PLAY KITCHEN

Who knew the memories our play kitchen would evoke?

My son called me up earlier this week, while cleaning out our attic, and said,
“Hey mom, we don’t need that old play kitchen that’s up in the attic anymore, do we?”
I couldn’t respond.
I was literally flooded with memories.

Yes son, we do still need that play kitchen.

After I finished with my errands that evening, I had to go up to the attic just to glimpse at our old play kitchen.

This may look like just a play kitchen to so many people.
When I look at it, I hear the excitement in my grandma’s voice when she called me up over 20 years ago to tell me that she’d bought my daughter the perfect gift for her first Christmas.

She was so excited that I could just hear and picture the joy she felt as she was telling me.
My daughter would only be 3 months old for her first Christmas, but yet I knew that this gift would be cherished for years to come.

When I was a child, my grandma had a handmade play kitchen in her basement that her father had built for her.
Oh, how I cherished the times she let me play with it. I just loved it. Even today, I can sit back and fill my head with the magic I felt when I played with it.

A few years ago, someone asked me how I decided to “unschool”.

I remember telling her that it just happened naturally. Learning experiences were just a part of our life.

Now that I’m thinking about it, this play kitchen was probably the real spark that lit the unschooling fire.

My daughter just loved this play kitchen.
We played with it for hours and hours every day, as soon as she was old enough to roll over to it.
She learned to stand by pulling herself up on it.
This play kitchen was a part of all 4 of my children’s childhood.
I cannot count how many meals we ate sitting in front of it.
All the tea parties and picnics with the stuffed animals.
The dolls that received their meals from it.

So how can a play kitchen spark an unschooling journey?

We used this kitchen for EVERYTHING!
On my daughter’s 3rd birthday, we went to a local family restaurant.
They knew it was her birthday because she was wearing a cute little birthday crown.
The waitress asked her if she received any presents. My daughter told them that she had received some new play food for her kitchen. She also told them that she had been given an apron just like the waitress was wearing, a small notebook and a special pen.
She then proclaimed, excitedly, that one day she was going to be a waitress too!
Well, for whatever reason, the waitress was so touched by this.
She asked if she’d like to take home a menu to use with her kitchen.
Oh my!
This simple gift was probably the spark that really began our unschooling journey.

Every morning as soon as I woke up, I had to read the menu and order something from it.
My daughter would sit and copy down whatever I “ordered”.
This is how she learned to write.

And read.
This particular kitchen came with a little red phone.
She learned to recognize numbers by “calling” grandma, grandpa, our house, etc on this phone.

Not too many years later, and we added coins to her “restaurant”.
She’d tell me how much I owed and we’d count out the money.
She learned to count by pennies first, then 5s, 10s, and 25s.
She learned addition and subtraction this way.
A few years later, she learned percentages this way.
For example, I’d write on her little chalkboard,
TODAY’S SPECIAL 25% off all lunch items.
She learned fractions.
Buy 1 meal at full price, 2nd is ½ off.
Or ALL APPETIZERS buy 1 get one ⅓ off.
She learned to tell time using the little hands on the clock on the play kitchen.

There is not a person that came over to my house for 20 years that did not have to experience this play kitchen in some manner.

So, yes son, we do still need this play kitchen.

Do you have a certain toy in your home that you just can’t part with?