The Invention of K’s Pineapple Waterfall
On a visit to my house several years ago, my granddaughter announced that she wanted to play with playdough and build a pineapple waterfall with grandma. My grandaughter, “K”, loved water of every type and she could find water to splash in almost anywhere. Taking her to the splash pad was always a particular delight for me.
If she found water, she could almost always find a few rocks to toss in. She and I spent quite a bit of time throwing rocks. My job was to gather them up and keep her pockets full. Her job was to make as big a splash as possible.
The Pineapple Waterfall
But back to the waterfall. I had no idea what a “pineapple waterfall” was, so, attempting to decode her meaning, I went to the refrigerator, pulled out a pineapple, and let her help me cut the flesh into chunks for a snack. This satisfied her for a few minutes, and then we got out the playdough and I thought the matter was closed.
Not so. Once the playdough was cleaned up, she went to my cupboard and peered inside, telling me she needed bowls—big bowls and small bowls. Then it clicked. I remembered standing with her in front of a fountain at a wedding reception the night before while she talked about big bowls and little bowls and pineapple. (I had been keeping an eye on her so she wouldn’t get wet.) I had seen only a fountain. She had seen the details I had missed—big bowls and little bowls and a pineapple.
So with the above “pineapple waterfall” as inspiration (the pineapple, in case you missed it, is at the top), we set out to build our own kid-friendly waterfall:
Construction is simple. All you need are big bowls and little bowls, just like K had explained. I stacked pint-sized mason jars in between the layers, but a more kid-friendly option (and also less likely to get broken) would be a tin can or any other support strong enough to hold a bowl full of water. Next, we added a running hose, and Voila, a pineapple waterfall. K didn’t seem too concerned about the missing pineapple, but she did spend nearly thirty minutes playing with her invention.
Imagination is the Mother of Invention:
Author Julia Cameron wrote, “The quality of life is in proportion always to the capacity for delight. The capacity for delight is the gift of paying attention.” -Julia Cameron, The Artist’s Way, p. 53
I try to keep this in mind when I’m with the grandchildren. They are inventing all the time, and when I pay attention, ideas can sometimes cross the grandma brain barrier and I can help facilitate the idea they have already invented but need adult assistance to bring into reality. Together, we increased our capacity for delight: she got to watch the water cascading over the edges of her fountain. I had the joy of seeing her invent something to play with.
Some tips for you if you are going to build your own waterfall:
- Opt for non-breakable supplies. The waterfall is pretty stable, provided that you’ve used a good sturdy base for each bowl to rest on, but if it gets bumped, you don’t want broken dishes.
- If you can find a totally level surface to stack your bowls on, your waterfall will be more likely to spill over the edges on all sides, rather than just on the downward slope like ours did.
- You don’t need to stop at three levels.
- It’s easiest to stack your waterfall on a sturdy, level surface like a sidewalk or driveway, but if you don’t want to waste a lot of water, consider building your fountain in the center of a patch of lawn or in some other area that needs water.
Re-inventing K’s Invention for Summertime Water Play
Over time, I’ve used versions of K’s waterfall over and over again with different grandchildren. Once, we filled the top with colorful pom poms and gave the 2-year-olds ice cream scoops to scoop them out.
Even the older grandkids even get a kick out of creating a waterfall. So far our record is 5 levels high. My supply of metal bread baking bowls has come in handy, and we never have quite enough.
For the older ones, it’s more of an engineering experience to learn laws of physics and balance. They aren’t as interested in just watching the water run. The little ones are just fascinated with being allowed to hold the hose. It’s a simple little addition to a grandma water day when we get out the water balloons, turn on the sprinklers, or get out the slip-n-slide.
If you don’t have bread-baking bowls in your supply, let the kids use their imaginations to think of receptacles you could scavenge from around your house to make your own waterfall work: Empty buckets, trash cans, and empty plastic jars could all work. Let us know if you try this and how you made it better! K would be happy to know her invention is constantly being re-imagined.
