FREE fun arvo with kids, AND Key lessons learnt!

Kids are therapeutic, there’s nothing complicated about them. The other day I got a lift home with a mum and her 3 year old. As I jumped into their car, Miss 3 wasn’t happy about that; she took a dislike to me, fair enough, I did have my floral baggy pants and bright orange flowy top, with purple sneakers, it was quite a sight! Maybe she was part of the undercover fashion police? But I love that she was honest with her feelings, that’s something us adults need to relearn. There’s a proverb that says, “Faithful are the wounds of a friend, But deceitful are the kisses of an enemy”.

By the end of the trip, though, she had a rethink and decided that she would like me, it probably helped that her mum prodded her in the ribs. Haha, good parenting!

So when I spent 5 days with my little buddies, Jai 7, Bodhe 5 and Lakyn 3, it was more refreshing for my soul than a trip to the counsellor. One afternoon we decided to create a puppet show, well it was my idea but after foraging for boxes in backyard alleys, this was high adventure for any boy, who could resist that? The boys and me had an awesome box picked out, I think it housed a fridge on steroids, we were so excited. Mum provided the realistic edge, where on earth would it be stored?

So magnimously, we relented to the smaller box, just a fridge on high dose multi-vitamins.

The kids painted, cut, and invented. That cardboard box was transformed into a puppet show complete with money collecting facility, quicker than you could buy one from Kmart. And as luck would have it, the kids wielding the knife like a wand didn’t cut anything other than the box; did I mention that I get my supervision skills from the Bear Grylls parenting school?

Next item on the agenda was the actual puppet show. I was keen to write a script for our slippery snakes and lovely lizard sock puppets, but Jai wanted to ‘wing it’. I could understand his logic, with his parents as a captive audience they’d love whatever he’d do. But here is my first rule in my vast experience of puppet show drama; Don’t make it boring!

“Jai”, I said,”Rule number 1 in puppet show theatre, and life, don’t make it boring”. He looked at me with his big wide eyes, like I was truly an expert, and made me believe that we could pull off something good!

So I started typing a few words, and Jai would complete the sentence. I wrote whatever he said, and it was pretty darn good! With his newly bought ukelele Jai strummed and sang,

“I love being a snake, it’s so fun for me, I’m glad I’m not a skunk or a bee, I’m so glad being me!”

Then Bodhe wanted in on the action, I started typing what he said. It needed a little work. Here’s another tip for all those dream crushers out there, the creative mind needs time and space to free base. Cutting them short before the juices really start flowing is death to the dreamer.

But Jai was upset, his musical show was being wrecked in front of his eyes.

“No problem Jai”, I say, “Here’s our next lesson; the tweak“. I changed a couple of words, made them rhyme, and we had on our hands a show that would rival a Broadway Musical!

“I want to slide like a snake, I really want to glide, I don’t want legs, I’d rather have pegs, I’ll just have to cut my legs off, but I won’t do that.”

Jai’s eyes lit up, not only had the show been saved, it was funny! Plus, he had just learnt a new word! ‘Tweak’, a great concept and awesome sound as it rolled off the tongue.

That afternoon we didn’t just build a puppet show. We learnt life lessons.

Don’t be boring. People’s time is precious, respect them enough not to waste it.
Let people dream wildly, being negative early on stops the flow quicker than a beaver blocking a brook.
Master the art of tweaking. There’s alot of great stuff out there not working because it just needs small adjustments and modifications to make it fly.

And my heart went home full, looking forward to the day when I get to spend time with my own grandchildren.

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