We have recently taken a few family trips to nearby lakes, and our collection of rocks and seashells has grown accordingly. Come fall, it will be pleasant to remember our summer, while playing with some of our finds and play dough.

Using my favourite recipe from the Imagination Tree, I made a fresh batch of play dough. Should I dye it blue? I decided against it. The natural colour of the dough was reminiscent of a sandy beach. Then, I added rocks and seashells to the tray. I could not pass on our favourite loose parts, which are currently googly eyes and mixed beans.

First, as a part of our tradition, we made seashell imprints and cupcakes.

Then an idea struck me: could we make some sea creatures, using parts found by the lakeside? We started with a fish. I showed Budster how to use beans to make scales. Seashells became fins, and we had a rather colourful fish!

Inspired by our success, I made a snail for Budster. Lately, his favourite book has been The Snail and the Whale by Julia Donaldson, so I recited some parts for him, while working on the play-dough snail. Our snail has fettuccine for tentacles with goggly eyes at their ends. I confess I had doubts about where to put the snail’s eyes, so I checked the scheme of a snail’s body. It is very fascinating and complicated! We will have to admire it together with Budster when he is older.

While I was musing over snails, Budster started making a googly eye creature. There was something resembling a lobster in it, so with the addition of a pair of seashells, we made one. There are lobsters for sale at our grocery store, and Budster loves watching them. He calls them, “Buggy!”

As we were playing with seashells and sea creatures, it was pleasant to look back at all the experiences that made Budster’s second summer so special. Now fall is around the corner, but it will be a lot of fun too!

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