Why We Love Shenanigans Toy Store

A Morning of Play, Imagination, and a Little Experiment in Charlottesville, VA

Young girl hugging an armful of stuffed animals while exploring Shenanigans toy store in Charlottesville, Virginia.

We started taking our daughter to Shenanigans when she was about two years old. I'm not going to lie: I think her dad and I were initially more excited about it than she was. We loved everything about the place. It was small. The people working there actually knew the store and the toys on the shelves. They smiled. They answered questions. They were infinitely patient. And then our daughter started exploring.

First came anything squishy. Then LEGOs and anything she could build with. (Magna-Tiles, we remember you.) Anything involving nature was always worth investigating. Hello, butterfly net. And somewhere along the way, Shenanigans became a place we had to drag her out of. I remember her plopping her little butt right down on the floor in the middle of the store to play with the wooden trains. She'd push a baby stroller around the aisles. She'd stop to investigate whatever caught her attention. And nobody minded. She could just be a kid.

Years later, that two-year-old is now a tween. She came with me to help during our recent Play Sessions at Shenanigans. And you know what? She was still exploring. "Mom, come over here. I gotta show you this!" Some things don't change.

There's Something Special About a Place That Lets Kids Explore

One of the things I've always loved about Shenanigans is that it doesn't feel like a place where children are expected to keep their hands to themselves. They're invited to wonder. To touch. To build. To pretend. To find something they've never seen before and immediately need to know what it does.

As a psychologist, I could tell you all kinds of things about the importance of play. About curiosity and imagination, open-ended toys, pretend play, social development, and what happens when we let children take the lead. But honestly?Spend ten minutes watching a child explore Shenanigans and you won't need me to explain it. You'll see it.

You'll hear it in the constant stream of:

• "What's this?"

• "Look at this!"

• "Can I try this?"

• "Oh, this is SO COOL."

You'll see the concentration on their faces when they're trying to figure something out. You'll hear the stories they invent. You'll watch them move from one discovery to another because there is simply too much to investigate. There is no right way to explore a toy store. And, as it turns out, that makes it a pretty wonderful place to photograph children.

Young girl pretending to ride a toy unicorn at Shenanigans Toy Store in Charlottesville, VA.

A Little Experiment

When Shenanigans and I planned these Play Sessions, they were a bit of an experiment. We genuinely didn't know exactly how it was going to go. Could I photograph a child authentically in ten minutes? Would they forget about the camera? Would they actually play?

And then I found myself kneeling on the hardwood floor with a little one, playing with ribbons and streamers. And, briefly, realizing that kneeling on hardwood floors is a much bigger commitment in your 40s than it used to be.

Oof.

But then they looked up. Above them were shelves that probably didn't seem particularly enormous to me, but must have looked absolutely gigantic from the perspective of a two-year-old. So many things to see. So many things to discover. And I remember thinking, “This is going to work.” Because I didn't need that child to look at me. I didn't need them to stand somewhere specific. I didn't need a perfect smile. There was already a story happening. I just needed to pay attention.

And Then I Got to Watch the Stories Unfold

One little girl cuddled what seemed like every stuffed animal she could find while telling me stories about her dogs. Another played puppets with her mom and laughed hysterically. Then she discovered a toy T. rex and suddenly we had moved on to much more serious business. She let me play with her while telling me all about the dinosaur. One little girl pushed a doll around the store in a toy shopping cart and flashed me the biggest smile. Because pushing your baby through the store is serious stuff. Another little one and I sat on the floor and rolled a wooden train back and forth. One kiddo found a Rubik's Cube that they absolutely needed to show me. Every time they noticed my camera, I got the biggest smile.

And everywhere I looked, kids were discovering something else. The giggles. The intense concentration. The stories. The need to touch and investigate and try. The constant jumping from one thing to another because there were still entire shelves left to explore.

And somewhere in all of that, the camera stopped being the point. The kids weren't performing for me. They were exploring. I just happened to be there to photograph it.

The People Who Made It Possible

And I can't talk about this morning without talking about the people at Shenanigans. I've always known the staff was wonderful. It's one of the reasons we've kept coming back over the years. But watching them during these sessions gave me an entirely new appreciation for them. They welcomed every family with genuine kindness. They smiled. They listened. They offered ideas. They helped whenever anyone needed something.

And somehow, I think they may have been every bit as excited about the Play Sessions as the families were. There was no sense that a bunch of children exploring their store was an inconvenience. Quite the opposite. They wanted them there. They wanted them to play. They wanted this little experiment of ours to work. That kind of generosity is something I won't forget.

I Hope This Is Only the Beginning

I went into these sessions hoping to give families photographs of their children playing in a place they love. I came out of them reminded all over again why I love photographing children this way.

There was so much personality packed into those ten-minute sessions. Some kids wanted to tell me everything they were thinking. Others barely noticed I was there once they found something interesting. They pretended, explored, laughed with their parents, investigated toys, and became completely absorbed in whatever had captured their attention. At one point, pushing a baby doll through the store in a shopping cart was clearly very serious business.

Those are the photographs I want families to have. Of course I love a beautiful portrait and a great smile, but I also want the photograph of the expression your child makes when they're concentrating. I want the things they're obsessed with right now, the way they play, the stories they tell, and the little pieces of their personality that are so familiar to you that you don't realize how much you'll miss them until they've changed.

I know that because I've watched it happen in my own family.

More than a decade ago, my daughter was the two-year-old sitting on the floor of Shenanigans playing with the wooden trains. This year, she stood beside me as my helper. She's a tween now, but every so often during the event I'd hear, "Mom, come over here. I gotta show you this!" She was still wandering those shelves. Still finding things she needed to investigate. Still wanting me to come see.

Maybe that's part of what I've always loved about Shenanigans. It gives children room to be curious, and somehow there is always something else to discover.

I'm incredibly grateful to the entire Shenanigans team for trusting me with their space, welcoming every family so warmly, and getting just as excited about this little experiment as I was. What started as an idea turned into a morning I won't soon forget.

And I really hope this is only the beginning.

“Warmly, Erin” sign-off for Erin E. Gallagher Photography, newborn and family lifestyle photographer.