We are only a few days into cold weather but my entergetic 3 year old is getting stir crazy on the weekends when it's too wet or cold to play outside, what do you do to keep toddlers busy? Perferably free ideas that we can do at home.
-
Forts! I used to love doing treasure hunts when I was little - my nana would make clues, "1. Where do you find the soap?" And then clue 2 would be under it. It would lead me all over the house til I found a treasure - stickers, coloring book or something!
-
Bump! More ideas please! Its rainy and cold here and I'm solo with E for the second day in a row because DH is working on the nursery. Shes sick of all her toys and going stir crazy already at 10! I'm also 6 months pregnant so soft play is out (she gets stuck and I'm too fat to rescue her!).
-
Great questions, following!
-
We have wild dance parties and she also loves to run as fast as she can (safely) across the mainroom. Bonus is it gets her to pick up her toys! (So she won't slip!)
-
My cousin is in MN I've seen FB pics of her letting LO play in tub with colored shaving cream! But I'm sure white would do just fine too!
-
We take both cars out of the garage and let her ride her bike. Or sometimes we will clear a path in the ufinishes basement and do that there. We also have a basement play room for her "active" toys like a trampoline and balance board and she can play while we sit on the couch in there.
-
Library? Bookstore? Mall walking? These are things we do to give LO a change of scenery when the weather is crap.
Also, not free, but we just got a membership to the science museum, which has reciprocity with most other museums too, so we're going to visit as many museums and other places covered by the membership as possible.
ETA: we also save all diaper boxes, Amazon boxes, etc, for crazy forts! LO loves building them, hiding in them, knocking them down. We also bring his slide indoors for winter. Maybe you have some summer great you can bring indoors for winter?
-
Indoor swimming pools. Not free, but city-run ones usually aren't that expensive.
-
We bought a cheapo pop up tent on Amazon and that keeps her occupied forever.
-
Painters tape on the floor. Make hopscotch, obstacle courses, race tracks for cars, streets to go with neighborhoods you make from blocks...
Dance parties
Run laps of the house
Kids yoga videos
Watch music videos and try to do the dances
Push laundry baskets around, the heavier the better
Make muffins, popsicles, smoothies, slowly at kid pace
Wash dishes
Spray bottle of water and vinegar plus rag cleaning
Play doh
Draw in a salt tray
Make masks
It's boring for me. And sometimes annoying, but I can slow down almost any of my chores and LO will happily work with me for a little while if I let go of the results and focus on the process. -
I wrote this post last winter
We still do a lot of these things! http://www.hellobee.com/2014/12/05/20-no-mess-sensory-activities/
-
I follow busytoddler on IG!
Reply
Subscribe to our newsletter
- Google Plus
- Stumbleupon
- Twitter
- Facebook
- Pinterest
- Favorite1
12 comments