Photo of the Chicken Coop Clubhouse

To the right and down a bit on this page you will see a photo added this week of me standing between some neighboring kids in front of the Chicken Coop Clubhouse which I've written about in a few blogs. The photo points out the truth in the adage, "A picture is worth 1,000 words."

Ramshackled with hardly any glass in the windows that small, old building was our DisneyWorld-the hub of our growing up in the country. It was a schoolhouse-a playhouse-a library-a restaurant-a stop along the way for stagecoaches or whatever else our imaginations pretended it to be. It provided us hours of creativity. It allowed us to explore the depths of childhood imagination. It instilled in us an excitement of the possibility. We learned sharing and responsibility; caring for those younger than we were; organizing events and carrying through with those events when the best laid plans hit roadblocks-just as life does when becoming adults. We read books; my favorites always by Laura Ingalls Wilder and Louisa May Alcott. We wrote books.

From that Chicken Coop Clbhouse came plays and fairs; circuses and artshows. We taught the younger ones their ABCs. We read to them. We did projects with them. We even sent worksheets and report cards home with them. We hand-printed 4 copies of a family newspaper and delivered the copies every Sunday morning complete with family news, display ads, and local family sports.

Most kids don't need anything fancy to play with. Imaginations just need to be stimulated-not from TV or electronic games but from the freedom to explore where their very own imaginations can take them. Turn a sofa into a cabin. Throw a blanket between two chairs. If your lucky turn an old chicken coop into a Clubhouse for if you do, those marvelous experiences will stay with that child forever. I know this for certain!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A Pinch of This and A Dash of That

Image
I recently made a few Raspberry Pies following my grandmother's recipe that is included in a cookbook featuring her recipes. It was put together by her oldest daughter. One of six daughters. I love using her recipes. They are quite simple. Basic. Born out of an era of raising a family on a farm where meals were homemade, and work and chores were nonstop and produce came from the garden, some of that produce eventually canned or stored in a root cellar. In a few of my grandmother's recipes, her instructions include words such as a pinch, a dash, a sprinkle or a hint as ways of measurement of certain ingredients. In the Raspberry Pie recipe, her instruction was to add a pinch of salt. Before, when coming upon that particular instruction, I would put a little bit of salt in a bowl or on a plate and take a pinch of it. Then add the pinch to the other ingredients. But this time I was curious. For whatever the reason, I asked Mr. Google what the instruction for a Pinch of an ingredie
Read more

Those Small Milk Cartons With Straws

Image
I can't remember what elementary grade I was in when taking a morning break to enjoy a small, sometimes cold and sometimes not so cold small container of whole milk with my classmates. The Milk Break was part of the daily schedule. I do remember how good it tasted. The milk didn't come in flavors. Not even chocolate. There was no fat free or calcium enriched or soybean milk. Just whole milk in individual cartons.  The cartons were either opened by the teacher and then the student put a straw into the milk or there was a sealed hole in the carton and either the student or teacher pushed a straw through the hole. Straws were not fancy or colored. They did not have brand names or licensed characters on them. They did not have loops, making it possible to watch the milk go around the loops as a student sucked on the straw. They did not come wrapped in cellophane attached to the carton.  Instead, the teacher would walk around each table full of students, stopping beside each student
Read more

Oh Those Netted Crinolines

Image
I hardly ever wore crinolines under my skirts way back when wearing crinolines underneath skirts was the fad. Not participating in a fad was unusual for me. After all, I ran to a department store located in the downtown of where I lived  the moment Sonny and Cher's "I Got You Babe" grabbed my attention. I had to have bellbottoms and short-sleeved ribbed sweaters. I had to grow my hair down to my waist. But crinolines were a different story. I didn't like all of that netting. I didn't like my skirts pushed way out in front of me even when most of my friends wore crinolines all the time.  However, there are most always exceptions to most anything-even when it comes to wearing crinolines if crinolines aren't your thing. For me, that exception  came when my grandmother made me a velvet green dress to wear to a Christmas party. It was going to be held in a grand old hotel in that downtown where I lived. My date was a Freshman at a nearby college. He was so cute. We
Read more