A Peek Inside Our Playroom: Sukkot Inspired Invitation to Build

I know, I know, it's not even Yom Kippur yet and I'm posting about Sukkot--but in my defense, Sukkot is my favorite holiday, and that sukkah isn't going to build itself!  In our house, we have one little boy who loves to help, loves to use tools and loves to build. It's an ideal combination this time of year. He is pretty set on helping his Tatty build our actual sukkah, so he's going to need some practice. And what better way to practice than through play? With a little creativity and things we had already on hand, we revamped our main toy/activity shelf into a Sukkah Building Invitation Station. Combining materials for building, manipulating, planning, drawing/writing, dramatic play and more, you can easily set up a play area to inspire architects of all ages and sizes. And just in case you need to keep the younger and shorter architects busy inside while the older and taller ones are busy out back, this is sure to keep them busy and occupied!




Every young architect needs a little inspiration. I searched the internet for photographs of interesting sukkahs and printed/laminated them and attached them to a metal ring to hang from our shelf. When the feeling strikes, S can pull the ring off the shelf and search through the photos for ideas. You can select photos from your own album of Sukkots past or pick favorites from over the internet. These will surely inspire great stories, dramatic play and certainly some building!

Before you begin to build, it's important to have a plan! I set out a simple blueprint station with blank graph paper and colored pencils. Alternatively you can print off some blank blueprints templates for a more "realistic" approach. Young architects can draw up their plans, dictate/write relevant notes and labels or capture a particularly great structure on paper before clean-up time.

I like blank graph paper for its open ended nature, but if a blank canvas is a bit too overwhelming, your young architect might like to glean inspiration from a template or some basic sukkah building plans printed off from the internet. If you search "sukkah building plans," you will likely come up with a plethora of unique images to work from.

I like this black and white plan that I found here

You can introduce your budding builder to the components that make up a kosher sukkah and incorporate sentence strips with important vocabulary words like "wall," "door," "schach," "beam," etc.

Next, it's time to build! You might want to add in some toy tools and construction vehicles, or perhaps some hard hats and vests for dressing up. You'll also need a selection of building materials. You can use your children's favorite blocks or manipulatives. Building toys can be pricey, but I have often found great wooden blocks, Legos, Duplos and Mega Blocks, Lincoln Logs and other such items at secondhand stores. Some building toys are worth investing in, in my opinion. Our favorites here are Magnetiles and Tinker Toys. Keep your eyes peeled for online sales when it comes to those. You also don't need to use toys at all! Plenty of amazing structures can be made from recycled materials like cardboard boxes, empty tissue boxes, cardboard tubes and so on. Recycled tissue boxes wrapped in a layer of duct tape can make fun and durable blocks for larger structures.

I like including unique natural materials and small loose parts as well. This combination of wooden tree disks and artificial leaves really brings out the feeling of Autumn. Artificial leaves and greenery or garlands can make for some great schach! Perhaps you might collect some fallen branches, sticks/twigs and greenery from outside. A great rock collection can also be used for building a unique sukkah.

Wooden craft sticks and small pieces of wood are great for permanent crafts but also great for temporary buildings and loose parts play. You may use them on their own or combine them with some playdough for an invitation to build a smaller sukkah--just the perfect size to sit outside of a dollhouse or entertain some Fisher Price sized guests.

It can be tempting to stock your play shelves with every building material and accessory known to man (especially if you have a lot in your collection as we do), but I encourage you to resist the urge. Less is definitely more in these set-ups. You may even want to introduce one material or a couple in combination at a time. Right now we have the shelves stocked with Legos, wooden blocks, and the small, loose parts pictured to the left and above. If any of those materials seem to get a bit stale, I will swap out for something else. On the other hand, if they really draw in my little architects in training, I'll leave them as is and maybe introduce new combinations or accessories.

Every sukkah needs some guests. Toy people or animals can make a great accompaniment. If you have dollhouse furniture, you may want to add that in as well, or perhaps you craft up some of your own chairs and a table. I have high hopes of introducing S to some basic (and supervised) woodworking this season, so we may end up with some handcrafted versions. Your little ones may want to add in some toy food for a festive meal, make their own mini lulav and esrog, craft some decorations or make up a miniature bed for those who have the custom to sleep in the sukkah. The opportunities are as infinite as the human imagination and great sukkahs come in as many shapes and sizes as those who take on the mitzvah of building them!

On a slightly larger scale, our play sukkah was a huge hit last year. Created with a combination of this fort building set we found at a discount store, blankets for walls, fall garlands from the dollar store for schach and a few clothespins to hold it all together. As Sukkot gets closer, we will surely be putting up another version for this year, but until then we will need all the space we can get in our living room for some creative sukkah building.  Wishing all who are celebrating an easy time getting that sukkah up and some happy playing in between it all!