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Day 8 - Text - Paddy the hurler comes to visit | Puppet Portal Project - Hospital A
2009-06-16

Day 8 - Text - Paddy the hurler comes to visit

We had another visiting puppet today, Paddy the hurler from Limerick, only I received him in time only for the afternoon session.

I had again only one patient for the morning session, a boy of 5yrs. His mother worked very closely with him, and afterwards on her evaluation form she wrote that she learned how to, "Make a puppet with simple ingrediants" and yes, "she would use (this activity) at home as a great way to communicate with child".

I may have said this previously, but one of the lovely things I enjoy about working as an artist in hospital is the opportunity to work with families, and to creatively support the bond between parent and child. Also, in this work, the parents learn alongside the child and take this experience with them, injecting the home with creativity.

The young child changed from this idea to that idea over half a dozen times, and finally settled simply on a head from clay which he wore on his index finger, using the rest of his hand as the body of the puppet. See photograph. This is actually a very contemporary and sophisticated type of puppetry!

His mum joined in the video making with her own puppet.

The boy had worked hard for nearly 1 hr and a half, so come time for the link up, he was too tired.

So instead, I used my laptop with a 3G modum, to take the experience of watching the live link to a girl who was bed bound with a broken leg. (There was no time to make puppets with her.) My other 3 colleagues were performing and showing in the 3 windows, and the girl enjoyed watching them. She became confident and with prompting from her mother, she animated her pink Teddy on the screen. He waved hello to the others. She was delighted. It was lunch time so I left her with some materials to start the design process for her puppet. Unfortunately, after lunch, she had gone home.
This was the same with another girl, with whom I had also left materials, upon request from a nurse.
This is the way of hospital work.

In the afternoon, Paddy was our inspiration, and I worked with 3 young girls aged 4-6. We made puppets in response to Paddy puppet, and our stories became sport orientated.

I am enjoying the puppet exchange and the sharing of ideas between all of us.

I arranged to come in the following day to finish the puppet window and the staff room activity.

The staff loved Paddy. The staff in general are becoming much more responsive to the project, and I feel that it is gaining momentum with them. Quite a few came into the playroom today to watch and ask after the project.