Make Winter Fun With These 9 Activities For Kids
It happens every year, without fail: winter. Yet every year we seem surprised by how cold it is and how depressing the snow and cold can get. This winter, tackle those blues and keep the kids moving at a pace that ensures everyone sleeps soundly. Don’t be afraid to get outside and have fun! You’ll enjoy the fresh air and the kids will enjoy making their own fun. The trick to winter fun is simplicity: you don’t have to leave your backyard to have a good time in the snow! Let’s look at nine ways to get the most out of your snow-filled backyard.
- Create a giant tic-tac-toe board in the snow! Have the kids gather some items from around the yard: pinecones or sticks. Gather at least 5 or 6 of each item. Pick teams and draw a giant tic-tac-toe board. It’s so simple and fun! Kids can drop their items into the boxes to claim their space and whoever fills three blocks in a row first, wins! Don’t worry about having to draw several large tic-tac-toe boxes in your yard; using the items instead of carving symbols in the snow makes the board last longer!
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- Paint the snow! This is so simple and kids will love spraying colored water all over the snow! Simply add a few drops of food coloring into a spray bottle filled with water. Shake it up to make sure the food coloring is mixed well throughout the bottle and start spraying! Be patient: it will take a bit of time to fill an area with color, but it’ll be so pretty! If you want more saturated colored snow, put food coloring and water in old condiment bottles with squirt tops: this makes it easy to write in the snow or pinpoint parts of the snow you want to paint!
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- Target practice is a fun way to past the afternoon in a snow filled yard! You can use the spray bottles you created in the last activity to create your snowy target for this activity. Regular spray paint works well too but is much messier and doesn’t come out of clothes easily. Make a giant circle and measure back from the circle about 5-12 steps, depending on the age of the children playing: smaller children will need to be closer to the target. Take turns making snowballs and throwing them at the target!
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- Winter is long and it gets dark pretty early in the day during the winter months. When the sun goes down, most people head indoors and binge watch Netflix until it’s time to go to bed. Why not keep the fun going in the dark? Put a piece of wood or a metal stake into the snow and make a winter ring toss with glow bracelets or necklaces. Dress warm and you can have lots of fun outside in the dark! Hang some glow sticks around so you can see and enjoy some hot chocolate when you come in from the cold.
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- Make the snow glow! Sometimes it’s hard to see past the traditional ways to play in the snow: build a snowman, make a snow angel, build an igloo or fort…but there is so much that you can do with snow to make it fun! We like this idea because it can be done in the dark too, or made during the day and enjoyed at night. Grab a set of those holiday lights left lying around after the festive season and string the lights to a spot in the yard and pile them up on the snow. Make some snow balls and stack them around the lights until the lights are covered – be sure to leave some space between the balls so the light can escape! This is a beautiful lawn decoration and kids will love seeing it light up!
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- Organize a snowy treasure hunt. When the kids aren’t looking, gather some toys from around the house and hide them in the snow in the backyard. Draw a loose interpretation of a map that gives kids an idea of where to start looking. Hand them the map and the list of items to find and let them run free! Have some fun treats to enjoy when the kids come back with all of their toys in hand: we recommend some warm cinnamon rolls!
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- Build a snow caste – with sand castle equipment! Stop waiting for summer to arrive to enjoy building in the elements. Grab your bucks and shovel and scoop heaps of snow into your buckets to build a snow castle. Grab some action figures or dolls and let the kids play outside in the snow. Don’t worry about their toys getting ruined; a little water never hurt anyone! They’ll be making memories and that’s what matters – and let’s be honest, they’ll be out of the house!
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- Send the kids outside to bury each other in the snow – you remember burying your brother or sisters in the sand at the beach don’t you? Well anything you can do in the warmth, you can do in the cold! It doesn’t take kids long to realize how much fun they can have rolling around in the snow and covering each other up in snow is so much fun!
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- Think outside the snowman and make tons of snowmen! Little snowmen are quick and easy to make and the kids will have a blast making a bunch of them! They’ll be a snowman army! Rocks make great eyes but if you’ve got some old buttons or Lego hanging around that the kids aren’t using, they will help make your snowmen really colorful and fun! Remember that snow spray paint you made earlier? Use it to color your snowmen and make your backyard really fun!
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