Too wet and windy for the seaside – let’s build a seaside here!

Another wet, windy and cold day when we had planned to get Maryhill Families to Troon Beach! But did that stop us?…NO WAY!

All families came over to Community Central Hall, and we decided that we could create our very own indoors picnic and have a cool fun time!

And so we got warmed up with Andre and Big As A Bear, dancing and making a conga with Nerea and playing a round of Funky Chicken with Taz and then Xiya and Andre showed everyone how to play ‘Oli Oli Octopus’ – a cool game that makes you run FAST!

Andre and Xiya were ‘it’ to start with but in this game, whoever gets tagged becomes It TOGETHER with those who started being ‘it’! You follow? Andre and Xiya were in the middle spreading their ‘tentacles’ trying to tag anyone who ran past by them – everyone must run from one end to the other but ALWAYS passing by the Octopuses and if you got tagged you became an Octopus! Everyone runs fast and tries to dodge a tag until in the end it was only James, Nerea and Xiyu left…we caught them in the end!

Then we played ‘Bear and The Honey Pot’ and Cyrus was very good at confusing the poor bear with his squeaky shoes!

Using our big silks, we created a beach and we set our picnic blankets down and then we Dressed Up for a Beach Parade – lead by Andre we showed off our fab creations made out of bits and bobs and old colourful clothes.

We swam and chilled and surfed and played in the waves of our silky Sea and we turned Andre, Nerea and Taz into Sand Sculptures we could mould and change and shape in whatever way we could imagine!

We even turned the grown-ups into ponies that the children could all have a pony-ride!

We had lots of nice picnic – eggs and cheese and hummus, tomatoes and cucumber, bananas and grapes then hot chocolate, muffins and biscuits. Yum!

Free play had people drawing together, writing in different languages, running and sliding around and chatting and chilling like a big bunch of pals on a day out but…IN!

Don’t you love it that even in bad weather Storyplay can brighten the day? WE DO!

So even though this was our last Picnic & Play of this Summer we all felt happy and grateful for having such lovely friends to Storyplay with.

I wonder what the Autumn will bring…

Andre, Nerea, Taz & Maryhill Families