The best recycling activities for kids use what is already in your bin: cardboard boxes, bottle caps, egg cartons, toilet roll tubes and clean food trays. Sorting games and bin matching work from about age 2 and need almost no prep, while building projects like cardboard castles and robots suit 4 and up and can … Read more
The best free Halloween game ideas for a kids’ party are simple toss, knock down, and hunt games made from recycling and dollar store supplies. A bean bag ghost board, a soup can knock down, a milk jug ring toss, and a straw bale prize dig are the easiest wins. Pick 3 to 5 games … Read more
The best Weather Activities Preschool are short, hands on projects that let 3 to 5 year olds see, touch, and move with the weather, like straw blown rain clouds, a shaving cream rain cloud jar, clothing sorts, play dough weather mats, and a daily weather wall. Keep each one to 10 to 20 minutes, alternate … Read more
Would you rather questions for kids are simple either/or choices, like “Would you rather have a pet dragon or a pet dinosaur?”, that get kids laughing, deciding and explaining why. The best ones offer two equally tempting (or equally gross) options a child can picture instantly. They work anywhere you’re stuck waiting: road trips, waiting … Read more
It was the second Saturday of the school holidays, 9:20 in the morning, and my youngest had already asked for the tablet four times. The yard was right there, unused. So I dragged out three couch cushions, a roll of painter’s tape, and a laundry basket, and had a course built before the coffee went … Read more
The candy bowls are full, the decorations are up, and twelve kids in costume are standing in your living room with nothing to do until the pizza arrives. That gap is where a Halloween party either turns into a memory or turns into chaos. Most “best Halloween games” lists recycle the same handful of ideas: … Read more
It was 10:15 on a Tuesday, the third wet morning that week, and the room had gone sour. Two children were fighting over the same plastic dinosaur. One was lying under the book corner, refusing to say why. I opened the back door, and within four minutes the same three were crouched over a puddle, … Read more
Three o’clock on a Sunday, rain since breakfast. The older two were arguing over whose turn it was on the tablet. The youngest was lying face down on the rug, announcing to no one in particular that this was the worst day ever. My husband and I just looked at each other. Now what? Rainy … Read more
It’s 9:40 on a rainy Saturday. Breakfast is done, the cartoons are off, and my youngest has already launched off the arm of the couch twice. The older one is “just walking” laps around the kitchen, which somehow sounds like a herd of horses. Rainy days turn my house into a pressure cooker of restless … Read more