Another Fruit Box Toy

I still have a few more fruit boxes in my storage room and was thrilled to pull one out this week to make a new toy for the younger children in our centre.
                     
The basket of hair curlers have been out, to play with, for a couple of weeks so it was easy to use those as toys to push through holes in the box.  I first traced the different sizes of curlers and cut out the hole.
                 
This year I have many more children under 3 years old then I have ever had so I’ve been creating more toys with loose parts for that age.
   
Notice the little one with the pink pants?  She isn’t walking yet but is standing on her own and beginning to shuffle sideways around the box.  The box is a great size to allow her to support herself, move and explore..
                           
      It is also big enough for several children to play at the same time.
                    
A couple of years ago I made a similar toy for the children to play with at the table.  They really enjoyed it.

So I shouldn’t have been surprised that even the older children were interested in playing with the box.

Farmers’ Show

Today our community hosted a Young Farmers’ Exhibit and we were lucky to
                                get on the tour list.
                        
There were two large buildings with exhibits plus the animals and machinery
                          outside.  Those were our focus.
               
We arrived on time for our first demo – cow milking - but the cow wasn’t ready so we were directed to the seed planting table.  We planted a bean seed to take
                                     back to school.
 
Then we met Casey the Cow and learned all about her.  The different parts of her body.  How much she weighs.  How much and what she eats in a day.  And what she likes to do; eat, sleep, drink and be social.

         Finally we saw how she is milked.  She is a very calm cow.
          
We watched the milk move through the tubing from the suctions to the
big glass jar.  In an average milking she would fill the jar 2/3 full.

         Then we met a few more animals that live on local farms. 
                             A calf that is just a few weeks old.
   
Donkeys, sheep and goats,
  
                           a pony and a uniquely coloured cow.

And lastly were the bunnies.  There was a momma and five babies.

After the animals we checked out the tractors.
     
  
    Who doesn’t want to sit on a big machine and pretend you’re driving?

        
                        We had some fun posing for pictures.
    
                           Picking apples and filling baskets.
         
And looking for eggs in the chicken coop.  There was a lot more to see but not of interest to the children in our group.  I was very impressed with how organized this event was set up.  We had our own tour guide who led us around and made sure we saw everything that we were interested in.

Emergency Vehicles Visit

            
After making our fruit box vehicles we were fortunate to have a couple
             of visits from people that work in our community.
          
    The first was the RCMP.  They brought two cars for us to investigate.

       
We looked over the outside of the vehicle and under the hood (learned the word ‘engine’) then opened the doors.  We noticed a lot of lights on the police cars.
                    
        
Then we climbed inside and saw their computer and radio and imagined what it would be like to drive it.  We also sat in the back, which was a bit squished, and wondered who sits there and looks through the glass to the officers in the front.


          
               Then today a tow truck came to the school.
             
    This is a family run company with husband and wife as drivers. 
              They came to share their vehicle and job with us.
 
It was raining pretty hard so not many children came outside.  That is until
        they peeked out the window and saw my car being winched up.
  
The children were offered the chance to use the levers to lift my car up and down. 
Hmmm, a question for the children will be "how can we add levers to our fruit box tow truck?"
           
The driver showed us the hook that they would use to turn a car over if it
        had flipped.  We saw the winch working at the other end.

     But oh, oh, I locked my keys in the car!  How do they open the door?
  
It took him about a minute to open the door using special tools.  We got to
           play with the blow up tool (sorry I didn’t get the proper name).
                         
We noticed these small wheels in the back of the truck.  What are they for?

                          
Within minutes Damien had them off and under my car ready to lift it totally off the ground.  They are used if a vehicle has all wheel transmission or if the back wheels are damaged and can’t turn.
                  
           It was an awesome way to learn more about emergency vehicles. 
I love our community that when asked they will share their time and jobs with
                                              us.