Love is sharing Play-Doh

Kindergarten holds wedding ceremony

NATASHA MARTIN/FAIRFAX NZ

I DO: Vili Finau, left, and Sammy Jaques, both aged four, got "married'' at Hanan Kindergarten.

When Sammy Jaques got married, she had to think long and hard about who she wanted to share her Play-Doh with.

The four-year-old was "married" to fellow four-year-old Vili Finau in an elaborate ceremony at Timaru's Hanan Kindergarten.

The children have been celebrating all week - wrapping wedding gifts, writing vows, preparing the bouquet and signing the register.

Teacher Debbie Bingham said wedding fever started six weeks ago when staff decided to use dress-up fabric as a bridal veil.

"We were given a whole stack of long pieces of fabric that were like netting for the windows. The girls decided that it was long hair like Rapunzel. We had to purchase all these hair ties because they would come in every day and want [the netting] tied into their hair. That went for the whole term ... At the end of that term we thought, `How can we keep it going?' and we thought of [one of the teachers who is having a] wedding. The Rapunzel hair became bridal veils."

Magazines and DVDs were inspiration while the children found and made rings. To choose the bride and groom, the children held a "forum".

"The girls knew who it would be. Sammy was such an enthusiastic part of the programme. But for the boys, nobody wanted to be the groom," Mrs Bingham laughed. "So Sammy said who she would like and [Vili] said, `Oh, all right then'."

Luckily, Sammy was up for a wedding yesterday as her mum had reminded her a week before that her wedding was soon, and she replied that she "didn't feel like getting married today".

Mrs Bingham said staff thought teaching children about the tradition of weddings was important. "The children were able to identify with an aunty or uncle and, for some of them, their mum and dad just got married."

- © Fairfax NZ News