed some scissors and deflowered a few shrubs!

We also had some big recycled plastic lids which made great pizza bases.

Then balancing them very carefully …

into the oven they went.

What a busy lot of cooks they were in their new mudpie cafe.

They have certainly taken ownership of this project!

We see lots and lots of time being spent here over the coming warmer months!

A little while ago we showed you how we make no sew capes.

Well it’s birthday party time again, for another one of Sherry’s grandchildren, so this time we have come up with …

no sew wings!

Sure, for those of you who prefer, a few stitches don’t take long to do, but if you are under pressure by your children to produce instant wings, this is the way to go!

All you need are two tea towels (we bought two packs of 3 tea towels in K Mart for $2, which meant we could make three sets of wings for $4) …

 and some elastic!

Tie two corners of the tea towels together.

This becomes the center back.

Then slip a loop of elastic over the knot to go around the child’s neck.

Now add a smaller loop to the top outside corners of each tea towel, to go around the wrists …

and there you have it. How easy is that?

The children thought they were pretty darn good …

Whether they became fairy wings, bat wings, bird wings or super hero wings …

 they were just perfect for fun at the park!!!

An activity the participants at the Yarra ranges Conference did with us was to blow bubbles, but think outside the square with how they formed them.

We’ve blogged a lot over time, about different implements the children have used to make bubbles, from hands …

to blowers made out of wire …

to using just one one straw …

sometimes double length straws …

and at other times bundles of straws!

For our recent Water Workshop, the participants used bottles with the bottoms cut out which we picked up from Resoursce Rescue.

They created huge bubbles!

Naturally we thought the children might like to give it a go too.

They managed very well … The shape of the bottles was ideal!

We also mentioned to them the bundle of straws our kinder children made last year and they thought they’d like to give that a go as well.

When they were dipping the bendy straws into the bubble mixture they flared out due to the concertina part …

which created a wonderful, random bubbly effect!

The bubbles went off in all directions, to everyone’s surprise - what fun!