Top 10 things to do indoors with children!
Finding new things to do with your kids can at times feel tough, so here’s our top 10 things to do indoors. This list is aimed at pre-school children, and you may need to alter them depending on the age of your children.
I’ve always found it’s best to break down the day with a variety of games, to give you all a break, and to prevent boredom/frustration from creeping in.
These are just our top 10 ideas, we’d love to here yours:
Water play - Really easy to be done no matter how much space you have, my 3 yr old loves playing in the sink, well he doesn’t get in! - but stands on a wee step to play with his toys in the sink, either the kitchen of bathroom. A wee bit of soap helps clean the toys, and create games of swimming/rescuing toys.
Painting/Drawing - Sounds simple and it can be, but you can challenge each other to draw different creatures of objects, or both draw a little bit.
Board games - Clearly depends on the age of your child, Orchard Toys have some really good games. Charity shops are great places to pick up bargains, or perhaps ask other parents you know to swap games. The Shopping list game is our 3 yr olds favourite. Our 11 yr old is the house champion at Labyrinth another good one is Junior Articulate (recommended by one of our mums). There’s so many board games, I’d avoid Monopoly, and instead go for Junior Monopoly
Labyrinth in action!
4. Den Building - You’ll need some bedsheets and maybe pegs, or something else to hold the sheets in place. Kids love making wee nooks and crannies to hide in. We normally combine it with snack time, so they can eat in the den.
5. Gardening - Depends on the size of your garden/if you’ve got one, but if not you can get your children to help plant some seeds in pots, or wee cups, you can even make plant pots out of paper, it’s a great excuse to get their hands dirty. Weeding outside is another good way to get them involved, or picking up leaves/twigs, remember to stop and find beasties, if you’ve a bug hunting kit..otherwise known as a magnifying glass even better. Another great thing our 3 yr old loves to do in the garden is paint the fence, with an old paint brush and some water, either a fence, or a wee wall are ideal.
6. Baking - again another way to let kids get messy. Something simple like pancakes (we recently made Banana pancakes, a good way to get more fruit into them, and gluten free!) which only have a few ingredients, cookies, or savoury muffins. Pizza’s are also really easy to make.
Banana Pancakes!
7. Storytime - Ideally with some of your wee one’s cuddly toys, get them all together and either read a few books together, or make up your own stories.
8. Hide and Seek - Again depends on how much space you have, but this can be a great game for all.
9. Dance party - You don’t need to be an ace dancer, signer or part of Dads Rock Academy to entertain your wee ones, generally kids love to dance and sing, we have a wee 5-10 minute dance party in our kitchen to some classic ‘Frozen’ tunes or something a wee bit more rocky!
10. Making play dough - It’s really easy to make, we’ve done it at our playgroups. Here’s a recipe for it. Dough Remember with kids, it’s often not the end product that’s important, but the process! Here’s also a lovely blog on why we should play with play dough! - Play
Ok over to you, let’s add to this list and share some of your great indoor activities for kids. We’d love to hear them.