The Travelling Bear

The Picnic Bear

Who doesn’t love a picnic? Umbrage does. “The Teddy Bears’ Picnic” has been a hit with all ages for over 100 years. First written in 1907, the song represents the love each generation has for their teddy bears. ‘If you go down to the woods today…’ you might like to take a picnic and make it a fundraising event for After Umbrage and our unpaid carers.

It’s the most wholesome of childhood activities – so collect your childs’ favourite teddy bears and head to the woods or your favourite picnic spot, enjoy some classic sweet treats and fun activities.

Getting organised…

Pack your favourite teddy bears

The stars of the whole event – what’s a teddy bear’s picnic without the teddy bears themselves? Help your kids choose who gets to attend the picnic. Just make sure you have a list of all the bears that are taken so you can make sure everyone is accounted for when you leave! The last thing anyone wants is a teddy bear left behind.

Read a teddy bear book

Take the teddy bear’s picnic as an opportunity for some good old fashioned reading time, with a classic bear-themed book. What about, ‘We’re Going on a Bear Hunt’ by Michael Rosen?

Bring some classic teddy bear picnic food

Classic picnic food is the best kind of food. Might not always be healthy but comfort food it is. Who doesn’t love a picky lunch with plenty of classic British treats, sweets and snacks? While you might want to keep it simple for smaller kids with a pickier palate, the grown-ups could indulge.

Some great options for teddy bear picnic food are:

• Sandwiches (if you can find a teddy-bear shaped sandwich cutter, then even better!)
• Biscuits and cupcakes
• Plenty of sliced fruit or easy-to-pack fruit like tangerines
• Classic party food

Feeling a little bit fancier? Why not get the whole gamily involved with baking some treats inspired by famous teddy bears?

The Party Bear

Party games over dinner any one? Charades is a traditional classic. Or a version of ‘Never have I ever…’. You name it. But the idea is that you create some fun with friends and make it into a jolly with a fundraising element.

You could design invitations to attend, add our logo and tell people what you have planned. The host could buy a Bear and each guest puts an amount in and the winner of the game gets the bear? Name the teddy bear competition, bring a desert inspired by your teddy bear with a prize for the best one.

In short, we want you to get creative and have some fun!

Here are some more ideas…

The word chain game

While you and your guests sit around the table in a circle, you can begin this game by stating a word that pertains to the reason for your gathering. For instance, you can say the word “teddy bear” . The person next to you would then have to recite your word and add a word of her own. This pattern of adding a word and reciting back the words that came before continues around the table until all but one person is out for breaking the pattern and forgetting a word.

Spoof

This game is played by any number of players in a series of rounds. In each round the objective is to guess the aggregate number of coins held in concealment by all the players, with each player being allowed to conceal up to three coins in their hand. The coins may be of any denomination, and the values of the coins are irrelevant: in fact, any suitable objects could be used in place of coins, e.g. matches or AU tokens.

For the first round an initial player is selected in some fashion, such as spinning a burnt match to see who it points at or the person who suggested the game. Thank you host!

At the beginning of every round each player conceals a quantity of coins, or no coins at all, in their closed fist, extended into the circle of play. The initial player calls what they think is the total number of coins in play. Play proceeds clockwise around the circle until each player has ventured a call regarding the total number of coins, and no player can call the same total as any other player. The call of “Spoof!” is sometimes used to mean “zero”.

After all players have made their calls, they open their fists and display their coins for the group to count the total. It is illegal for a player to open their hand without making a call. The player who has correctly guessed the total number of coins withdraws from the game and the remainder of the group proceeds to the next round. If no player guesses the total correctly, the entire group continues play in the next round. The starting player for each subsequent round is the next remaining player, clockwise from the starter of the previous round.

Play continues until all players have been eliminated except for one, whereupon that last remaining player has to do the washing up!