It’s been messy, exciting, squelchy, and creative in the forest this week! The rain has made conditions rather muddy as you may have already noticed from the clothing you have received. However, at Little Forest Folk we always try to create positive responses to all types of weather conditions and encourage the children to embrace their natural environment. With that said, we’ve seen many children splashing, sitting, rolling, and sliding in the mud and the rising puddles our site contains. One fun game was to use construction materials to build a bridge across a large puddle that contained crocodiles looking for an easy snack. Luckily our Forest Folk-ers are so good at balancing that none of them were eaten!
Another fun messy activity has been to use items such as vinegar, bicarbonate of soda, turmeric, and paint in order to create some stinky and mucky volcanoes on the meadow. By the end of the activity staff and children smelt heavily of vinegar and had very yellow hands. However, the lava was not quite as hot as from normal volcanoes and Twickenham was not buried like Pompeii.
As conditions made it difficult to use paper and paint on the art and craft table, we got very creative and found some old potatoes (too old to eat) and made our very own potato people. First, the children went hunting for short, thin sticks for the arms and legs. Then one child suggested we use small stones for eyes. After we had gathered enough material, each child took it in turns to use a pointy stick that was just right for making holes in the potatoes. Once they were finished some of the group decided to paint hair and facial features on to their potato. One even turned theirs into a ‘Potato spider’ with eight stick legs. Anyone bitten by it turned into a potato too!
We also harvested some mud to use in another unusual way, this time as part of small bird feeders. The children used spades to dig up the mud (although it didn’t take much digging), then spread it onto individual pieces of card. Later they carefully added a sprinkling of bird seeds to the mixture, making sure not to bury it too deeply in the mud. Once everyone had finished, we looked for the best places to leave them for our feathered friends (especially the curious robin who enjoys joining us for snack times). Happy pecking!
Thursday saw us mark ‘World Book Day’, a real favourite at Little Forest Folk. Thank you to everyone who took part, either in fabulous costumes or in listening to lots of wonderful new stories such as ‘Alice in Wonderland’, a selection of Mr Men books, ‘The most wonderful gift in the world’ and many more. Our forest was alive with Gruffalo’s, Stickmen, Buzz Lightyear, Fantastic Mr Fox, dinosaurs, Wonder Woman, Princess Pearl. In the morning we had a visit from Little Miss Sunshine. Unfortunately, the skies remained overcast, but her big smile kept everyone warm. She really enjoyed hiding away under our big trees. The afternoon saw the visit of The Mad Hatter who decided to use the forest for one of his famous tea parties. He hunted high and low for his friend the rabbit, but alas the rabbit was running late as usual. Therefore, some of the children held the large clock while we listened to Alice’s adventures after she tumbled down the rabbit hole. The mud kitchen sprung to life baking some delicious mud jam tarts for the gathering to munch.
Little Forest Folk
Twickenham