A mother and daughter have launched an eco-friendly children's toy business.

32-year-old mother-of-two Emily Clarke and 61-year-old Hilary Pike, from Stowmarket, have teamed up to launch Little Ones Play - an online and pop-up shop selling "planet friendly" children's toys.

Emily said: "Hilary had worked in school for a long time and had a lot of knowledge about the power of play and when I had children she started looking into ideas such as Montessori learning, play schemas and the curiosity approach.

"The more we learned the more we wanted to buy products which were good for the planet and opened ended, i.e. they had no fixed way of playing with them.

"Therefore allowing children to use their creativity to come up with ideas to learn and to problem solve.

"We couldn't find a store which housed all the bits we wanted in one place so (crazily) we started our own. We believed if we felt this way there would be other parents and grandparents out there who also felt the same."

The online shop sells a variety of wooden toys while they will be appearing at a variety of events across the county in the next couple of months.

These are: Trinity Park (November 6), Hadleigh Market (November 18 and 25), High Lodge in Darsham (November 19), Bury St Edmunds (November 24), Stowmarket (November 27), Saxmundham (December 2), Baylham Rare Breeds Farm (December 3).

Emily added: "We are both so passionate about play and wanted what we call 'proper play' to be available to as many children as possible.

"We know that open-ended play helps children develop important life skills such as promoting physical and language development, it helps children understand their emotions, it promotes social development and most of all its fun.

"We want to grow the business to allow more people to experience the power of open ended play.

"We are looking into doing toddler and baby open ended play classes. The ultimate dream is to have a physical shop."