Hanging ice block

It's being a busy week, and looks like it is only getting busier for the rest of it. That's one of the good things about working with toddlers: you can't hurry their pace, so there are enforced periods of calm and peace in my week. (Mind you, this is not around lunch-times!!!)

I took G and I to playcentre again this week. (One of these days they are going to fill up that session, but in the meantime we're making the most of it.) I saw a great new way to offer water play. Henrietta had frozen an ice-cream container full of water, with a cup in the middle of it, so that she ended up with that size block of ice with a hole in it. She had hung this by a rope over the water trough. I was playing with it with I(child), watching it drip, trying to catch drips in our hands, and making it swing so I(child) and E* could experience the pendulum motion. I(child) was trying to figure out where to put her hands to reach the block of ice as it swung toward her. She couldn't reach it when it was still, as the water trough was in the way.

(I have written E* to differentiate from E, who wasn't with us yesterday.)

At home, Elanor and I got an ice-cream container (with a good fitting lit), and worked out what cup will just fit. We think it has to be a tight fit so the cup doesn't float around, or fill with water. It froze overnight (a full ice-cream container will usually take longer than overnight to freeze - the air in the middle made it faster in this case), and this afternoon we put it out, hanging from the washing line. Great excitement from the Little Kids. Elanor spent a long time playing with it too.