Out of the Ordinary

Looking at his happy face in the photos you wouldn't guess how horrible and anguishing this experience was for The Punk. When I suggested PlayDoh time, he was thrilled. When I brought out this tray of unusual PlayDoh tools he cried. "We have to use my PlayDoh tools!" he managed to mumble through the snot and the tears. To use anything else was incomprehensible... which is exactly why we needed to try them.
The Punk is a creature of habit. Lots of habits. Lots of schedules. Lots of little things can throw him off kilter. He's getting so much better at bouncing back, but we still need to work on these little quirks once in a while. And so, he went to his room to calm down. When he came back out he was ready (but still not convinced it was a good idea) to try the "other things" in the PlayDoh.

With toothpicks, beads, Popsicle sticks, bits of drinking straws, buttons and pipe cleaners we made so many unusual things! Bugs and snakes, birds and pizza! We experienced all the textures that we wouldn't have felt if we had used the ordinary tools.

And we had fun. He began to smile. He began to create. He found new uses for things that only had other purposes in his mind. We rolled, we counted, we smooshed.

We found that everything on the tray could be used to make something different. Something new. And it was cool to see him open up and enjoy another approach to the same old PlayDoh he's so used to playing with. I was proud of him. He opened his mind and used his imagination.

And the moment we were done and all cleaned up he said "I'm glad that's over. Now we never have to do that again. We can just use PlayDoh tools from now on."

Oh well.

"Police Car"

Stick Puzzles

Popsicle Sticks, craft sticks, whatever you call them - they can be made into puzzles for kids. You can follow a detailed tutorial here or here. I just used photos on regular copy paper, and Elmer's glue. I need a new color cartridge, so all photos were in black and white - which makes it even harder to sort when they are all together!

I made the puzzles and let them dry - sliced them apart and put them in a cup for The Punk to find in the morning. He had fun trying to figure out what they were, and then he was off! He found that I had marked the backs, so he turned them all over and sorted them into piles. Then he sorted them by number - and solved the puzzles. A very proud Punk, indeed.

Back in the cup they went - and onto the School Shelf. I'm sure this will be a repeat when Daddy comes home!