Wishing Everyone a Very Merry Christmas & a Happy New Year !!

Dads Zone @ The Leys Childrens Centre, Blackbird Leys, Oxford

Saturdads Group @ Grandpont Children's Centre, Oxford

Dads Go Wild at Playday Festival

A few sporadic showers was not enough to stop hundreds of families attending the Oxford City, South and Vale Playday event at Hill End on 17th September 2011.  The event was part of National Playday, which celebrates children and young people’s right to PLAY. Now in its 25th year, Play Day is the biggest play sector event in the UK, possibly Europe! The official date of National Playday was August 3rd 2011. On or around the first Wednesday of August, thousands of play events took place across the UK. In Oxfordshire Playday events spread from the end of July till September. To find out more about Playday visit www.playday.org.uk

Dads Go Wild took part in the Oxford City, South and Vale Playday event on 17th September, a free event set up by the Oxfordshire Play Association. Organised by the Oxfordshire Parenting Forum, Dads Go Wild is now in its 4th year. Dads Go Wild was developed to enable dads to spend some quality time with their children while learning more about father-friendly support groups across the county. This year Dads Go Wild, along with many other organisations, took part in the larger Playday event. Several Children’s Centres organised transport for their families and ‘Saturdads’ groups encouraged their fathers to attend. Early estimates suggest that there were over 1000 participants enjoying activities ranging from junk modelling to cooking on a campfire. Dads Go Wild provided a variety of activities including face painting and glitter tattoos, water play and wind socks. Oxfordshire Parenting Forum also organised for Paul Eagles (Living Instruments) to lead some drumming circles for the event. These were very popular and the loud mesmeric beats drew everyone together in the centre of the field.

The Dads Go Wild area was a constant throng of activity with the water play feature keeping children and their families amused for hours. Around 20 metres of guttering, donated to us from the East Street Centre (Banbury) and Leys Children Centre (Oxford), was set up in two opposing lines with a tray of water either end. The children loved pouring water down the guttering and watching ducks, cars and small balls race down. It was fun for all ages and an activity that dads in particular seemed drawn to.

As always, face painting was an incredibly popular activity with Debbie and her team faced with a never ending queue of eagerly waiting children. The painted faces looked awesome and the glitter tattoos were very striking. Whilst the children and their families waited for their turn, the Oxfordshire Parenting Forum workers were able to talk to fathers about father-friendly groups across the county.

Inside the tent at the back of the Dads Go Wild area, children were creatively designing and constructing their own windsocks. With a simple template, children were able to decorate their windsocks, using pens and paint, and then stick them together so that they looked like flying fish. After a slow start, the activity soon became inundated with budding artists when a few scattered showers sent people running into the tent for cover. Apart from the showers, conditions were perfect for the windsocks with the after-effects of Hurricane Irene crossing the Atlantic to blow the children’s socks through the air. Children ran out of the tent eager to fly their fish and more and more children came to make their windsock after seeing the fun other children were having.

Dads Go Wild and the Playday event was a huge success. Hundreds of fathers and their families were in attendance with outdoor activities once again proving to be very popular with fathers. We look forward to organising more outdoor regional events as part of the Dads Outdoors project and eagerly wait next year’s county event.