It’s no secret that I love two things – encouraging my children to be creative and encouraging my children to play with an imagination. With A I’m so very that she has a fantastic imagination, as well as, loves to learn. I feel like both are incredibly important traits for her as she grows and I can only hope the B has the same balance. With that, I try and find creative ways to encourage her imagination to grow and do so affordably because buying tons of things can get expensive. Making items also adds an extra level of fun for letting her get hands on.
At the end of last year, my mom gave us a small play tent that was once my little sister’s. A loved it and last Fall we made s’more outside. To encourage her imagination at times that we really can’t go out and make s’mores, I wanted to help her imaginative thrive indoors with an activity where she could. Especially since she loves her play tent.
One afternoon a couple of months ago we decided to make a play set of s’mores! I gathered us the items that we needed from around the house. Our S’More DIY is extremely simple and used items that I had around the house: cardboard, round foam makeup pads, brown felt and hot glue (or tacky glue.) It’s really just as simple as it sounds.
You’ll need to cut out the cardboard squares with a ultility knife (scissor could work if you have no better options) and the felt. If you choose to use tacky glue instead of hot glue, you could easily let your child take the reigns of the craft from there adding glue to the cardboard and layering on the foam make up pad, more glue, the felt pad and more glue before putting on the top cardboard piece. It’s really that simple! If you only have hot glue – I recommend doing the gluing but letting your little one hand you the items to include them in the process!
To take things one step further I created an upcycled campfire out of two paper towel roll empties, tissue paper and hot glue.
All you are going to do for the camp fire is leave one tube in tact and cut the second one in half at 45 degree angle. Glue the two pieces on top of the full roll.
Take your tissue paper from the center and pull into a cone-like shape and tack it onto the paper towel roll empties to create the look of a fire. Crumpled paper gives it more of a fun look!
Now you are all set for having a great time with an indoor campfire and s’mores without the bugs, heat or real fire! We play with our set all of the time and it’s perfect for our little play tent. It’ll also be such a fun addition to our Hide-A-Boo Hideout when it comes in August! 
Do your little ones love to imagine and play? Tag us in your social media posts if you make our fun activity! We would love to see it!
