Due to the current pandemic, I, like so many other Nanas and Grandads, have found it very difficult to be separated from our friends and loved ones, especially our grandchildren. Unless you can put some play into a phone call with a child, it will usually fizzle out after a few minutes

I am a retired Arts and Crafts teacher, and due to the isolation, I miss my grandchildren, so I devised playful ways of interacting with them over the phone and computer. I wrote this book, my second to be self-published this year, to share my techniques with other grandparents who are missing their grandchildren. In the book, I share some of the methods I use to stay in touch with my younger grandchildren using the phone or computer.

There are many props, and I describe how to accumulate enough “characters” to keep the grandchild happy playing for at least an hour.  I also discuss:

• Suitable phone packages and applications enable the reader to import books and video games and purchase them online for those who are not very computer savvy like me!
• Non-technical props suitable for play, such as teddies, monsters, and other characters lying undiscovered around the house.
• Younger children prefer short games, and I have a chapter on these called Five Minute Games.
• How to make cloth monsters from materials that the reader will also find around the home.
• Another chapter discusses making characters from paper and empty cartons and lots of helpful script ideas to bring them to life.

All these teddies, monsters, and characters have to live somewhere, and I have devoted a chapter on making a unique forest or dwelling for them.