When my kids were little, we read to them every night; and one of their favorite books was "The Spooky Old Tree", by Stan and Jan Berenstain.
It tells the story of three little bears (one with a light, one with a stick, and one with a rope) who go out at night to explore the interior of a twisted and menacing-looking tree. They encounter all kinds of frightening situations, including a twisty old stair, a spooky hall, and Great Sleeping Bear, who is less than thrilled about being awakened. Naturally, they come through all this unscathed, but they do lose their tools and acquire a case of the shivers. But after a thrilling chase "up a ladder, through the floor, down a slide and out a door", they arrive "home again, safe at last". It's a great book, with terrific illustrations.
Not surprisingly, when my older daughter had kids of her own, "The Spooky Old Tree" became a regular feature in their nightly readings, as well. However, her children soon discovered something interesting: Grandma and Grandpa's house (which we moved into after our kids were beyond the nightly reading stage) is perfectly set up to play a live-action version of the book.
We have a spiral staircase that leads from the kitchen to the back of an upstairs hallway which also has a straight set of steps leading down to the front door, mimicking the final slide to safety. They would go round and round the house, with a flashlight, a foam "stick" and a length of yarn, up the twisty old stair, through the spooky hall and down the front steps to safety. It was one of their favorite things to do when they came to visit.
The part of Great Sleeping Bear was played (somewhat reluctantly) by our white Siberian Husky, Sebastian. He was supposed to lie at the foot of the front steps as a final obstacle but having three young kids jumping over him mad him a bit nervous, so he would just follow them around to be petted.
(Side note: Sebastian absolutely refused to go up the spiral staircase; it terrified him. Once in a while he would go up one step, but he would start shaking and immediately turn around. No matter. He'd follow them to staircase and then go around to the front of the house to meet them when they came back down. Our cat, Pumpkin, however, loved that staircase. He'd lie for hours on one of the top steps about 12 feet in the air, looking out over the sunken family room, and survey his domain. Of course, when the game started, he'd take off for a quieter spot and lay on the lap of one of the adults. Sadly, both pets are gone now, but the part of Great Sleeping Bear has been taken over by a very large stuffed tiger, named Punjab, who doesn't seem to mind being climbed on.)
Those children are now a bit too old to play that game, but my younger daughter now has two children of her own, ages two and three. They, too, read the book regularly and the older grandkids recently introduced them to the live-action game. But there's one difference now: I'm recently retired. And I have a new hobby.
A few months ago, I decided that I was going to need something to do with all my free time after retirement, so I began to experiment with Arduino microcontrollers and Raspberry Pi computers. And that has led to a few "enhancements" of the Spooky Old Tree game.
Specifically I (along with my wife, who is a talented graphic artist and crafter) created three new interactive elements for the game. A falling spider, a jumping mouse, and an owl with light-up eyes. Each of these creatures is controlled by an Arduino Nano and their responses are triggered by shining a light on a sensor attached to them.
So, now when the kids go up into the spooky old hall, they can make things happen with their light. You can see some video of the elements in place and in action in this video on my YouTube channel.
These "stunts" turned out to be a great hit with the kids, and in my next couple of posts I'll be providing more detail on their construction, including Fritzing diagrams, schematics, and Arduino code in case you might like to build something like them.
They're great beginner projects because they are simple to build, easy to code, and very inexpensive.
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