Tablecloth town play mat

I found the idea for making a play mat yourself out of a shower curtain here from Filth Wizardry a few years ago.  Her site is FULL of fun and creative ideas for kids.  She allows them to play freely and be creative in ways I'd never even think of.  I loved the idea and filed it away in my brain. 

My kids have really been enjoying the Richard Scarry's Busy Town book lately as well as his others in the Busy Town series.

They especially enjoy looking at the maps inside the covers and seeing where things are all over the town.

When we all ended up sick a few weeks ago I decided we'd make a busy town of our own.  I didn't have a shower curtain on hand but I do have a stock of plastic dollar store table cloths so we used one of those.  We taped it to the floor with painters tape.

I copied Lindsey and taped two markers to a container to draw the roads.  My four year old helped draw and he loved creating his own buildings, a Batcave, railroad tracks and a zoo.  He also drew our house, our street and several neighbor's houses.

My daughter was asleep but requested a purple castle.  I drew it then my son drew a moat around it.

We included 7-11 for any needed Slurpee runs.

When we finished drawing, we busted out Little People, Imaginext figures, and more to play.

 

Unfortunately, the town quickly found itself under Dinosaur attack.

Luckily, Spiderman, Hulk and Batman came in and saved the day.

I left it taped down there for two days and we got hours of play out it.  The tablecloth didn't hold up as well as a shower curtain probably would have, but it worked for us at the time. 

Next, he wants to make outer space with planets, stars, aliens and space ships.  I'll tell you all about it when we draw that one.

Have you done this with your kids?  What did you include in your town?