While your children are on summer holiday you must always be prepared to keep them entertained. You need activities that are suitable for children of different ages and that can occupy their attention for a longer period.
You also need activities that are fun both inside and out of your house. Your children will be entertained and busy and, depending on the situation, you might take some time for yourself, or jump right in and find your inner child.
Homemade Play Dough
This is one of the simplest recipes for homemade play dough. Store it in a plastic container or Ziploc bag and it will be good for a few play sessions. You can also bake and save your children’s creations.
Mix:
- 1/4 cup of salt
- 1 cup of flour
- 1/4 cup of water
- knead until it reaches clay consistency, add flour or water if necessary
With this play dough your options are almost endless. Older children may be involved in the process of making the dough. They will enjoy choosing the colors for the dough, kneading and watching it change the color. You can also add some glitter to the dough and then show them how to make beads and their own jewelry, which you can later bake and they can wear it.
Younger children will enjoy just playing and kneading, improving their motor skills in the process. You can refrigerate a part of the dough for sensory variety. You can give them different molds or beach toys to shape the dough. To make the playtime longer don’t give out all the toys and tools at once, but gradually introduce new ones when you see them tire of the previous.
Iced Water Colors
For this activity you will need a several ice trays, which you can also find in fun shapes other than cubes, like fruits or animals. All you have to do is fill the trays with water, add a couple of drops of food coloring to each cube and freeze them. Prepare big trays and paper for the little artists to work on.
Your children can draw with crayons and then color with ice colors.You can suggest that they draw with a white crayon on the white paper and make ‘magic’ since the water colors won’t paint the places where there are drawings with wax crayons. When your ice cube colors are ready just hand them out and watch the magic happen.
You can also try fabric painting with older children. Just find old white or light colored T-shirts and let them try out their designer skills. They can leave the ice cubes to melt on the fabric and see what shapes will come out, or they can make their own designs. These designs will probably last until the first wash.
So, these two activities will certainly keep your children satisfied and entertained for a while. They are also a good practice for their motor skills and creativity. And on the hot summer day, nothing is better than playing with ice.
You can also use these activities on rainy days, you can bring the play dough on summer vacation and you can vary the length of play time and toys involved in the process. And the best thing is that they are equally entertaining for a child of three or ten years old.
And, I’m sure that somewhere in the process you will feel the urge to jump in on all the fun. So, just go on and do it, you won’t regret it!
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