So I was thinking, when was the last time I let my kids go outside and just have fun playing with things that were not store bought? I mean when I was young the highlight of my week was gathering up cardboard boxes from anything and everything and uses those to make toys. Yeah, cheap thrills! Hehehe!

Here are some fun and purposely messy crafts for toddlers and kids. Oh yeah – and a lot of this stuff is pocket friendly!

Sheet Painting – ages 4+

We all have old mangy looking bed sheets, admit it– time to finally drag one out and let the kids use it for some fun. Grab some spray bottles and fill them with acrylic or tempera paint diluted with water.

Lay the sheet on the ground or grass. If you are able to hang it on a clothesline it could even bring a bit more fun spraying a moving sheet. Let them spray that sheet until their hearts are content!

Once completed the kids can turn this huge art piece into a tent for camping or whatever kids want to use it for. Try not to limit their imaginations or give them instruction on how to express themselves. When it comes to art especially messy projects like this the less direction the better!

Drop-and-Splat Painting – ages 2+

This is an incredibly messy but fun and easy outdoor activity for kids. This is a project for a warm summer day when you can put those little ones in an old bathing suit or clothes that are OK to get messy.

Items:

• Plastic cups
• Water
• Food coloring
• Old clothes to wear (staining WILL happen!)
• Newspaper>
• Paper
• Rocks
• Straws

Fill old yogurt cups with water (or plastic cups) and set them outside.

Add a few drops of food coloring to each cup to make different colors.

Lay out a sheet of newspaper or paper on the ground. Idea: add rocks to the corners of the newspaper/paper to keep it from flying away!

Put a straw in a cup of colored water, and show your kiddies how to place a thumb or finger over the top end of the straw. This will keep water inside the straw when you remove it from the cup.

Next, lift the straw out of the cup and over the paper and uncover the straw end so the colored water drops onto the paper.

Try experimenting by raising straws full of water to different heights and observing how the height of the drop changes the resulting splat.

Variations: Try soaking cotton balls in the mixture and letting the kids splat them on the paper. You can also experiment with foil balls, rubber band balls, pinecones, and whatever else you can think of.

Some more quick and easy ideas:

Got Extra Kool-Aid?

Painting with Golf Balls

Cut out a large piece of paper and put it in the bottom of a plastic pool. Place golf balls dipped in different paint colors on the paper. Together the children can hold the edges of the pool and roll the golf balls around. This makes a great design when you are done.

Bored with the sandbox?

Give the children spray bottles with colored water. When the children spray the sand it will change color until they shovel it up.

Look for more fun kid crafts ideas at Crafts for Kidlets!

Outdoor Toddler Child Craft Ideas is a post from: Play-Activities.com

Do you have your PURTS the new summer vitamin?

Are your toddlers getting their vitamins?

With the start of summer more of us will be aware of covering up our toddlers to avoid skin problems. We’re careful that they eat their greens and munch an apple to get their Vitamin C.

It’s what caring parents do. Vitamins are vital to the health of us all.

I’d like to propose five new vitamins just in time for summer. Release date is worldwide with no known side effects–except possibly the big bi-product of laughter, smiles and contentment.

Give your child PURTS this summer.

Vitamin P

To read more about the benefits of these amazing vitamins please visit my post over at Steady Mom.

Drowning in Watermelon?

What will you do with all those seeds?

Keep your toddler and preschoooler happy with this Watermelon noise maker

Vitamin P

To read more about this craft please visit my Blissfully Domestic post..

Friday 2nd July 2010 is the final day to enter the Outdoor products contest. Easy entry and multiple bonus entry opportunities

Summer vitamins and Watermelon seed spitting is a post from: Play-Activities.com

Welcome KMGH-TV Channel 7 Denver viewers! Thanks for watching this morning and stopping by for more information about the products I featured on TV.

While you’re here, you can learn more about me and my work on my profile page.

Featured products

Sport Brella

At the park, beach, pool or campsite, the SKLZ Sport-Brella gives you instant protection from the sun, rain, and wind with its domed shape, side flaps and 125 SPF. Its umbrella action open mechanism allows it to be set up in just three seconds and fits the whole family. Includes top wind vents, side zippered windows for efficient airflow and additional visibility, internal pockets for gear and valuables, convenient carry bag and tethers/ground stakes for use when necessary for additional stability. $69.99, sklz.com

Thermacell Outdoor Lantern

The ThermaCELL Outdoor Insect-Repellent Lantern is the best option for keeping mosquitoes and other insects in any outdoor setting. The Patio Lantern is both a powerful insect repellent device and a functional and portable, long-lasting outdoor LED lantern, with both functions being usable separately or together. Providing a 15×15 ft mosquito-free zone, it is 98% effective (tested and used by the Department of Defense and the United States Army), making it the most effective insect repellent device on the market. It is also non-toxic, safe and non-intrusive, being DEET-free, silent, portable and odor free. Rather than a harmful toxin, ThermaCELL utilizes allethrin, an artificial version of a natural insecticide found in chrysanthemum flowers. Weighs only 13 ounces. $31.99, mosquitorepellent.com

Pottyflip

Pottyflip is a full size, clean, safe, portable, disposable and biodegradable child potty that folds out from a palm-sized package. Easy to carry several in any purse or handbag, it is also easy to use. Just unwrap, flip open and it is ready to go. After use, fold it back up and dispose of the whole potty. No mess, no fuss. No more dirty public restroom seats or trying to find some hidden corner for a child to go to the bathroom. Also environmentally-friendly, it is fully and rapidly biodegradable. $24 for a pack of 12, pottyflipusa.com or at stores throughout North America.

Snack-Trap

The Snack-Trap is a child feeding product (designed for toddlers/kids ages 1-5) that minimizes wasted snacks and saves associated clean up time while promoting the development of self-feeding skills among infants. Consists of an attractive, colorfully imprinted, tip-resistant, handled cup that allows toddlers to grasp and hold the cup themselves with a unique, patent-pending lid with slits that allow toddlers to see and retrieve food with ease themselves but automatically closes when the toddlers remove their hand. 4.99, snacktrap.com, or at retailers throughout North America.

I’m giving away these 4 items. All as seen in the TV segment.

• Green Sport Brilla
• ThermaCELL Outdoor Insect-Repellent Lantern
• Potty Flip (2) unopened.
• Green snack trap with a dinosaur.

Four winners will be randomly chosen, each person winning one item.

To enter, leave a comment and tell me which two of these products you’d most like to win and why.

Please leave your e-mail address so I can reach you easily if you win.

For bonus entries, you can do one or more of the following – be sure to leave a separate comment for each extra entry:

• Follow me on twitter at @playactivities and tweet “@playactivities is giving away awesome outdoor products at http://tinyurl.com/2wqqazq . Enter today! “
• Subscribe to the RSS feed for play-activities.com
• Subscribe to the Play-Activities newsletter
• Subscribe to the Raising Playful Tots newsletter found here
• Post an entry on your own blog about this giveaway and link back ( trackback)
• Subscribe to Raising Playful Tots, the play activities podcast through iTunes. Come back and leave a comment here.

Contest details ( closed)

The contest will close at 11:59 p.m., MST, Friday 2nd July 2010. Four winners will be chosen using random.org. I will do my best to match the item to the person’s first or second choice, however I cannot guarantee that. If a winner does not want the assigned item, another item will not be offered, they will forfeit their win and another person will be chosen. After e-mailing the winners, they will have 48 hours to respond before I draw another name. I will publish the winners first names on my site after they have confirmed. Continental U.S. Entries only.

Disclosure: I was not paid to appear on TV or review these products. I did receive free products so I could show them during the segment. I was given the option to keep all of the products, however, I am choosing to share the love and give them away to readers. I will personally pay shipping fees to mail products to the winners.

Good luck

Outdoor products for the summer is a post from: Play-Activities.com

Your old school

You choose which one. Don’t live nearby? We don’t either. Photographs and yearbooks. But better yet they are likely to be online now. You can give your child a virtual tour. It’s hard for your preschooler to understand that you were their age and that you went to school.  If you are able to visit, take pictures and show them your route to school. Dig up a fun memory. Little ones need to have connections in the past and see how history develops.

An outdoor market

I still smile at, “  3 pound of Bananas for a pound!”. It’s what I grew up hearing as I went through my local market town on a Wednesday market day. Buying my fruit and veg in brown bags. The sights and sounds are amazing. Usually we’re on a mission to get everything and get out. But try one time that the market is the attraction. Meander and wander. It’s a sensory zoo of sensations so not for the faint of heart. Farmer’s markets holds similar promise. Find some strange fruit or vegetable to buy and try.

Photo credit:RKG

Top of a hill

Kids need to experience rolling down a hill. Running down a hill and falling, not like Jack and Jill though.

Grassy verges make for great rolling. The LO this weekend took off after his brothers up the steep hill in our local neighbourhood park. He stood proud as a peacock at the top looking down on me. Then burst into tears, for a short moment. I think he realised how far away we were. His brothers were still running. He was hesitating to come down by running. In fact, he stopped after a few steps and turned around like he LOVES to do downstairs.

Do your children do that? Bump down the stairs on their tummy at speed. Sounds terrible and you have to look every time because it really could be one of the coming down head first.

He lay on the grass. Arms above his head and waited. And instead of the usual whooshing down the stairs he just stayed there.

Alas no camera!

He got up and ran down the hill with a mix of laughter and fear………..hysteria I think sums it up. He made it down smiling, laughing,  crying and clung to my leg. I could feel his little heart beating away as I scooped him up. He wriggled to be down and looked at the hill. He’d conquered it. Looked at me and ran off along the path to the floating blossom.

Where would be your summer place to visit?

3 summer places to visit is a post from: Play-Activities.com

Can’t beat it!

With the forecast of a Winter storm warning in effect for the next 24 hours with snow estimated to be 18+ inches to the North West of us. I thought these winter play pictures would be appropriate for May in Colorado! ( Just a hint of sarcasm there!)

It may take 30minutes to get on all the gear and the same to drag it all off and put it somewhere other than in a steaming heap on the floor afterwards…..but boy do they love to go outside in the snow!

I think the biggest surprise for the MO was falling backwards to make a snow angel and not realising the snow was so wet and the sides caving in on him. That was the last picture I took. Shortly after this shot I had to wade over and recover a very wet surprised MO.

Unexpected snow fall + ample playtime outside = unstructured play and deliriously happy children.

Hot chocolates all round today!

Thanks for stopping by.

This post is part of Childhood 101 ” We Play” Please visit the others and find out what they were playing this week.

Unstructured play in snow is a post from: Play-Activities.com

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Click here to take the Play Activities survey

__________________________

Today the guest post is by Kari of Active kids club.  Listen to her interview at Raising playful tots show #17.

Outdoor Playgroups

Together we will move mountains

A lot of the time it is hard to know how to start things. Like changing a habit or how we can get more outdoor time. Finding an outdoor program or occasional family trip to nature is a good start, but let’s make a point to discover the everyday nature first; that local park or ravine in your community. Little explorers are not born to skiing on Whistler or hiking the Rocky Mountains. Exploring starts in your neighborhood, in your backyard and in the many natural space you can find around you.

Organizing outdoor playgroups

Debra, Mari, Kristen and Cinza are all organizing outdoor playgroups in their communities in Toronto. Free and open to anyone who wants join. Why do they do it? Debra organizes so she makes sure that she has one set day that she gets out of the house. Mari is an active woman and loves to spend time outside. Her passion in life is skiing and wants to meet like minded parents and kids. Designer Kristen has a quite connection to nature that she wishes to foster in her children. She is a walker and loves to discover bugs and create nature art Cinza is a new mom and a runner who looks forward to connecting with other moms for a high energy stroller tour around her neighborhood.

Grassroots without any rules

Outdoor playgroups get organized differently for individual reasons. Some have one activity when they meet while others are constantly changing. An outdoor playgroup is not meant to be a program or service to any particular parent, it is suppose to be a place where parents discover nature, play together and build connections between parents, their kids and nature. It is not any different than a indoor playgroup, other than it is just The beauty of an outdoor playgroup is that it is inherently grassroots. There are no rules how you are to do it.

At Activekidsclub.com we like to believe we are living dangerously when we live our motto no bad weather, only bad clothing. Basically we see ourselves as a part of nature and bad weather is… well it is natural.
Making sure that you get your outdoor time

Whether you love to be outside or maybe just want to live healthier and give your kids some much needed green time, being part of an outdoor playgroup is an excellent way to make sure that you get your daily nature time. It is more fun in groups. As an added bonus, it can create friendships among both the kids and the parents.

Wanna start an outdoor playgroup where you live?

Join Debra, Mari,Cinza and Kristen here at Activekidsclub.com and start your own outdoor playgroup. Collectively we know a thing or two about organizing a group and what to do outside so we have created some useful tools for you. We bet you have lots of other ideas that we would of never though of without your input. Together we can move mountains.

This is how you do it

Register at Activekidsclub.com http://www.activekidsclub.com

Read How to create an outdoor playgroup

http://www.activekidsclub.com/forum/8-organize-playgroups/14-organize-an-outdoor-playgroup.html

Join us on our forum with questions http://www.activekidsclub.com/forum/8-organize-playgroups/

DOWNLOAD Outdoor flyer : www.activekidsclub.com/PDF/Playgroupflyer.pdf

Add a new outdoor playgroup in our forum and we will set you up with a blog

Add images to our photo galleryhttp://www.activekidsclub.com/component/option,com_joomgallery/func,detail/id,60/

Kari Svenneby is the founder of Activekidsclub.com .–Discovering the wonder of nature with kids and adults .Get inspired with simple solutions.Let’s play

Do you meet outside to play with friends?

Outdoor playgroups is a post from: Play-Activities.com

With three boys roughly equally spaced I often get the impression that I’ve been here done this before. Not just with clothes, which is inevitable. But with behaviours and play activities.

Photo credit: sean dreilinger

The first time my oldest threw himself on the floor and let us know how he felt I was stunned, embarrassed and lost. Fast forward the middle one, we could smile and had a few options up our sleeve and now the youngest tried for a week then gave up ( Well right now he’d rather climb than tantrum). We still get thrown a loop don’t get me wrong. Each child is unique and brings a little something the other one didn’t so there is still the challenge but I feel my confidence has grown with each child.

I think play activities can catch you like this too.

We can get a bit like a deer in the headlights. So many options and that crippling tiredness.

Apart from the obvious reach fors. Here are some activities we’ve loved over the years.

5 ways to overcome the play activity blues

If it’s not working, it’s not working try something else

You child may not be ready for crafts, playing by themselves, not creating a mess, always dumps the Legos, sit for anything like you expected. Not everyday needs to be a fight. Try something else and come back. Development may happen in steps. I see my children skip steps and fall down the steps all the time. Keep heading toward the goal but don’t get discouraged along the way.
My child won’t do craft activities- what now?
Childhood games

More time for play

Stuck on pretend play

Repeat. If it worked before it is likely to work again

We all have those moments when the play activity goes well for them, you and the universe. Then we forget what we did or what happened exactly and it’s like a moment of loss. Keep a record of successful activities so when we have, “one of those days” we can try something we know worked well before. That’s not to say it will work well again but we know it did….once.

Play activity: Roll the dice

Play activity:Make a learning wheel.
Play activity: The crocodimes are coming!
Rebus reading

Try a new activity

Getting stuck in a rut is easy. We love routines. Buy the same cereal and coffee. Unless something jumps out at us like a Sale or Advert we’re pretty much creatures of habit. All good except sometimes even we get bored. Trying something new requires more work but the rewards are usually right behind.

If you love reading but 2 hours of reading to your little one is getting old even though you had decided it was what you wanted to do. Try using an Audio story. Love reading yourself but too tired to read at night try a non fiction audio book or parenting podcast.

Portable play activity

Roundup of play ideas and activities
Waiting for Preschool play activity

Places to find activities-

• ask your mother what you did?
• Online activity sites
• Ask on forums
• watch a How to Video

Process over product

Change the way you think about play activities. They maybe learning experiences but they need to be fun. Remind yourself of what learning is happening when the button won’t stick with the glue stick ( problem solving). Is our reaction to go and get the white glue or rescue the child? Once you’re retrieved the thrown button and everyone is calmer. What happens next? That lovely activity cut lovingly from the magazine is now a big old mess of high emotions and high expectations but the opportunity to grow socially and emotionally should not be forgotten. Could you change the activity to a science one of investigation, think on your feet? An essential adult skill is the ability to work through problems logically, the knowledge to know when to walk away from situations that are frustrating or dangerous and knowing how to check our feelings. Tell our boss they are a dumb idiot maybe what we want to say, at times but we learn that doesn’t keep us our job and saying something else would have got the same point across.

I guess I’m saying that many times it will be the things you learn as you go along over the end product especially in the Early years. We can help our little guys and appreciate without belittling their efforts.

Sensory play 5 Taste

Go outside

Whether the weather be hot.

Whether the weather be cold

Whether the weather, whatever the weather, whether you like it or not……………………..Go Outside!

Changes everyone’s moods.

What a walk!

How curious?
Playground family fun
What’s happening in your playground?

What do you do when you have the play activity blues?

If you have a post or resource about overcoming the play activity blues to add feel free to add this in the comments as well.

Overcoming the play activity blues is a post from: Play-Activities.com

This week on the Raising Playful Tots podcast join Allie from NoTimeForFlashcards.com and I as we talk about Christmas Play Activities.

There will be three interviews this week all short ones because we’re all so busy.

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We are coming up to the end of the year. So do you think we managed more outdoor play?

I have mentioned here before during this year about my struggle with getting enough outdoor play in with all the children. It was on our must improve list this year. Anyone I saw who was doing this I was always asking, ‘How do you get them ( the kids) outside and staying outside?”.

I looked for blogs to follow and connected with a lot of people via #playoutdoors on Twitter. They inspire me and never once judged me for my failings as a mum. Maybe they are commonsense notions for many but previously it just didn’t happen on anything like a regular basis.

Over the year slowly we have been going out more and if you compare my posts this year to last year you’ll have seen a big increase in the outdoor activities we have tried.I have enjoyed the focus on this area. It has been hard for me too to get the right frame of mind to be outside. We have a small garden that slopes, a dog and no space to do much. I have had to adjust my thinking and use what we have more effectively.  It’s not been easy but the children really love it.

Connecting with all those talented people and surrounding myself with their ideas rubs off.

When you write about play activities you can give the impression that you know everything but I don’t. I’m a mum who likes to try a variety of play activities with her children that are fun, engaging and have many outcomes. I make mistakes, pick myself up and try again in a different way.

As we close out this year, I know that 2010 will bring some unique challenges with three children and being a married military spouse. I don’t claim to know or do it all. But what I do do I share freely with you all, warts and all.

I know we all have our hang ups about play somewhere, something we don’t do or find hard to do with or for our kids.

How do you overcome? Where did/do you go for support?

Do you think we did it? is a post from: Play-Activities.com