It’s that time of year – With winter storms roaring about, kids (and parents) can start to get Cabin Fever.
Bundle up and have the hot chocolate waiting!
Here are a few ideas gathered from my Weekly Parenting Tips to get you out of the house and connecting with your child in a fun way:
Make Snow Angels
Imagine what different animal snow angels might look like and try to create them.
Build a Snow Man or a snow family.
Use sunglasses and sombreros or find other creative ways to decorate your snow people. Don’t forget to make some snow pets.
Follow the Leader.
Have one person create a path that another person has to follow. It can involve jumping, zig-zagging, or even crawling through a snow tunnel (or under low branches).
Tunnels and Igloos
If you live where the snow is deep, create an igloo or a snow tunnel.
Snow Cones.
This is one my kids love, even when there isn’t a foot of snow on the ground. We gather clean, white snow in a cup and then pour juice over it to make homemade snow cones.
If it’s too wet and cold to go outside,
or if you don’t have any snow…
you can still have fun connecting with your child.
Here are a few indoor ideas:
Snowball pictures.
Grab some glue/glue sticks, cotton balls, and some construction paper and create a snow scene.
Indoor Snowball races.
Using a table or the floor, blow cotton balls to race them across a finish line. You can add to the fun by blowing the cotton balls with straws.
Finger paints in the bathtub.
Turn on the heat, put on the bathing suits and plop your child in the tub with finger paints (or bath soap/paints).
We have tile on our walls, so I just let my daughters paint right on the walls. It was great fun, a little messy, but in the end, both the bathroom and the girls got clean.
Baking/Cooking.
While cooking can be a challenge with kids, if you get things planned out in your mind ahead of time, it can be quite fun. Not to mention the fact that baking/cooking can help heat up a cold winter day.
I would love to hear from you in the comments below what you do when your kids, or you, start to go stir crazy with Cabin Fever!
If you are feeling overwhelmed or ready to pull your hair out, it is OK to ask for help.
CLICK HERE to sign up for a 20-minute “sanity” session. I make time in my schedule to offer 5 sessions for free each month. This could be your month to get out of overwhelm and back into enjoying parenting.
I love these ideas Dr. Renee! Especially the indoor snowball races using straws and cotton balls to blow them across the floor. It sounded like so much fun it literally had me grinning from ear to ear. 😁
I wish I had this list when my son was little. We were always looking for fun things to do to avoid cabin fever, when we were literally snowed in!