Sunday, November 30, 2008

Think out-of-the-box

Check it out -- a cabin for the Lilliputians!

Who ever thought that pages from the phone book and a box of tetrapack juice could be fashioned into such an interesting-looking house? For this "log cabin," my multi-talented co-worker Nicole used about 25 or so pages from the Yellow Pages telephone directory, an empty box of Zesto juice drinks, an empty box of a bar of bath soap, an empty box of a toothpaste tube, some glue, clear adhesive tape and scissors/cutter.

Brilliant huh? She did all the work; when she brought the little cabin over, it was all done. Here it is, with Snoopy as the welcoming committee for his humble abode, standing by the half-open door.

"I wonder what toy we can make out of boxes..." I thought aloud one day as we thought about one of the upcoming materials in our lineup for an upcoming issue. Then I brought a bunch of boxes of different sizes for her to transform into playthings -- the juice box, milk cartons, a couple of buco pie boxes, an empty box of pressed powder, soap boxes etc.

"I can make a log cabin out of this Zesto box and the yellow pages," she remarked, "and use a small toothpaste box for a chimney."

When she showed me the finished product, was I blown away! I knew it was going to be creative, but I had no idea it was going to be so fascinatingly cute!




Obviously, I wasn't the only one who was so taken by the little cabin; 3-year old Marco liked it a lot and played with the door, fiddled with the paper "logs" and tried putting his matchbox cars inside the cabin. Who said kids need expensive toys that beep, light up, talk and make all sorts of sounds to be entertained?



How's this for a "cabin in the woods"?

Back to the kids and their playthings. Shown below are some kids having a grand time (it doesn't look like they're having a grand time, but take my word for it: they weren't anything near being bored) with old boxes and coloring materials. They decorated the box with their own kind of artwork using oil pastel...




... then this rambunctious toddler choo-chooed his way around the lawn. I'm not sure if this was before or after we punched the bottom side of the box so he could make like a train and carry the box off the ground as he choo-chooed.




But he sure had fun -- and he didn't need Thomas to do the choo-chooing for him. That he did all by himself. And with cheap, easy-to-find things around the home!

4 comments:

petrufied said...

You know, a lot of what those kids did that day I never even thought of! :D

sunnyday said...

Iba talaga ang imagination ng mga bata :-)

John-D Borra said...

When my wife was a child, her mom said that her dad would always buy her these lovely big dolls. Naturally, Tina just played with the boxes these dolls came in. The unbridled, creative joy of a child is timeless. :)

sunnyday said...

Funny! Hope Daddy wasn't too disappointed.

This reminds me of the times my parents brought home popsicles by the box (or maybe it was another kind of frozen delight...). Anyway, of course the ice cream was delightful, but I remember getting excited more because it meant dry ice to play with! The ice cream was just secondary.

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