The greatest thing ever in the history of the world and of all of human endeavour from time immemorial is stories. ― Rainn Wilson

Stories are an inseparable part of our lives. Stories are our window to the world around us. Stories are all around us. They are what move us, make us feel alive, and inspire us. They delight, enchant, touch, teach, recall, motivate, challenge. They help us understand. They imprint a picture on our minds.

We have grown up listening to stories from our elders. And we do the same with our kids too. We read stories to them at bed time and inspire them to fall in love with the magical world of stories and books.

Imagine a day when our kids starts telling us stories! Wouldn’t that be just great!!

Orson Scott Card once shared that anything can become a children’s book if you give it to a child. Children are actually the best  audience for literature because they have no patience with pretence.  How true is that!

Colgate is helping us do just that. Yes, Colgate has come out with limited edition Magical Sea World packs which the kids can cut, play with and learn about various sea creatures. Every character inside Colgate’s Magical Sea World pack has some interesting trivia which helps kids to learn about sea creatures too.

The four different Colgate packs named as Pirate Hunt, Treasure Hunt, Pirate Ship and Coral Reef, can let a child’s imagination run wild.

My nephew D loves DIY projects. So, I shared these 4 packs with him. He immediately got working and cut the box open. Inside of the box had different characters and shapes. Each shape has a dotted line around it. D gently cut each shape along the dotted line (with a little help from his Mommy and Masi). And soon he had all the characters in front of him. And the child in him gave a whoop of joy. He painstakingly arranged them on the table and admired his handwork.

I then asked him to narrate a story based on these characters. He looked at them for a moment and impromptu shared his imaginative story #‎ColgateMagicalStories‬.

Blackbeard and his twin sister Sadie are pirates of the Caribbean. One day, Sadie sees a mermaid in the middle of the sea through her binocular. She tells Blackbeard that she wants to meet the beautiful mermaid. Blackbeard starts on a voyage on his ship to find the mermaid. As his ship sails through the sea waters, he meets some friendly creatures of the sea. He meets the Killer Whale, Sharks, Dolphins, Sea Turtle, Crabs, Sting Ray, Star Fish, Octopus, Puffer Fish etc. He chats with all these sea creatures and they share interesting things about themselves. For example, Sting Ray shared that it produces electric shock from its tail for defense or that Sea Turtles can grow up to 300 kg in weight or that Dolphins live in groups called pods.

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Blackbeard asks them about the mermaid. They all point in different directions and say that she is mysterious and elusive. All that does not deters Blackbeard for he is determined to find the mermaid. He even dives deep in the sea to look for her. While he is looking for her, he finds a lost treasure. He happily takes the treasure to his ship. His talking parrot that is perched up high on the ship’s mast shrieks and tells Blackbeard the place where he saw the mermaid. Blackbeard takes his ship in that direction and finds the mermaid sitting outside her palace on an island. The mermaid is happy to see a human and agrees to go with him to meet his sister Sadie. All the animals circle around the ship and cheer them. Blackbeard and Sadie become great friends with the mermaid and they all have some good times together.

We all clapped as little D finished his story on a happy note.

We smiled and noted with satisfaction that how this little DIY activity not only engaged the child and we got to spend some quality time with him, but also helped him to hone his story-telling skills, cognitive skills, imaginative skills and even creative skills.