Prompt 10: You are 6 years old! Someone has kindly given you 4 chairs covered with an enormous blanket!! It’s a tent! Tell us about your play day.

At six, I’d just become a big sister. I spent most of my playtime with Carol, the baby doll I received when Rob was born (she still only has one arm, as my cousin Sara threw it out the car window one day driving over the Kaimai’s) and my best friend Debbie.

We met at Brookfield kindergarten, hate at first sight. She hit me on the head with a hammer and I lured her to the Big Kids Slide (strictly forbidden) then pushed her down it. Her mum picked us up that afternoon and asked us about our day. From then on we were together more often than not until I moved away to Auckland. Our tents would be anything from a circus tent to a doll’s house to an escape from our brothers.

If I was by myself my imagination would take over and the tent would be Eeyore’s house in the 100 Acre Wood, to a ship on the High Seas of Narnia, to Pippi Longstocking’s House or even Dr Doolittle’s surgery.

Today my kids love “tents”. B & Z probably use theirs to hide mess, but Mase has a special space under his bed, complete with an adjustable Ikea lamp, that’s perfect for playtime. I’m a little jealous!

Mase’s lamp: http://www.ikea.com/au/en/catalog/products/00201777/