twolittleajs: imaginative play

Thursday, 25 September 2014

Piratey Play!

On Friday it was International talk like a Pirate day, but I was working and we were busy on the Saturday, so I made it the Monday morning theme for Alyssa and I whilst Arthur was at pre-school. Once we returned home from dropping Arthur off, I let Alyssa play with Arthur's Pirate ship in the kitchen, whilst I quickly washed some dishes, telling her things like 'Sail' and 'crows nest'. She took great delight in the trap door and kept saying making them all fall in, she also enjoyed the little cannon that fired boulders at the ship.

Once she started to get bored of that, and my dishes were sparkling, I cut some paper into little Pirate hat shapes for her to colour in how she wanted, she seems to really enjoy colouring, and regularly asks me to "coyour in!" So I knew she would really enjoy this. Soon it was time to pick Arthur up again, three hours always sounds a lot longer than it is on a Monday morning now, I seem to blink and the morning has gone. so we took Arthur his hat, and on seeing it he got all excited saying "have you made me a pirate ship too?" I had actually made him a pirate ship lunch, but not an actually ship so he was insistent that I changed the sofa into a ship for him, he even made suggestions, like the blue blanket for the sea, and that we needed another blanket for a sail, it's great to see his imagination working away. Once built I used a little plastic plank that we have and some doll to make walk the plank, and refilled the treasure in an old chest Arthur made last year, then let the two of them go treasure hunting and other piratey things. It was lovely to see Arthur leading Alyssa in play saying things like "C'mon! Back on the ship, we have to find the treasure!"

I'm hoping that as Alyssa starts to talk a bit more, her imagination will lead to many hours of fun between the two of them, for when they actually play nicely together, they get on really well!

Preparing the pirate for battle!!

Making pirate hats

Aaarrrggg! A feast fit for a ships mate!

Arthur's hat ready for him

"WALK THE PLANK!!!!

A glittering treasure chest

Rummaging through the loot

Another victim of the plank!

Tuesday, 4 March 2014

A trip to 'Narnia'

After our Saturday night movie night film of 'Narnia', Arthur has become a little bit of a fan, watching it again the following day with daddy. He started continuously entering the front room, sweeping his arm around proclaiming "welcome to my castle!"

So with a trip to the doctors in order for Alyssa who has been poorly again, I was looking for something to do that could easily be abandoned and then taken up again once the appointment was over. So I set about recreating parts of Narnia in the front room. We had 'Tea with Mr Tumniss' in front of his 'fire', meeting Aslan in his tent, the Beavers den including an escape tunnel from the wolves and the stone slab.

I then grabbed a lovely waistcoat type outfit that was made for Arthur for Christmas (with other things given with it, it is a great home made wizard outfit), and used it as a regal gown for either Arthur or Alyssa, and Arthur's knight tunic from a previous Knights and Castles play day, he was very impressed to find Alsan on his outfit.

Alyssa straight away was drawn to the tea set up, and played on the flute that I had left out and poured tea, whilst Arthur was more hyper and clambered in and out of the beavers dam escaping the wolves, fighting baddies, and cutting Alsan free from the stone table. I love setting up imaginative play then just watching them get on and play, especially when they play together, and include me obviously!!