SEASONAL FEATURE
WINTER-TIME BLUES... GONE! By Jessica Ensing Winter is the season of shorter days, but if you’re stuck indoors with bored kids the days can start to seem much longer! With outdoors out of the question many days due to cold and rain, it can be hard to find suitable indoor substitutions for things that would usually happen on the deck or on the lawn or at a playground. Here’s some of our favourite inside activities to keep the fun going all year long!
M E SS F R E E P A I NT I N G
Painting is an outdoor activity in our house. Somehow the paint always seems to end up everywhere, and on everything my children touch for h o u r s a f t e r w a r d s . To r e c r e a t e s o m e of the joy of painting whilst still protecting our carpet during winter, we’ve turned to ziploc bags (you could probably use an old Kai Carrier designated for the purpose for a more eco friendly alternative). There are a few different ways to do it - you can put the paint (or paints) in a dollop on a piece of paper and slide that into the bag, you can put paint straight into the bag for them to push around and draw in, or (the favourite in our house at the moment) you can put two colours of paint in and let them mix them together. The key thing is to make sure you seal the bag before giving it to your child! If your little one is particularly adventurous or likely to try to open the bag you can duct tape it to a board or table top so at least you’ll hear a warning right before it gets opened up. And beware of your child trying to use pens or other potentially sharp objects on the bags as this can cause leaks!
26 PALMY PARENT . PALMERSTON NORTH PARENTS CENTRE MAGAZINE
