Discovering what’s free to do with your family in your city!

We are very lucky to have fantastic museums and cultural venues in our city and many of them are free!

Picnic & Play is all about taking Storyplay out in the world – we sometimes go to beaches, other times to lochs or parks but we also love to go to museums!

Picnic & Play in Glasgow is all about families taking local public transport to travel to enjoy Storyplay and a delicious picnic with Licketyspit at one of our wonderful Glasgow Museums – we have been to Kelvingrove Galleries, Gallery of Modern Art, the Tall Ship and this Easter we are having brilliant Storyplay at the Riverside Museum – the museum of Transport!

Since Picnic & Play is all about exploring other places through Storyplay we thought that makes us STORYPLAY Explorers! And so our intrepid families imagined themselves beautifully with the help of Dressing up and turned themselves into a very vibrant bunch ready to discover all sorts of things using our Magic Ball…

Magic Ball, Magic Ball

Takes us where we want to go!

Whooooooosh!

A Magic Ball Adventure poem

Explorer Sandwich Hat, Explorer Pine Man, Explorer Shoes and Explorer Paris Artist,

Explorer Plotato , Explorer Blue Dragon, Explorer Ruby & the Archaeologist

Explorer Cristal,  Explorer Lily , Explorer Dog and Explorer I See…

Together they make – a Storyplay Explorer Team Extraordinareee!!!

We landed on a beach but we were washed away

It was a bit too much to resist such a great wave!

We found a big ship but somehow, we were bigger

How will we all fit in?!!!

Just blow up this balloon, blow it up and you will shrink!

Anusha’s fab idea was a brilliant tip!

Cause we all blew a balloon and we all became small!

So tiny happy us enjoyed a cool ship trip

Until a massive Giant appeared on the scene!.

He said – Have you ever travelled by means of giant palm?

We said, ‘We haven’t, no!’ – as we climbed onto his hand!

But how can we go back to our normal size?

‘There is an old machine that can help you all with that’

We fought a fierce fire and rescued trembling Ruby,

We went by train with Amjad and that was also groovy!

And then we flew up high on a hot air balloon

And we looked down from the sky

And felt as high as the moon!

We looked at all the countries, the countries of our pals-

Spain, Poland, Scotland

Nigeria, Pakistan,

Iran, Iraq and England

We saw them like a map!

And so away we flew after exploring lots

To have a lovely Picnic and to draw all of our thoughts!

Ruby, Andre, Taz & Whiteinch, Castlemilk, Maryhill, Govan & Cranhill families

Licketyspit’s Art Gallery

There’s lots of ideas and activities to get you playing at home. Try our interactive videos! Including…

• Making with Iona
• Cooking with Taz
• Exploring with Jack
• Funky Chicken
• Grandma Grandma

and many more!

Find out more about what’s happening at Licketyspit by clicking on the button.

We have some Lickety Mums who volunteer at our Porridge & Play sessions as Storyplay Champions.

If you would like to find out more about Storyplay Champion training and volunteering, click on this button or get in touch with us on cfn@licketyspit.com

Discovering what’s free to do with your family in your city!

We are very lucky to have fantastic museums and cultural venues in our city and many of them are free!

Picnic & Play is all about taking Storyplay out in the world – we sometimes go to beaches, other times to lochs or parks but we also love to go to museums!

Picnic & Play in Glasgow is all about families taking local public transport to travel to enjoy Storyplay and a delicious picnic with Licketyspit at one of our wonderful Glasgow Museums – we have been to Kelvingrove Galleries, Gallery of Modern Art, the Tall Ship and this Easter we are having brilliant Storyplay at the Riverside Museum – the museum of Transport!

Since Picnic & Play is all about exploring other places through Storyplay we thought that makes us STORYPLAY Explorers! And so our intrepid families imagined themselves beautifully with the help of Dressing up and turned themselves into a very vibrant bunch ready to discover all sorts of things using our Magic Ball…

Magic Ball, Magic Ball

Takes us where we want to go!

Whooooooosh!

A Magic Ball Adventure recalled by Poppy, Jesé, Deon, Zara, Taz, Kim & Caroline

When Poppy opened the Magic Ball’s zipper she shouted – ‘ITS A FOREST!!!’.

The trees were big and beautiful but suddenly Sarah and Mateo got grabbed by tree branches! Sarah was trapped in a tree embrace, and Mateo was being dragged by his leg!

‘Quick! Let’s get out of here!’

So, we ran away and found a great big train, which nobody knew how to drive, until Kim said – ‘I got this’. So, we held on tight and off we went. Let me tell you…good try Kim but her driving was rather bumpy and quite fast!

As we stopped, a man with a problem appeared – ‘And what kind of problem do you have?’

• ‘A pizza problem! I need all this pizza, and I have no clue where to get any!’
• What about MAKING some pizza?’ – a fabulous Italian Pizza Chef had the solution!

We told the Italian Pizza Chef that we were good helpers and off we went to her incredible Moving Kitchen – where the oven, the microwave and the fridge keep moving about making our Italian Pizza Chef rather confused and very lively!

We went to town with our ingredients – tomatoes, pepperoni, pineapple, cheese, onions, Indian flavours and even a wee bit of a potion that helps you see the sky closer!

And so with much freshly made pizza we had enough to feed the dinosaurs of the Man with a Pizza Problem and to have a right big slice for ourselves too – result!

After our pizza making, we took another train, this time the driver was Poppy and she was excellent! She took us to the beach in India and oh how we swam!

There we bumped into a group of teenagers who joined us on our travels by bus, this time to Africa! We took the subway to go to a big dancing party – we threw some cool shapes and enjoyed some funky moves, took some cool portraits, to remember our excellent adventure and then, actually quite hungry, we drove back to have a well-deserved Picnic.

All in all, a fantastic big adventure with great pals at the Riverside Museum!

See you all soon!

Andre, Sarah, Taz & fabulous Castlemilk & Whiteinch families

Licketyspit’s Art Gallery

There’s lots of ideas and activities to get you playing at home. Try our interactive videos! Including…

• Making with Iona
• Cooking with Taz
• Exploring with Jack
• Funky Chicken
• Grandma Grandma

and many more!

Find out more about what’s happening at Licketyspit by clicking on the button.

We have some Lickety Mums who volunteer at our Porridge & Play sessions as Storyplay Champions.

If you would like to find out more about Storyplay Champion training and volunteering, click on this button or get in touch with us on cfn@licketyspit.com

Bookplay is a Porridge & Play session where we all listen to a Story and then instead of the Magic Ball we ALL JUMP into the world of a BOOK to have an adventure!

The Just-so-John Bookplay stories are by a writer called Rudyard Kipling who was born 160 years ago in India! Rudyard travelled all over the world, which was quite amazing because this was before there were aeroplanes so you could only travel by foot, by boat, by horse, by bicycle  or by train!!  

Rudyard’s stories for children were inspired by all the different places he saw – a bit like us with our Flying Balloons game! His Just-So stories are about animals in India and Africa! (His most famous children’s book is The Jungle Book – which you might have heard of! ) His Just So Stories are about how he imagined some of the animals in the world came to be the way they are – how the camel got his hump? , how the leopard got his spots?, how the whale got his throat? and other questions.

Virginia’s Dad John loved these Just So Stories when he was a child. When he grew up he read them to his children (including Virginia) and then he read them to his grandchildren! John lived until he was nearly 91! When he died  some of his friends and family decided it would be fun to help Licketyspit to do some Just-so- John Bookplay Sessions to introduce the stories John loved to more children!  We are calling these our Just-So-John Bookplays! We hope you enjoy them!

‘How the Whale got His Throat’ by Rudyard Kipling – a Bookplay by Bridgeton, Whiteinch and Maryhill Hub families…

Today our Bookplay session was outdoors in a spot Licketyspit families love to go to …the Children’s Wood!

The Children’s Wood is a brilliant green space in Glasgow – we are very lucky that we live in a city with so many big and wee green spaces for us all to enjoy and look after. Our pal Andrea from the Children’s Wood Team joined us too and of course we thought – what’s more exciting than to listen to a good story around Andrea’s campfire?

 Excellent idea, my beloved!

Andrea knows everything about building fires we can enjoy safely and without damaging any nature around us – so we set up our Storyplay camp around the campfire, with a nice big picnic, and a wee shelter to make us all feel cozy and give us cover in case it rained – It didn’t! hurray!

And so, we sat round the fire and Ruby read the Rudyard Kipling Just So Story about ‘How The Whale Got His Throat’. You could have heard a pin drop! Everyone was so engrossed in the tale!

‘By means of a grating, I have stopped your ‘ating.’

While we toasted some marshmallows we all chatted about the story –

How many characters were there?

Who would like to play what?

How could you be one character one minute and another the next?, just

like that?

And how could the Mariner (sailor)manage to create a giant grating for the Whale’s throat with only a wee knife?

Well…the Mariner, as we had heard, was ‘a man of infinite-resource-and-sagacity.’

Did you know that infinite’ means ‘never ending’ and ‘Sagacity’ means ‘clever and canny’ ?

It was time to get on our feet and JUMP INTO the Kipling story of ‘How The Whale Got His Throat’ and a great way in is to dress up!

Abackr got started as the Stute Fish and Malak was a crab, Waheed felt strongly that he wanted to be the Whale and Farah decided to be the Sea itself! Many doubled as fish and other sea creatures, and everyone embodied the Big Great Whale swimming across the sea…whoosh!

Then Sarah and Grace became the Mariners and got eaten up by the whale – and that was too much fun not to have a go at, so other people became Mariners and enjoyed getting gulped up too!

‘Noble and generous Cetacean, have you ever tasted Man?’

Inside the Whale’s belly a riot ensued and we all ‘stumped and they jumped and they thumped and they bumped…they pranced and they danced and they …hopped and they dropped and they ..danced hornpipes where they shouldn’t!” until the Whale got the hiccups.

Getting out of the Whale’s belly was also very fun, so quite a few Mariners got ejected!

The grating created by the Mariners who cut up the raft with the cunning use of the wee Jack knife, which proved to be very effective – the Whale tried several times to eat up more mariners but with no success because the grating we had stuck across the Whale’s throat was most effective. From that moment on, no fish or humans could ever be eaten by the Whale. Which also meant that the Whale’s digestion was going to be much more comfortable – happy days!

We had our lovely Picnic sitting together beneath the trees in the Children’s Wood enjoying being outdoors in the fresh air – we even had time to chase about between the trees!

Isn’t it great how you can Bookplay absolutely anywhere you like? All you need is your favourite story, some friends and your fantastic imaginations! What other great story could you Bookplay with your family and friends? Maybe you could tell us about it?

Ruby, Sarah, Taz, Andrea & our pals at The Children’s Wood

Could you BOOKPLAY a story with your family and friends this weekend?

Listen to John telling How The Whale Got His Throat by Rudyard Kipling by clicking here!

Lots of Storyplay, lots of friends, lots of food, lots of FUN on our last session of this block.

We always call the last session of each block a Porridge & Play Celebration because we celebrate many things that day – making new friends who live in the same bit of the city, learning things about each other, learning games that we can play together as a family and as a community, tasting and sharing delicious food and the fact that the Licketyspit family of families keeps growing!

Our circle was as big as ever and Big As a Bear got louder than EVER! Andre got everyone going and ready to welcome Funky Chicken – Zoe was a Naughty cat,  Xiyu a Golden Fish, Maya was  the Silly Giraffe and Waheed a Mountain Lion. Xiya became Karate Cat, Violet was Sunny Dog and Salaar was the Funny Lion! We particularly loved being Dying Flies today!

Next up was Dressing up – the Maryhill Hub families, children and grown-ups alike, are big fans of Dressing Up and they became exuberant Chefs with exuberant names like Lobster Chef! Ruby Chef was in a pickle because she needed some fresh ideas and help for an exquisite new cake recipe…we all were up for it: Let’s Bake A Cake!!

With ordinary and extraordinary ingredients – I recall mango, pineapple, eggs, flour and a smelly sock or two – we baked the most delicious, finger- licking and exciting cake ever seen in Maryhill! But can you believe that when we were enjoying a piece, suddenly Andre found something unexpected in his…a Magic Ball!!

Naturally, we all wanted to go on an adventure, so we blew the Magic Ball up to make it big enough for us all to climb inside, chanted the magic words and…WHOOOOSHHH!

Zac guided us all as he knew we had landed in the Jungle! and Zac knows everything there is to know about the jungle! As we were cautiously creeping about, we heard a sort of a roar ……AND a big green Dragon appeared and before we knew  it we were inside her belly!

Thrishitha and Salaar speak Dragon so they could speak to the Dragon. They found out that in order to get out we needed a boat and someone who could steer it! Waheed was ready to step up, so we climbed in and Waheed steered the boat out of the Dragon! Then the Dragon gave us a ride on her back…how kind! It was a very exciting flight and we had excellent views!

We had just landed and we were saying Cheerio to the Dragon when….WOOOOOOF!

A howling trio of wolves appeared! – Wolf Stuart lived in a dark cave, Wolf Andre lived under a mattress and liked to eat mustard and Wolf Violet lived under water and liked chocolate – A nice game of What’s The Time Mr. Wolf ensued…which took us, neatly to ‘Dinner Time!’

We love to share food at our Celebration, and the Maryhill families brought gorgeous delicacies from home to share  – Cinnamon rolls made by Rita, Maya and Olesya, chicken sausages that looked like octopus that Mai and Mali brought, Arvin and Shirley brought dumplings and Violet, Claire and Steven had made cornflakes & chocolate cakes.There were veggie sandwiches & Chocolate sandwiches made by Amna and Salaar and a Honey Cake made by Penny and Yulia plus lovely Kiir that Rohini made and another Indian sweet made semolina and cashews homemade by Gouthami. Plus, leek & tattie soup and lots of bread, cheese, hummus and fruit – what an absolute feast!!

The best part was, well…everything! Children and grown-ups together playing and sitting at a table to eat and chat like in a great big family gathering. And although it was the last session of the block, Storyplay adventures have just only begun for the families at our Maryhill Hub – look out for Bookplay and Picnic & Play adventures coming up very soon!.

Taz, Andre, Virginia, Ruby, Johnny and Maryhill Hub families

Maryhill Art Gallery!

There’s lots of ideas and activities to get you playing at home. Try our interactive videos! Including…

• Making with Iona
• Cooking with Taz
• Exploring with Jack
• Funky Chicken
• Grandma Grandma

and many more!

Find out more about what’s happening at Licketyspit by clicking on the button.

We have some Lickety Mums who volunteer at our Porridge & Play sessions as Storyplay Champions.

If you would like to find out more about Storyplay Champion training and volunteering, click on this button or get in touch with us on cfn@licketyspit.com

So we were nine families with 14 children this week at the CCH for Porridge & Play Maryhill. Everyone is feeling like we’ve become old friends! 

We started with a Dance Warm-Up to Salaar’s favourite song – Thunder by Imagine Dragons – and some Sufi poetry Amna introduced us to!

Rita said “Do you know the Funky Chicken?” And then an amazing array of characters appeared – The Squirmy Worm, Dizzy Elephant, Sunny Dog, Funky Monkey, Naughty Octopus, Scary Tiger, Lazy Cat, Loud Dinosaur, Happy Butterfly! Not forgetting Aarushi’s Jumping Rabbit and Shriyansh’s Jumping Dolphin!

Then we played “I’m going to drink a bottle of!!!…” This was Lizzie, Zoe & Zac’s first ever Witches Fingers and they created fantabulous witches – he he he!

Arvin was a Witch in our marvellous Magic Ball Story which Rita has written about below! (His witch pretended to eat the Ball – disaster! – but she tricked us!)

Our Dressing Up today was a delicious array of colour and invention and so was our Storyplay, and our food was delicioso! 

We had great chats and we realised that today is EID! So Happy Eid to all our friends

Here is the Magic Ball Story and our amazing Gallery!

See you all next week for our Maryhill Hub celebration!

Andre, Ruby, Taz & the Maryhill Hub

Maryhill Art Gallery!

Read the artists’ comments here!

There’s lots of ideas and activities to get you playing at home. Try our interactive videos! Including…

• Making with Iona
• Cooking with Taz
• Exploring with Jack
• Funky Chicken
• Grandma Grandma

and many more!

Find out more about what’s happening at Licketyspit by clicking on the button.

We have some Lickety Mums who volunteer at our Porridge & Play sessions as Storyplay Champions.

If you would like to find out more about Storyplay Champion training and volunteering, click on this button or get in touch with us on cfn@licketyspit.com

Bookplay is a Porridge & Play session where we all listen to a Story and then instead of the Magic Ball we ALL JUMP into the world of a BOOK to have an adventure!

The Just-so-John Bookplay stories are by a writer called Rudyard Kipling who was born 160 years ago in India! Rudyard travelled all over the world, which was quite amazing because this was before there were aeroplanes so you could only travel by foot, by boat, by horse, by bicycle  or by train!!  

Rudyard’s stories for children were inspired by all the different places he saw – a bit like us with our Flying Balloons game! His Just-So stories are about animals in India and Africa! (His most famous children’s book is The Jungle Book – which you might have heard of! ) His Just So Stories are about how he imagined some of the animals in the world came to be the way they are – how the camel got his hump? , how the leopard got his spots?, how the whale got his throat? and other questions.

Virginia’s Dad John loved these Just So Stories when he was a child. When he grew up he read them to his children (including Virginia) and then he read them to his grandchildren! John lived until he was nearly 91! When he died  some of his friends and family decided it would be fun to help Licketyspit to do some Just-so- John Bookplay Sessions to introduce the stories John loved to more children!  We are calling these our Just-So-John Bookplays! We hope you enjoy them!

‘How the Rhinoceros Got His Skin’  by Rudyard Kipling – a Bookplay by our Castlemilk Hub families…

Our second Just-so-John Bookplay at Castlemilk Library was an absolute joy! Families got together exited to see which Just-So-Story we would jump into this time. So, we enjoyed a few of our Storyplay games to get us all going and then Ruby read us the story of…‘How the Rhinoceros got his Skin’.

ONCE upon a time, on an uninhabited island on the shores of the Red Sea, there lived a Parsee from whose hat the rays of the sun were reflected in more-than-oriental splendour. 

Dressing up the Licketyspit way is the perfect way for us to become all the characters, places and things in the story!

And one day he took flour and water and currants and plums and sugar and things and made himself one cake which was two feet across and three feet thick.

But just as he was going to eat it there came down to the beach one Rhinoceros with a horn on his nose, two piggy eyes, and few manners. In those days the Rhinoceros’s skin fitted him quite tight. There were no wrinkles in it anywhere.

We fabulously moved from being one character to becoming another as we recalled the story!

And the Rhinoceros upset the oil-stove with his nose, and the cake rolled on the sand, and he spiked that cake on the horn of his nose, and he ate it, and he went away, waving his tail.

‘Them that takes cakes

Which the Parsee-man bakes

Makes dreadful mistakes.’

Mr. Parsee carefully planned how to get his own back on the rhino for eating his fantastic cake!

During a Heat Wave while the rhino was cooling down in the water…

The Rhinoceros took off his skin and carried it over his shoulder as he came down to the beach to bathe. In those days it buttoned underneath with three buttons and looked like a waterproof

Mr. Parsee collected cake crumbs from his camp and sprinkled them all over the inside of the rhino’s skin and waited for the rhino to come out the water and put his skin back on…

And it tickled like cake crumbs in bed! Then he wanted to scratch, but that made it worse

The poor grumpy rhino tried everything to stop the itch! He even scratched and rubbed against a palm tree – that looked very much like one of our grown-ups and made us all laugh and laugh! But the itch wouldn’t go away which made the rhino grumpier and grumpier…

So he went home, very angry indeed and horribly scratchy; and from that day to this every rhinoceros has great folds in his skin and a very bad temper, all on account of the cake-crumbs inside

What a fantastic way to play with a good story…that’s why we call it BOOKPLAY!

Could you BOOKPLAY a story with your family and friends this weekend?

Listen to John telling How The Rhinoceros Got His Skin by Rudyard Kipling by clicking here!

Check out the wonderful ART GALLERY inspired by our  Just-So- John Bookplay at Castlemilk Library!

Week two of Porridge & Play MARYHILL got us all sharing our best moves – warming up our bodies and our imaginations, singing, dressing-up to transform ourselves into Forest Creatures and much more!

A very Big Circle to see everyone,

Cause our games are way best when we’re ALL in the fun!

First Big as a Bear gets us all going,

Running and jumping we are telling a story,

About how we can be whatever we like!

An Ox or a Hare or a Bird flying high!

So many of us here so let’s hear all our names,

And show everyone our cool move as well!

Then The Funky Chicken shows up to play,

Can you think of an animal? Does it move in some way?

What sound does it make? Can we do it again?!

Maya’s Funny Duckling liked Olesya’s Sleepy Tiger

Amna’s Happy Penguin liked Salaar’s Cheeky Lion!

Yachai’s Funny Bunny saw Rita’s a Happy Butterfly,

Shirley’s Jumping Rabbit loved Stephen’s Hyperactive Sloth!

But, have you heard before about a man called Fred?

Who likes to go to bed at night with Jelly On His Head?

If that sounds a bit silly just wait ‘til you hear,

What a girl called Bella Spears takes to bed in her ears!!

We sang about Grace, about Claire, about John,

What other funny things you could think to put on?

Dressing up – just combining old bits and old bobs,

Clothes now too wee or we don’t use a lot.

An ordinary shirt can become a spy’s cape,

A jacket an apron for an excited chef,

A scarf can become the long tail of a mouse,

Just have a good look and find things round your house!

Dressing up in this way lets us be anyone,

Dressing up in this way is just fabulous fun!

Today we were Forest Creatures just for a laugh!

Butterflies, flowers, a ghost and a squirrel, 

Cheeky cat, baby bear, a bat and a panther.

A kingfisher, giraffe and even a tree! 

A fox with a tail, 

Now what else could you be?

While we were admiring ourselves and our forest,

We heard of a Wolf who owns a cool watch,

If the creatures – who don’t! –  want to find out the time

They must ask Mr Wolf – Mr. Wolf, What’s the time?

At 3 ride a bike, at 7 we nap, at 10 go to school,

But we all know the golden rule –

Be careful, be careful we better watch out…

Guess what happens at DINNER when Wolfy’s about?!

When playing is done doing some drawing is good! 

Then we’re usually hungry and ready for food!

Fruit, cheese, tomatoes, fresh bread and some soup,

Olesya, Rita and Maya brought home-made hummus too!

The Maryhill Hub families truly are game, 

So full of ideas in the sun and the rain,

When we meet there is no doubt we will all find the way,

To enjoy some amazing STORYPLAY!

See you next week!

Andre, Ruby, Taz, Virginia  & the Maryhill Hub families

Maryhill Art Gallery!

Read the artists’ comments here!

There’s lots of ideas and activities to get you playing at home. Try our interactive videos! Including…

• Making with Iona
• Cooking with Taz
• Exploring with Jack
• Funky Chicken
• Grandma Grandma

and many more!

Find out more about what’s happening at Licketyspit by clicking on the button.

We have some Lickety Mums who volunteer at our Porridge & Play sessions as Storyplay Champions.

If you would like to find out more about Storyplay Champion training and volunteering, click on this button or get in touch with us on cfn@licketyspit.com

Bookplay is a Porridge & Play session where we all listen to a Story and then instead of the Magic Ball we ALL JUMP into the world of a BOOK to have an adventure!

The Just-so-John Bookplay stories are by a writer called Rudyard Kipling who was born 160 years ago in India! Rudyard travelled all over the world, which was quite amazing because this was before there were aeroplanes so you could only travel by foot, by boat, by horse, by bicycle  or by train!!  

Rudyard’s stories for children were inspired by all the different places he saw – a bit like us with our Flying Balloons game! His Just-So stories are about animals in India and Africa! (His most famous children’s book is The Jungle Book – which you might have heard of! ) His Just So Stories are about how he imagined some of the animals in the world came to be the way they are – how the camel got his hump? , how the leopard got his spots?, how the whale got his throat? and other questions.

Virginia’s Dad John loved these Just So Stories when he was a child. When he grew up he read them to his children (including Virginia) and then he read them to his grandchildren! John lived until he was nearly 91! When he died  some of his friends and family decided it would be fun to help Licketyspit to do some Just-so- John Bookplay Sessions to introduce the stories John loved to more children!  We are calling these our Just-So-John Bookplays! We hope you enjoy them!

‘How the Whale Got His Throat’ by Rudyard Kipling – a Bookplay by our Castlemilk Hub families…

In the sea, once upon a time O my Best Beloved, there was a Whale, and he ate fishes

We gathered at Castlemilk Library and we found out today was World Book Day – which was perfect for a Bookplay! We were oh so ready to jump into this tale about a whale, a person, and a wee tiny but wise fish. 

Before jumping into the book, we got warmed up and ready by playing some of our Storyplay games to get our imaginations going and then Virginia read us the story…

All the fishes he could find in all the sea he ate with his mouth—so! Till at last there was only one small fish left in all the sea, and he was a small ‘Stute Fish

We all dressed up as the characters in the story!

Some  of us decided to be the tiny ‘Stute Fish’!

Noble and generous Cetacean, have you ever tasted Man?’ ‘If you swim to latitude Fifty North, longitude Forty West (that is magic), you will find, sitting on a raft, in the middle of the sea, with nothing on but a pair of blue canvas breeches, a pair of suspenders (you must not forget the suspenders, Best Beloved), and a jack- knife, one ship-wrecked Mariner, who, it is only fair to tell you, is a man of infinite-resource-and-sagacity.’ 

(‘infinite’ means ‘never ending’ and ‘sagacity’ means ‘clever and canny!’).

Some of us became the Mariner person…with the suspenders (or ‘braces’ to hold up his trousers!)  

And of course, some of us became the very hungry Whale!

A brilliant thing about Bookplay is that you can be one character at one moment and a different character the next – we all collaborated and worked together so we could play out the whole story

 Noble and generous Cetacean, have you ever tasted Man?

A pair of ship-wrecked Mariners!

Even though the Whale had eaten all the fishes – except one! – he was still hungry so he ate the Mariners!

Inside the Whale’s belly the Mariners “stumped and they jumped and they thumped and they bumped…they pranced and they danced and they …hopped and they dropped and they ..danced hornpipes where they shouldn’t!”     amongst other things until the Whale got the hiccups!

‘Tell him to come out,’ said the ‘Stute Fish.

‘Nay, nay!’ said the Mariner. ‘Not so, but far otherwise. Take me to my natal-shore IN SCOTLAND! 

The Mariner, who was indeed a person of infinite-resource-and-sagacity, had taken his jack-knife and cut up the raft into a little square grating all running criss- cross, and he had tied it firm with his suspenders, dragged that grating good and tight into the Whale’s throat, and there it stuck 

By means of a grating, I have stopped your ating.

WHAT AN ADVENTURE!  Do you think you could Bookplay other good stories?

All we had was each other and our bag of dressing up clothes! (Which as you know is just a collection of old clothes no-one wanted anymore!)

If you do a Bookplay at home send us a message or a photo!

Listen to John telling How The Whale Got His Throat by Rudyard Kipling by clicking here!

Check out the wonderful ART GALLERY inspired by our  Just-So- John Bookplay at Castlemilk Library!

A new block of Porridge & Play sessions has started with a fabulous group of families – some returning friends and many new ones gathering for the first time at the big Reid Hall.

Our circle today was BIG and all the families were smiling and ready to use their imaginations, relax and have quality time together.

‘Make yourselves as Big As A Bear’ – warming up is great to get everyone ready!

Funky Chicken was a hoot, and we met very many animals –

Thrishitha was the Naughty Dog and Yachai was the Angry Bird

Maya was a Sneaky Snake and Zoe a Grumpy Lion

Zac was a Happy Dog and Shriyansh was a Sleepy Lion

Farah was a Cheeky Rabbit and Violet a Good Dog

And Mai got as all dancing as the Dancing Dolphin!

‘Flying Balloons’

There were yellow and rainbow and purple and gold

and silver and blue and green and classic red balloons!

And we blew them up big and we flew up high in the sky

And we flew and flew above the Canal – what can you see?

Red birds and apple pie that tasted of chocolate, steak or blueberries? We heard music, is that a drum?

We saw a dog and even dolphins in the canal!

Dressing up was a hit!

All our friends new and not so new LOVED dressing up in the Licketyspit way – we don’t dress up in a costume to be just one character, we take old clothes and we combine them to transform ourselves into many different guises and today we were PIRATES!

Meet Pirate Potato, Pirate Carrot, Pirate Pizza, The Clown, Pirate Piano, Pirate Alloa, Pirate Strawberry, Captain Seas, Captain Purple, Captain Precious and the world famous ARRRRGGH Captain!

We scrubbed the deck and aye aye’d to our hearts content – A Haaa!

Then we sat round our big great table full of delicious fruit and bread and cheese and we enjoyed a tasty Carrot & Coriander soup.

A fantastic first session for the current Maryhill Hub families who left home smiling and wondering where they could go next on a Flying Balloon…

See you all next week!

Andre, Ruby, Virginia & Taz

Maryhill Art Gallery!

READ SOME OF THE ARTIST’S COMMENTS FROM THE LICKETY ART GALLERY:

There’s lots of ideas and activities to get you playing at home. Try our interactive videos! Including…

• Making with Iona
• Cooking with Taz
• Exploring with Jack
• Funky Chicken
• Grandma Grandma

and many more!

Find out more about what’s happening at Licketyspit by clicking on the button.

We have some Lickety Mums who volunteer at our Porridge & Play sessions as Storyplay Champions.

If you would like to find out more about Storyplay Champion training and volunteering, click on this button or get in touch with us on cfn@licketyspit.com

Season’s Greetings from everyone at Licketyspit!

As we head into 2026, we know that times are hard for everyone. Any contribution you can to make to this appeal will not only go towards funding our annual Winter Ceilidh for the families that we work with (old and New Scots alike) but will also help towards next year’s planned programme of work across Glasgow, so that we can continue to bring Storyplay (and healthy food) to the families most in need of our help.

There’s lots of ideas and activities to get you playing at home. Try our interactive videos! Including…

• Making with Iona
• Cooking with Taz
• Exploring with Jack
• Funky Chicken
• Grandma Grandma

and many more!

Find out more about what’s happening at Licketyspit by clicking on the button.

We have some Lickety Mums who volunteer at our Porridge & Play sessions as Storyplay Champions.

If you would like to find out more about Storyplay Champion training and volunteering, click on this button or get in touch with us on cfn@licketyspit.com