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Journal bethanie's Journal: All You Need Is.... Yarn 32

Journal by bethanie
Experiment: Give a 3-year-old a ball of yarn and let her have at it.

The kid has entertained herself for *hours* with this damn thing. Makes me wonder why I bother buying toys -- all she needs is some string. Amazing.
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All You Need Is.... Yarn More

All You Need Is.... Yarn

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  • when it comes down to it. kids aren't that complicated, parents are. they still enjoy the simple things in life (yarn, bubble wrap, cardboard boxes, ect). as adults, most of us don't even remeber what those are. parents are lucky, they have someone there to remind them:)
  • ...he would probably attempt to tie up my four-year-old so she can't run away when he tries to beat her up.

    He's very posessive of his stuff and hates it when she takes it away from him and then stands there and teases him, so he hits her, or tries to sit on her.

    I have no idea where they picked this up. They don't teach that on Barney or Veggietales, and I don't think I've seen the neighborhood kids doing anything like that.
  • Just another data point for comparison: My mother and my grandparents tell me I did much the same thing when I was little.

    I would take a piece of string and unravel it, taking out each individual piece of fibre and putting it aside, until I had a big ball of fluff. I like to think it is part of the reason why I love doing intricate work with my hands, like fiddling with small computer parts...

    I have noticed this behaviour with a number of "mechanically inclined" children as well.

    Perhaps Kiddo will end u
  • Her favorite toy is...Twinings Earl Grey tea wrappers. (No other tea bag wrapper will do, for some odd reason.) She also likes twist-ties from bread bags. And empty cardboard boxes. And plastic bags.

    Indeed when we got her, I told my wife that cats don't need expensive toys. Ethelred's Axiom of Cats: There is an inverse proportion between the amount a toy cost and how much the cat will play with it.

    She bought lots of expensive toys anyway...that sit around ignored. But man, crumple up a tea wrapper, and

    • Molly won't have anything to do with your average "doggie toys"...squeaky toys and such. She loves plain old tennis balls, though. She'll chew on them, fetch them, etc. $2 for three balls is cheaper than most toys, which is an added bonus.
    • My husband's cat likes to play with all sorts of weird things; I think the weirdest thing she does is wander around the house with her favorite cat toy in her mouth. Not weird? Well, her favorite toy is what I call 'polarfleece on a stick'. It's a 5' length of polarfleece strip attached to a plexi 'wand'. And she's small and cute. :)

      but she'll play with everything, from rack screws (I used to come home with pockets full of them from racking servers) to twist ties to cough drop wrappers.

      My cat's a little m
    • Indeed when we got her, I told my wife that cats don't need expensive toys. Ethelred's Axiom of Cats: There is an inverse proportion between the amount a toy cost and how much the cat will play with it.

      Don't forget the magic laser pointer. Most cats go bezerk and will chase that little red dot around until they tire out.

      Another favorite seems to be wooden beads or drawer pulls.
      • Don't forget the magic laser pointer. Most cats go bezerk and will chase that little red dot around until they tire out.

        Ah, but Ethelred's Axiom of Cats, Subsection 1a, Paragraph XXIV states that a small flashlight is cheaper and has the same effect as a laser pointer ('cheaper' since the flashlight is likely to already be in your possession, whereas a laser pointer won't be). ;-)

        Another favorite seems to be wooden beads or drawer pulls.

        Her fave is definitely tightly balled-up Earl Grey tea wrappers,

  • I used to let my cat "have at it" with a ball of string and she loved it.

    Now... speaking from personal experience, I remember being totally facinated with string when I was a 3 year old. I remember one particular incident where I took all of my mechanized toys (mostly wind up cause I'm an oldster) and pulled string around the legs of the dinner table and connected them to various moving parts of the mechanized toys. My mom asked me what I was doing and I replied, "I'm building a computer". A geek even a
    • No, Kiddo is not playing with the yarn like a cat (and I don't like cats, so I am probably overly sensitive to the comparison).

      She unrolls it and lays it out in the floor in various patterns. Pretends it's various kinds of bridges and boundaries. Then it's monsters. Then she wraps it around her ankles and pulls it around and calls it socks. And then there are the words that she completely invents to describe what it is and what it's doing. I can hardly keep up.

      Just all kinds of bizarre and extremely ima
  • Using a spool of kite string, I used to make a web out of my whole bedroom. I'd start at the dresser, loop around the bed post, bee-line to the desk, wrap around the closet doorknob, come around the opposite bed post, back to the dresser, over to the chair...etc,etc. I went until the spool ran dry. I guess I felt I needed a little challenge getting out of my room in the morning. *shrug* Writing this makes me want to stop by the kite store on the way home from work.....
  • ...room weaving.

    or better still, ask my mum. *grin*

    sol

  • Me: Here's a new $50 toy.
    Joseph: Look at the box!

  • No... (Score:2)

    by ryanr ( 30917 ) *
    My 3-year-old isn't happy unless he's destroying things. Digital cameras, regular cameras, PocketPCs, televisions, the main PC, his brothers' LEGO creations, furniture, walls, various media (DVDs, VHS tapes, CDs), VCRs, books, the XBox... torturing the cat.

    To be fair, he hasn't completely destroyed them all, yet. We caught him too quick with the XBox. Everything else, hey got. The cat's still alive, he can defend himself to a degree... but his fur still isn't the same.

    I'd be more than happy to buy him

  • I have Christmas pictures of my various daughters getting things such as big doll houses, emptying out the boxes, moving all the stuff to one side, and then playing with the now empty box for hours.

  • Cardboard boxes: they can be everything in your imagination! Hours and hours of fun!
  • There's not much difference between a ball of yarn and an effective garrot.

    Keep an eye on her when she plays with string, and make sure she doesn't try to make a necklace "like mommy's". Better safe than sorry.
    • Thanks. She *is* three years old, and is quite aware that she's not supposed to wrap things around her neck.

      I do keep an eye on her, but the method of parenting and discipline I prefer to use is to let her discover the consequences for herself. The few times she's gotten it wrapped around her neck, she's found out that it really doesn't feel very good, and immediately worked to untangle it. The natural consequences of her actions drive home the lesson much more effectively than my nagging reminders ever c

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