Homemade Toy Town

Publishing Guidelines: Feel free to publish the following article in its entirety in your ezine, website, or print newsletter. The resource box must be included with an active link. Please send a courtesy copy of the publication in which the article appears to: deborah@fiveminuteparent.com Word wrap to 60, (201 words) Homemade Toy Town By Deborah Shelton With a few items found around the house, and a little imagination, you can make your very own toy town. Once your town is built, fill it with your favorite dolls and toy cars. 1. Yarn: Use yarn to outline streets for toy cars. Roads can be as straight or as winding as you'd like. 2. Pinecones: "Plant" these trees along the edges of a street or in a park area. 3. Cardboard Tubes: Form toll bridges and tunnels with these easy-to-find tubes. 4. Tin Foil: Create lakes and rivers with flat pieces of tin foil. 5. Cardboard Boxes: Make buildings such as schools, banks and churches from small cardboard boxes. 6. Magazine Cut-Outs: Glue pictures from magazines onto small cardboard boxes to represent the type of buildings in the town. For example, glue a picture of a store or school onto a box. 7. Thread Spools: Set these in a park area, to use as tables. 8. Cotton Balls: Turn your town into a winter wonderland with fluffy puffs of cotton. 9. Popsicle Sticks: Great materials for building fences and bridges. 10. Kitchen Scale: Bring into play a small kitchen scale to use as a weigh station for the cars.