The Imagination Tree

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Friday Favourites!

February 4, 2011 by Anna Ranson

These are my favourite photos that I took this week. I am really an amateur with a camera but would desperately love to take a class and learn some more. It’s on the bucket list for this year! My brother let me use his lights and camera this week to mess about with some pictures of the girls. 
This one sums up Cakie completely.
Little Pop looking reflective for a brief moment.
And here is a little snapshot of their love. 

I just came across this post on a brilliant early years site this week. (It’s not new but I have only just seen it!)

It sums up everything that I believe about early years creative and sensory play ideas and is written much more succinctly than anything I could compose. So I invite you to go and read and enjoy the focus of “it’s not the product but the process” that’s important when working with young children. 100% spot on.

And how about this for a wonderfully fun example of messy play?! I’ve been thinking of setting some little bugs within jelly for play but these plastic animals are also great!

Have a great weekend!

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Filed Under: Friday Favourites

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Comments

  1. rachelle @ tinkerlab.com says

    February 6, 2011 at 7:26 am

    Anna, your pictures came out beautifully! You are quite humble. And, I’m flattered for the link share. Thanks 🙂

Friday Favourites!

January 28, 2011 by Anna Ranson

My favourite sight of the week- a picnic for Pooh bear all set up and played with in the time it took for mummy to have a shower. I love how the straw reaches his little mouth. Just gorgeous.

Favourite ideas that I have seen on other sites:

This lovely idea for putting together a toddler sewing basket, full of tactile, exploratory, heuristic play opportunities. This is actually an old post but I saw a link to it this week and it is great. Check out other ideas on Christie’s Childhood 101 blog as it is fab.

This site has a great post on developing your garden or outdoor space into a play space for your children and shows fabulous understanding of children’s love for the outdoor environment. It makes me really long for Spring so we can get going in our garden!

And this post about how to make your own birthday cakes from fabric, ribbon and embellishments is just beautiful! I really want to learn how to sew properly and make some for the girls. I will add it to the bucket list 🙂

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Filed Under: Friday Favourites

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Comments

  1. Tammy @ she wears flowers says

    January 28, 2011 at 6:46 pm

    Thanks for sharing my cake idea! There isn’t too much sewing and most is done or can be done with glue as well. I hope you make it! It is so much fun!

    You have a lovely site!!

  2. Christie - Childhood 101 says

    January 29, 2011 at 6:47 am

    Thank you for including the toddler sewing basket on your list, it really has been a lot of fun 🙂

  3. Anna @ The Imagination Tree says

    January 29, 2011 at 10:50 am

    Oooo in that case Tammy, there’s nothing stopping me! I will have a go later today 🙂 Thanks for the idea.

    You are welcome Christie! I look forward to making one for C when I can get all the bits together. I shall link back to you when I do so.

  4. jenny @ let the children play says

    January 30, 2011 at 2:00 pm

    thanks Anna for the link love!

  5. sbobet says

    December 22, 2011 at 9:54 am

    Wonderful blog! I found it while searching on Yahoo News. Do you have any tips on how to get listed in Yahoo News? I’ve been trying for a while but I never seem to get there! Many thanks.sbo

Friday Favourites!

November 13, 2010 by Anna Ranson

As December is fast approaching I have been thinking about making my own advent calendar for the girls (spurred on by my friend Tineke who is making a beautiful one for her baby son!) It’s now added to the list along with stockings, wrapping paper and tree ornaments. Hmmmmm!

I came across this lovely tutorial at Make It Do It for a Christmas tree advent calendar pattern with 25 little pockets. It looks really effective, although lots of hard work too!

I also love this amazing idea for storing toy cars and providing a play space and learning activity all rolled into one. It would make such a nice home-made Christmas present. These lovely crafts remind me that I need to find a space for my sewing machine and learn how to use it properly!

Have a lovely weekend!

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Filed Under: Friday Favourites

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Comments

  1. Jackie H. says

    November 13, 2010 at 2:06 pm

    You are right! Those are great ideas. I’m going to make the cozy car storage. Well, if I can force myself to take a break from blogging long enough to get all my Christmas stuff made! LOL

Friday Favourites!

October 29, 2010 by Anna Ranson

I am going to link up each Friday to some of the best activities, articles or other posts to do with children that I have read during the week.

Firstly, I absolutely LOVE these simple, yet beautiful little houses made out of juice cartons! Brilliant for small-world and imaginative play, and I’m sure older children could have a really good attempt at making these themselves. Little ones could help to decorate!

This is a fun post that shows you how to make paint colours using food! Educational, fun and creative- great combination!

And finally, I am loving the wonderful resources on this site for doing fun Bible time sessions at home with your children. They are downloadable and look like they would print out nicely (if only we had our printer connected!)

And a little thank you to Michelle from Best Toys For Toddlers for passing on a blog award to me (not really sure what that means but grateful nonetheless!)

versatilebloggeraward.jpg

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Filed Under: Friday Favourites, Links, Resources

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Comments

  1. Caz says

    October 29, 2010 at 10:20 pm

    Thankyou so much for linking to our food painting activity, glad you enjoyed it 🙂 You have a lovely Blog and I have to say your girls are just adorable! I especially loved reading your profile – I know what you mean about our own kids being harder to teach than other peoples, amazing how different it is isn’t it.

  2. Darcey says

    October 31, 2010 at 6:49 pm

    I thought of doing something like this a while ago for my own blog, but never got around to it. So, thank you for reminding me. I’ve linked up to your blog on my post, http://play2grow.blogspot.com/2010/10/weekly-favorites-october-31-2010.html
    You have a great blog!

  3. Joyfulmama says

    November 1, 2010 at 8:44 pm

    Hi Anna, thanks SO much for linking to my blog!! We are having tons of fun with our juice box houses, and so glad to have you sharing the delight with us. Lots of love from Joyful Mama’s Place!

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About The Imagination Tree Hello and welcome! I'm Anna, Mama of 4, early years teacher and play enthusiast from the UK! Click here to read more about me.

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