Our Teddybears Picnic

A popular theme in nurseries is the Teddybears Picnic. We decided upon this theme as Robbie’s fantastic nursery was celebrating their 2 year opening birthday, but due to Covid-19 couldn’t have the party they had hoped for. We decided to have our own little party in their honour. Below I have added a mind map I used to plan this topic and have detailed the activities we completed.

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Birthday Card and Singing Happy Birthday – resources: cardboard, paint, pens, candle, matches.

As part of the celebrations for Robbie’s nursery’s 2nd birthday, they held a competition to design a birthday card. We used old pizza boxes and painted and coloured in our designs for our cards. Robbie gave Mummy all the ideas and helped with the colouring and painting. We included all of Robbie’s favourite things.

Of course, no birthday celebration would be complete without a candle to blow out and a good rendition of Happy Birthday. We used Robbie’s birthday cake candle and our teddybear paw cupcakes for this.

Teddybear Masks – resources: paper plate, plain paper, paint, pens, lollypop sticks, glue, scissors.

To make our masks we cut a paper plate in half and painted it brown. While we waited for the paint to dry we drew circles and triangles for the nose and coloured the triangles black, cut these out and stuck the triangles onto the circles. We also drew and coloured in little ear shapes which we also cut out. Once the main part was dry Mummy cut out two eye holes and we stuck the ears and noses on with glue. Finally, we used Sellotape to attach a lolly-stick to the back of the plates so we could hold our masks.

Teddy Folding Painted Picture – resources: plain paper, brown paint, pens, glue, googly eyes.

We folded an A4 piece of paper in half and Robbie used the brown paint to create a large shape on one side of the paper, making sure there was a good amount of paint used. We then folded the paper over and pressed down over the painted areas, transferring the paint onto the other side. We opened it and let it dry. We drew ears and a nose on more plain paper coloured them in and cut them out. Finally, we stuck the ears, nose and googly eyes on.

Fork Stamping Teddybear Picture – resources: plain paper, brown paint, fork, pens, scissors, glue, googly eyes.

We made this picture by dipping a fork into some brown paint and stamping it in a circle, then in two little splodges underneath. While we waited for it to dry we drew and coloured in paws, ears, a nose and a bow-tie. Once the paint was dry we stuck these on and added some googly eyes to finish the picture.

Party Decorations and Invitations

Bunting – resources: computer, printer, scissors, string, Sellotape.

As this was a party I wanted to make the day a little more special for Robbie and decided to make some simple decorations. To make this bunting I used Microsoft Word on my computer. I inserted 3 triangle shapes onto the page alternating in direction. I then used Google Images to find a teddy bear picture I liked and saved this to my computer so I could insert it as an image onto my triangles. I then added a text box with the writing and copied and pasted this as many times as I needed. You can highlight the different sections of one triangle at the same time and “group” them so that they don’t become unformatted during copying and pasting. I printed them, cut them out and used Sellotape to attach them to some string so I could hang them up for the party.

Invitations – resources: computer, printer, paper, pens.

I made Robbie and Daddy a special invitation in a similar way to making the bunting. I used Microsoft Word and inserted two scroll images onto the page. I then inserted the image of the teddy and a text box so I could write the party information. Finally, I filled the top and bottom of the scroll shape, printed them and cut them out.

Robbie also wrote his own invitations for all his teddies using plain paper and pens. He told Mummy what to write and then signed them himself.

The Tent – needed: a tent (you could also make a tent using old sheets etc.), cushions, blankets, duvets, Teddybears, homemade decorations, balloons, small table, computer.

We used our big camping tent as the setting for our picnic, as the weather was a little drizzly. I put lots of blankets and cushions on the floor of the tent and then put our double duvet over the top to make it warm and comfortable. I put our little outdoor table in one corner with my computer on it and sat all Robbie’s teddies around the edges of the tent. We brought down all of Robbie’s books about bears and put them in the tent as well. I finally used the decorations I had made previously and some balloons leftover from Robbie’s birthday to decorate the outside of the tent and the little table.

We had great fun in the tent and spent the whole day there doing different activities.

Party Food – Robbie helped with the baking for the party.

Teddybear Cookies – Recipe here

For these cute little snacks I used a generic oat biscuit recipe, but placed one large and two small balls of cookie dough next to each other so that when they spread out during baking they would stick together. We also added raisins for eyes and a nose. They were really fun and very tasty.

Teddybear Racer Cakes

These were really easy and another great fun snack. We bought some Pombear teddybear crisps, Mini Rolls and Smarties from Asda. I cut a little slit into the Mini Roll and squashed a teddy crisp into it. I then used a match to melt the chocolate on the side of the Mini Roll a little bit and stuck Smarties on to resemble the cars wheels and steering wheel.

Teddy Paw Cupcakes – Recipe here

For these fun cakes, I used a straightforward cupcake recipe from BBC Good Food, but once the cakes were iced I rolled the top of them in desiccated coconut and added Smarties to make them look like bear paws.

Teddy Fruit Faces – needed: apple, orange, banana, raisins.

These were really easy to make and a great healthy option for our party food. I cut an apple into rings and removed the core and seeds. I then peeled an orange and placed two segments onto the apple for ears, added two raisins for eyes and a slice of banana for a nose (missing from the picture as Robbie had pinched it already).

Teddybear oatcakes/sandwiches – needed: oatcakes/bread, ham, cheese, ketchup (or other condiments) you could also use cherry tomatoes and cucumber for the eyes and nose, we chose not to as Robbie was being a little fussy with his food at that point and Ketchup was always a winner.

These were a fun substitute for the usual boring party sandwich. We used oatcakes as our base as Robbie was particularly enjoying eating oatcakes at this time. I cut some ham to fit on the oatcake, cut small triangles of cheese and placed these on as ears and used Ketchup to dot on eyes and a nose. They were a great hit and very filling.

We also bought some Pombear crisps and had these alongside our picnic food.

Teddy Telly – resources: computer, Youtube

We had some quiet time in the tent watching teddybear themed programs such as Winnie the Pooh.

Teddybear Yoga – resources: computer, Cosmic Kids Yoga on YouTube

We had great fun doing Cosmic Kids “Going on a bear hunt” video in the tent. The Cosmic Kids yoga videos are a great way to get active and are really engaging and fun for children.

Imaginative Play Picnic – resources: play food, bowls, teddybears.

Robbie had great fun playing with his toy food and sharing it out between his teddies. We talked about what food he had for the teddies and about how best to share it, whether to share it equally or whether the bigger teddies might need more food.