Have you tried any of the Pinterest play activities recently? Well Peanut and I decided to take the test and try out a few of the popular pinned ideas. Here’s how they turned out…
1) Our first pin to try was coloring on laminated self-portraits with dry erase markers. While the process was successful I’m not so sure how much Peanut enjoyed it at this stage in her life. For instance, when I got ready to draw on Teacup’s portrait I said, “I think I’ll make Teacup look like a cat. Peanut immediately got upset and said, “No mommy! I like Teacup just the way she is.” She didn’t want me to draw on her sister at all and make her look different. Now how’s that for a sister? Ha! I need to remember this for some day a few years down the road when I hear this same little girl say, “But mom, why can’t Teacup just be different?” Needless to say, while I still think this idea is cute, these laminated portraits now sit on our shelf unused because Peanut doesn’t like making people look like something they are not. There definitely has to be some sort of deep theological parallel to this…maybe it’s the fact that we don’t need to change ourselves because God loves us just the way we are. Isn’t it just like kids to give you a God-moment?
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| Original pin from Play at Home Mom |
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| Peanut drawing on her laminated self-portrait. |
The second pin to try was the water bottle bubble maker. I decided this would be a good activity for Peanut as we are having trouble getting her to figure out how to blow out. She likes to blow in (i.e. straws) but when it comes to blowing out she still finds it more difficult. In fact, if any of you have a good way to teach a child to blow her nose I’d love to hear it! Alas, that is a total other subject.
For the water bottle bubble maker, I chopped the bottom of a small used water bottle and let her dip the large end into the bubbles. Peanut definitely enjoyed doing this for awhile once she figured out how to blow through the bottle. However, she eventually grew tired of it because while the bottle created some large bubbles, once they grew too large they popped right on the end of the bottle instead of disconnecting themselves and floating in the air. Peanut likes to chase floating bubbles so this eventually frustrated her to no end.
| Original pin from Projects for Preschoolers |
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| Peanut blowing bubbles with her water bottle bubble blower. |
For our last experiment, we decided to try one more pin–the cardboard box baby swing. This was probably the most successful pin of the three. First of all, Peanut loves to swing and while we swing we almost always count. As such, once I put up this cardboard box swing, I could hear throughout the house, “One-two-three-four-FIVE!” as she got ready to push her baby in her swing.
Secondly, Peanut used to have a small doll swing we purchased for her from the store for around $10. We were very disappointed in it because it kept falling apart all the time. This swing is made out of cardboard and ribbon and works so much better.
A few words of advice if you decide to try this pin: 1) Make sure you use twine or shoestrings or ribbon to hold your swing up. We used yarn at first and it quickly broke from one excited little toddler’s swings. 2) Finding a place to put the swing can somewhat be a challenge. We chose to put ours in her doorway. It is held up by a couple of push pins on top of her door trim. 3) If you compare the original pic with our pin, you’ll see that the string is strung through the cardboard box a little differently. We found that if you place two holes on either side of the box instead of one it doesn’t tip over quite as easily.
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| Original pin from Growing Play |
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| Our cardboard box swing (and yes that is my cabbage patch doll from years ago…remember those? |
