Outdoor Music Making Area

One of the first ways parents communicate with their babies is with music.  Lullabies, nursery rhymes, chants and the such are used universally from infancy and beyond to communicate and teach our little ones.  Fortunately, it doesn't matter to our little ones if we have a horrible singing voice (like me) or if we can sing like one of the three tenors...what's important is the rhythm, the music.

With music being such an integral part of our lives from infancy onward, there is no need to wonder why children love to bang on things.  In the house while you are working on something, it's hard to appreciate the learning and fun that is involved in such things...but hey, kids love to make music!  Trying to find a working compromise to this issue in our house lead me to turn to Pinterest where I found this awesome outdoor music area and decided it would be the perfect solution!

On one side of our backyard we have chain link fence with those privacy slats.  Fortunately, our neighbors on that side also have a big old shed against the fence, which I figured would help block a lot of the noise on their side.  Our other three fence sides are concrete and wood, so I figured the chain link backed up against the shed was the best possible placement for our own music area.

Gathering the materials wasn't much of a problem either.  Everything I hung up was already around the house, not getting any use otherwise.  Of course, there's always the thrift store!

I started with some coated wire racks that had once belonged to a couple three shelf shoe racks. I then just added whatever old metal pieces I could find.  I used a combination of floral wire, shower curtain rings, and heavy duty twist ties to hang everything up.

Wire shelf racks, a strainer, and a tall cooling rack...

A muffin tin, a chain with a clip to hold the spatula 'drumstick' and a metal bowl

At about that point, the boys were eager to try it out, so I let them show off their musical chops!

Curls wasn't too sure about it all at first, but Dirty D went right into banging out a musical tune.  After listening for a few minutes, Curls decided he wanted to get a closer look. 

"What's all that ruckus?!?!" -Curls (in baby talk)

With the addition of two old skillets, I felt that our music area was complete.

Curls seemed to think so too, because he was ready at that point to start clanging around!

I have to say, I wasn't much of a 'metal' fan before this, but now I am! 

Here's where I linked up:

http://deceptivelyeducational.blogspot.com/ 

http://www.icanteachmychild.com/

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