We Mixed....Montessori with Imagination

 And it is so sweet.  Recently, I added some imagination/pretend play items to our playroom.  I have to say, what a brilliant mixture it has created.  In a home, it works so wonderfully.

They played trains while another practiced writing, while another built the pink tower, matched with the brown stair. 

The two can coexist, with care.  It's true :)

I mixed the Pink Tower and The Brown Stair together in a pretty basket from Africa.  I found that my girls didn't use them as much out on the shelves, as the mystery of the differing sizes were already displayed.  So, I put them together in this basket (that little box holds the tiny Pink Tower Cube) and let them re-discover the grading on their own.  

Pumpkin is playing with her trains in a tree.  Why?  It flies, and that's okay.  Pretending is creativity, and that's valid in any environment.  

Here we mix a Waldorf toy with the trains while tracing cursive letters.