PlayDoh. The Portal to the Past

My daughters love to play PlayDoh. We have every accoutremen known in the PlayDoh world, and they break out and utilize every single piece. As anyone who knows me well will attest...I love creativity. So I love to sit with them and watch their little fingers manipulate the clay and transform gigantic blobs of homemade dough into tiny sea creatures, ghosts and halloween cats, easter eggs and even giant boulders for their 4x4 trucks to scale. It always amazes me how much energy my 2 year old uses when rolling out PlayDoh. I wonder if Michael Angelo used this much energy painting the Sistine Chapel?

Recently while kneading the dough and transforming it into a giant pineapple for our Bikin Bottom town, that familiar PlayDoh smell washed over me and transported me back to elementary school when friends were eating Elmer's Paste and a little boy stuck a piece of "Hot Tamale" candy up his nose (simply because he 'could'), and the smell of Mrs. McDonald's Chanel No 5 filled the entire 2nd floor.

And then it got me wondering in this day and age with our 3 year olds playing computer games, our five year olds playing Mario Kart instead of actually going outside and riding a go-kart. What kind of smells will evoke precious childhood memories for the next generation? Will the poisonous rays emitted by their handheld PDA transport them back to the days of Nintendo DS, LeapFrog, and Wii? It really started to bother me, and then in an instant, my 2 year old picked up a giant blob of PlayDoh and held it to her tiny face and inhaled. She smiled at me from across the table and said, "Mmmmmhhhm. I love PayDoh." With those simple three words, my heart melted. It made me realize that it's not the gadget or the latest and greatest children band...it's the time we spend with our children, passing along those childhood traditions. 

And then I knew despite the latest and greatest technology, my girls childhood would be full of happy memories evoked by the sweet, warm smell of homemade PlayDoh.