This week at home we have been enjoying a fairy themed week

At school Esther and William have been practising writing numbers and letters

I decided to combine home and school with a sensory writing tray

Inspired by The Imagination Tree

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I filled a baking tray with fine table salt

I added a few drops of pink food colouring

A sprinkle of silver glitter

And some sparkly coloured confetti

I added some stars

And some writing tools

I showed Esther and William how to use the tools

To make marks in the fairy sand

I showed them how to write lower and upper case letters

I showed them how to write numbers in different ways

Supporting what they had been doing at school

Esther and William both had a little go with the tools

But what they really wanted to do was use their fingers

And sense the sand with their hands

We spent some time making marks

Before moving on to small world play

Fairy world play

As I had intended this as a sensory writing activity

Rather than small world play

I did not have any toys out for creating a fairy land

Esther and William had to choose and fetch things for themselves

Esther chose some small wooden objects from her Wobbly Garden game

Toadstools, flowers, ladybirds and bees

She also chose pink and purple trees from a Big Jigs fairy train set

William wanted woodland creatures

A family of deer, a hedgehog

Esther chose a baby squirrel and some birds

They both enjoyed making their animals talk

And covering them in magical fairy dust

And then they played

They played and played

Each with their own magical fairy land

That they had chosen and designed

The magic came from them

From my precious babies

The storytelling

The ideas

The characters

The voices

All them

All Esther and William

And their beautiful minds

Esther loved using the Carddies Fairies that we had coloured earlier in the week

They are perfect for using in small world play

In fairy world play

Esther and William have played with their sensory trays

Every day after school this week

And even today Saturday

Today William could wait no longer

He had to add trains to his play

While Esther in her Miss Francis Tutu from Beebies Baby Store

Made nests for her animals

And added buildings to create a fairy village

This has been one of our simplest but most successful ideas

For imaginative and sensory play

We are loving our fairy week

And still have lots more fairy fun to come