Wednesday, February 22, 2017

No Hide & Seek

Over the years I have often told children that Hide & Seek is an outdoor game.  Yes, I personally remember enjoying many wonderful indoor games of Hide & Seek but they were held in a much larger building with multiple rooms. The confined space of our little playroom does make it difficult to play a traditional game of Hide & Seek – there are not really any good places for even a little person to hide.
My current group of preschoolers often initiate indoor games that they call ‘Hide & Seek’ but I always end up redirecting them.  The problem really is that their energy level makes their game unsuitable for our indoor space – they do not play according to traditional rules.
In their game of ‘Hide & Seek’ the three of them together choose a ‘hiding spot’.  Then two of them crawl into ‘sleeping bags’ (old pillow cases that are kept with the dress-up clothes/blankets) while the third child goes to the other side of the room, covers his eyes and counts to 10.  He then shouts ‘ready or not, here I come’, runs across the room and jumps on the two ‘hiding’ boys.  This is then followed by fits of laughter and a group decision as to who hides and who seeks for the next round.
*Sigh*.  This is not Hide & Seek.  This is rough and tumble play that they call hide & seek because they know that I will say running and jumping games are outdoor games.  If I say Hide & Seek is an outdoor game they will argue – and they will be correct – Hide & Seek can be played indoors – but their game cannot even if they call it Hide & Seek.
So why won’t I allow this game?  It is a cooperative game and the three playing are in agreement – for now – but there are other, smaller children who are not.  They do occasionally try to join, or just get in the way and someone always gets hurt.  I will allow this type of play outdoors – but there is simply not enough space indoors for the reward to outweigh the risk.
So, I suggested that they could take turns hiding a small toy instead – there are many places to hide small toys. They thought this was a terrific  idea and immediately chose one of the six stuffed squirrels.  I was somewhat concerned that this would cause confusion if someone ‘found’ one of the five squirrels that were not hidden but that wasn’t a problem.
The real problem was that none of the boys  could resist telling the others where the squirrel was hidden.  Two would sit in the corner and cover their eyes while the third hid the squirrel.  Then as soon as the two seekers stood up to search the hider would say “It’s over there” and point to the hiding spot. The other two would race to the location and whomever grabbed the squirrel first would be the hider – and would hide the squirrel in exactly the same spot that it was hidden in before round after round after round. *sigh*
So, I suggested that I should be the hider and all of them could be the seekers – I also chose to hide a small stuffed bear that wasn’t normally in the playroom.  They covered their eyes and giggled while I hid the bear.  When I said it was hidden they came out of the corner and bounced around asking me where it was.  I told them to look for it.  After searching for nearly a minute they began lamenting “This is so hard”.
I smiled and said. “This is Hide and Seek – indoor style”.  The excitement when they did actually find the bear was priceless. ðŸ™‚ This is now their favourite game.  Sometimes they become engaged in other activities before the bear gets found.  If at any point I need to redirect their behaviour then all I have to do is ask if they’ve found the bear yet and they all begin searching again.
Hide and Seek might be my favourite game too.
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Friday, February 3, 2017

Little Miss Button

The search for our new cat began online, looking through listings of adoptable pets.  Our first trip to the Winnipeg Humane Society was ‘just to look’ but there was one in particular – named ‘Button’ that I was hoping to see.  However, when we arrived at her kennel there was a ‘Hold’ sign – someone else liked her too.  We checked out all the kennels and played with many cats but as planned we were just looking.

Over the next week we visited a few satellite locations and I did more online searching.  I noticed that Button was still listed as adoptable so the following weekend we went back to the Humane Society. There was no longer a hold on Button.  It took a long time to coax her out of the back corner of her cage.  She was so timid – maybe too timid for a busy home like ours but eventually she snuggled her scrawny little body in my arms and purred. I put her back in her kennel and we looked at some other cats.  I also revisited Button and coaxed her out for another snuggle.

There were a couple of cats that we were interested in so we met with an adoption counselor to get some more information about them.  After learning more about their background we  decided they were not a good fit for us.  I asked about Button…they didn’t know much.  She was about nine months old.  She was found living under a porch in the freezing cold.  She had ear mites but had been treated and her ears were fine now.  She had been spayed before being put up for adoption.  She was very underweight and they were trying to get her to eat more.

So….we adopted her.

They had recommended that we should keep her in quarantine for at least a week – to adjust to us and hopefully gain some weight before meeting our other cats and the children.  We kept her upstairs in my son’s room.  She was so very happy all the time – purring and climbing all over us.  It was impossible to get a decent picture of her because she was always moving or wrapping herself around my neck.

At first I had to sit beside her food dish to get her to eat.  She would devour the food in her bowl but if I walked away before she finished eating then she would follow – pressing her little body against my leg like “Please don’t leave me”.  By the end of the week she was much more relaxed and putting on some weight – her spine and hip bones were not nearly as pronounced as they had been.

Over the weekend we introduced her to Mali and Malta – they do NOT love her but they haven’t been terribly mean.  It is interesting that it seems like Button thinks these other cats are in HER home.  Most of the disputes between them are started by Button.

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I joke about her ‘angry’ face because in almost every picture I take she looks a little angry.

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It doesn’t matter how happy, relaxed or content she is she still ends up making that face when I take the picture.

I guess she must have just been unhappy in the confines of her kennel at the Humane Society because here she is not a timid cat at all.  In fact she likes to be the centre of attention – as long as she doesn’t have to hold still for too long. (angry face)

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She likes to be where the action is – and she loves people.  All people.  Any sized people – even babies.  No cats.

She helps when we get dressed to go outside; (angry face)

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She watches the children through the playroom window because she hasn’t yet figured out how to get in there when the gate is shut;

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Is there a cat in this picture?

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Yes, she’s playing one of her favourite games – attack the toys the children put under the gate.

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Welcome home Little Miss Button – we look forward to getting to know you.