Hellobee Boards

I spent a lot of time with my grandparents in the late elementary time frame (they were our summer childcare), not the same as bringing kids on a visit but it definitely got boring to be dropped off at my grandparents house a few towns away every day. Here are some things that helped:

Craft kits were great, my Nana was into making pressed flowers and we did lots of construction paper crafts. She has arthritis in hands so we had the “responsibility” to cut the paper, which felt very big and important at the time. Coloring and sticker books were also big.

Idk if your family has or is into puzzles but I did a lot of big puzzles with my grandpa—not little kid ones but actual grown up ones, which again was novel at first and felt special.

They had a set of encyclopedias, and we would look for funny words together, which was a great game that could go on longer than you think and could work with a dictionary, too. Someone would say a category and we would each find something we thought was cool or amusing and read the entry to everyone else. A lot of the time it was just a funny word, but it made us laugh.

We played LOTS of card games—Uno was a particular favorite, but also things like crazy eights, rummy, and a game called golf that I don’t know if anyone else anywhere knows how to play.

My grandparents had a keyboard, which was another thing we didn’t have at home, and was fun to play with and took headphones, which made a huge difference. If your family doesn’t have any musical instruments a tablet app for music could do the same things.

Baking together and decorating cakes and cookies was also a lot of fun, but got very messy, so depends on how your family would feel about that.

You might also see if neighbors will have visiting kids, too, and arrange a play date. My grandparents’ next door neighbor had a granddaughter a year younger than me who I used to play with when she visited.

I guess my best advice is to think about any novel things that your parents of in laws have that are kid safe and use those to your advantage. Even my Nana’s arthritis grasper was a cool toy that entertained me as a kid. Also anything that they can “get away with” or ways you can spin limitations as new responsibilities that aren’t typical for your household will feel special and turn negatives into positives.

My son, also an only child, does great with solo games, like rush hour jr. and smart farmer. Does your daughter like perler beads?

@Mrs. Carrot: we have a marginally similar situation with extended travel to relatives who are just less active than we are. In addition to the constructive advice here, I lean into more permissive screen time approaches (these relatives used to have Netflix when we didn’t so that was exciting) for both shows and app based games, and candy/treats. Plus low low low expectations. My good friend whose kids are much older encouraged me to think of travel to visit family not as a “vacation” but rather as a “tour of duty” and that reframe has been invaluable. Good luck!!!

Is she into American Girl dolls at all? We have a couple of these books and while they are crafting they are more assembling things out of pieces included in the book or found around the house:
Doll School: Design a Day of Learning and Play! https://www.amazon.com/dp/1683371267/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_glt_fabc_AFT7Z9TA5G6Y35GYV7R5

I feel like Monopoly is a great grandparent/downtime game, as I can never finish a game in regular life. My 6 and 9 year old favorite version is called House Divided, it’s about buying states go get votes for an election. We also love the game Ticket to Ride and I could see grandparents enjoying that.

Also a craft but kind of unique - my 9 year old got a great set of polymer clay and a book with ideas of how to make different animals and characters, she could spend hours working on tiny clay projects and it’s small to bring with!

Or what about checking out Outschool for some kind of fun class or something she’d be interested in? Just to break up the time. We recently took a great ASL class that both my daughter and I looked forward too!

@Mrs. Carrot: Has anyone said TV?!
Girl, this is the time to embrace all the available tools without guilt!!!!

@Mrs. Carrot: Right? It’s their break too! I remind myself that my son (6) needs downtime from our normal busy schedules just like I do. And if that’s extra blippi (shudder) for the two weeks before school starts again, so be it. 🤣

Any projects you can do in the apartment? Maybe cooking or baking. Combine it with a trip to get groceries. My kids barely go to stores bc of COVID, so it is sadly fun to take my newly vaccinated second grader to Whole Foods.

Also, I have never been there, but there is a place in northern NJ called Genius Gems. It's basically a STEM center focused on magnatiles. I've heard great things about it. The reason I have not gone is that my twins were 1.5 and super destructive -- as in, routinely destroying their big brother's magnatile creations -- before COVID hit. And I have been avoiding indoor places since then. Also it's pretty expensive for a family of five, but it's reasonable for a one child and one adult.

https://geniusgems.com/

@Mrs. Carrot: liberty science center

By the end of summer they required proof of vax (I assume they still do)....so this could be a safer indoor activity?