Stories By Melissa Alani: Water the seed of imagination with a play garden

We plant the seed of imagination by reading to our children; water the growing seed by creating a play garden with your child. Creating the play garden will help develop their creative imagination, processing skills, motor skills, and will teach them responsibility by maintaining their garden . Turn this time into a great bonding experience by making this a family event.

First sit down with your child and plan the type of play garden your child would like to create. Our daughters love Tinker Bell, and chose to create a fairy garden using their toy figures.

Go to the local craft store, and let your child pick out a few items for them to create. With the fairy garden, our daughters created fairy houses using inexpensive wooden bird houses, moss, silk flowers, a few bird and butterflies. They enjoyed expressing their own creativity by picking out and designing their own houses.

Decided where to plant the garden, keep in mind sun/shade and amount of water the area receives. Then as a family go to the local nursery to pick out the flowers and plants. Make sure the plants are kid friendly and that they will not harm your child. Lay out the garden together with the plants and crafts. Time to dig! Allow your child to help dig the holes and tickle to roots, they will have a feeling of accomplishment by helping along with their parents.

Once the play garden is complete, teach your child how to care and maintain their garden. Our daughters take turns watering their fairy garden.