Discovery Totes by Helicopter Studios

Open-ended play is important for kids and we love toys that encourage it. Shannon of Helicopter Studios makes what she calls "Discovery Totes," portable, cloth mats with various motifs (a campground, an urban skyline, cottages on the beach, a stream through a forest) to spark children's imaginations.

Each approximately 17" diameter Discovery Tote ($60-68) is handmade and folds up for easy storage or moving. Find them at Helicopter Studios.

If you're inspired to make something similar, check out our previous post on Holly's Dinosaur Mat tutorial.

(Via Indie Fixx)

Comments (4)

Just wanted to let your readers know that a more detailed version of my dinosaur playmat tutorial likely will be available in the near future at craftzine.com (it was slated to be published in the next print version of Craft magazine but alas that won't happen now that they're moving to online-only) Holly

posted by Hollyrh on February 19th 2009 at 7:17pm
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Eeee! I can not even begin to say how much I love these. What great toys to encourage creativity!

posted by Kaete on February 19th 2009 at 8:22pm
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Thanks, Holly! We look forward to it.

Carrie

posted by CMcB on February 20th 2009 at 10:54am
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Thank you so much for your feature on my work! It was a surprise to find....and oh, what a great surprise!!
Sincerely, Shannon Duffy

posted by helicopterstudios on February 21st 2009 at 11:53am
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