Spring time is a time of transition for children in areas where four seasons truly exist. The weather changes frequently. One day it's winter cold, the next day it's sunny and near 80 degrees. We pull our patio furniture and backyard toys out of storage, only to have it start pouring down rain the next day.
Younger children have a harder time adjusting to the rapidly changing weather patterns as Spring pushes its way into our region. So here are some additional fun playtime ideas my family enjoys during this rough transition. Feel free to steal an idea or two for your own fun!
Spring Crafts
There are tons of fun crafts you can do with your children that are easy and cute too. Check with a local craft store for pre-packaged craft supplies or use your imagination to help your child create their own masterpiece with a little bit of construction paper, glue, and fun beads or buttons. The sky's the limit when it comes to crafts. If you crave a little bit of inspiration for ideas, check out some of the link's below.
Crafts For Kids - Enchanted Learning
Family Home Videos or Photo Albums
Young children love to see themselves on TV or in books. Have fun with all of that video footage you've taken over the years, but rarely sit down to enjoy watching. Caution: You may want to have a box of tissues handy. It will blow you away to see a visual reminder of how little your not-so-little-anymore child used to be. No home videos handy? Grab a photo album and look through it together. My children even love to watch the video of mommy and daddy's wedding. Obviously, they aren't in that video but they think mommy looked like a princess and daddy was oh so handsome.
Scrapbook Together
Yes, even young children have fun scrapbooking. Give them some supplies and help them create their own scrapbook page for their book. They'll love the one on one time with you and later on they'll really enjoy paging through the scrapbook to see their own special page.
Rearrange and Reorganize their Bedrooms
I'm always amazed at how much my daughter loves having her bedroom rearranged and thoroughly cleaned. Of course, she doesn't like to take the task on her own shoulders, but if mommy's helping out and offering cool ideas and suggestions, she totally gets into it. This works really well if you happen to be struggling to encourage your child to spend time in their bedroom on their own. When my daughter's bedroom is clean and well organized, she loves to hang out there playing with her Barbie's or reading a book.
Color Together
This is by far a family favorite for us. I love coloring with my girls. There's just something so therapeutic about coloring a page in my child's coloring book. Actually, I've been tempted to buy my own book that only I'm allowed to color in. Sounds so childish, I know. But I can't be the only parent out there who feels totally relaxed and creative when I have a coloring crayon in my hand!
Hide and Seek
This is a classic and it's a very fun family game when the entire family gets into it. We even add monster roars to our game. The person who's seeking is the monster. When they find someone they roar loudly and lots of squealing giggles pour out of the hider. We can't help but laugh a lot during this fun family game.
Jump on the Bed
Here's another opportunity to be SuperMom in the eyes of your children. Let them jump on the bed, under your careful supervision. When I was pregnant with Abby, we lived in the hot desert of Temecula, CA. It was summer and way too hot to go out to the park. So Faith would be bouncing off the walls needing to burn off energy. I finally got to the point where I let her jump on our bed. She loved it and would giggle so much that it actually improved my overly-exhausted pregnant mommy mood.
Snuggle Up for Some Reading
We love to read to our children. It's something we've done since they were babies. Whenever there seems to be a need for snuggling, we embrace the opportunity and grab a book or two to read with our girls. This has instilled a love for books in them that I'm often in awe about. My five year old now loves to read on her own for pleasure! So if the opportunity to read to your child presents itself, jump at it. It's so worth it!
Write Letters or Make Cards
Unfortunately many of our friends and family members live far away from us. So we've gotten in the habit of taking time when it's rainy or cold out, to write letters or make nice cards for those we love and miss. When the girls were younger {I still like to do this with Abby from time to time} we'd sign their names with a painted handprint. Now that Faith is learning to write, she likes to draw pictures in the card and sign both her name and Abby's.
I hope these ideas have been helpful and encouraging to those of you who may be struggling to keep your children entertained during those difficult days when the weather just won't cooperate. The most important thing to keep in mind is this. Children want our time and attention. It doesn't matter what the activity is, as long as they can enjoy it with someone they truly love.
Do you have any tried and true rainy day activities that have become a family favorite?
~Until next time, May God bless you with quality time to enjoy your children in the very short season of their youth!
Rosann Cunningham
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I love these ideas! Thanks for stopping by Remember Ember! =)
What great ideas! I am all about rearranging rooms- especially with their input. We did that during the winter and it's helped with getting her to play in her room more. Have fun on your rainy days.
Melissa, thanks for stopping by and for your comment.
Loved both of these posts...we need all the rainy day ideas we can get.
It's been so long since we've watched old home videos...thanks for the reminder.
They will love that!
Kara, thanks so much for stopping by! Old home videos are the BEST, aren't they? Don't forget to grab a box of tissues before you all sit down to watch them. I'm sure it'll come in handy!
Blessings,
Rosann