Rainy Day Activities

The summer showers around here are getting intense.  Lightning, thunder, wind, rain.  Thankfully, neither of the kids or Big Molly are scared of thunderstorms, so that means we all just walk around the house bored, waiting for the rain to stop.

Earlier this week, there was a particularly bummed out rain delay that lasted almost all day.  By mid-afternoon, we were climbing the walls (literally – the kids were trying to climb their doorways to their bedrooms) (kids are weird), so I decided to put my Pinterest account to use.  I pin fun things all the time for the kids, but hardly ever do them.  Today was a perfect chance!

Here are a few of the rainy day activities that we loved:

Bulls-Eye Bowling – The original pin called for masking tape to be put down on the floor.  I didn’t have masking tape, so I used electrical tape (sorry, Chris…).  It didn’t work great.  I’d stick with masking tape next time.

The kids had to back up about six feet, and we bowled to see who could get closest to the center square. The original pin showed one ball at a time, but the kids had more fun just throwing as many balls down there as they could. Even I played! It was actually a lot of fun.  We went through our giant crate of plastic balls three times! We played for a good 20-30 minutes.

(Sorry these are blurry. My new camera and I are still at odds.)

Bonus! Big Molly laid down in the middle of our bowling alley several times. We counted her as an obstacle, like in mini-golf.

Pom Pom Races – For this one, you need masking tape (avoid the electrical!), a straw and a pom pom.  We tried both big and small pom poms and talked about how we had to change our strategy with different sizes.

Gracie was not very good at this game. She was a little too young. She didn’t quite understand how it worked. I showed her a couple times, but she wasn’t really interested. I’d say this activity is best for ages 4 years old and up.

I made two different “race tracks” for our pom poms.  We tried the straight line first, but Bean really liked the zig zag one.  In fact, later that day, he asked for more race tracks, and it was super easy to change them up.  Each track kept him entertained for 15-20 minutes.

Molly liked this game, too. She would sometimes breathe heavily and move a pom pom and the kids thought it was hysterical!

Water Pouring – When the rain stopped, we were ready to head outside. Gracie has been playing with her tea sets for a couple of weeks now, so I set her up with a water pouring activity. Being the water girl that she is, she played with this for over an hour, and would have played longer if I hadn’t insisted we go inside to start cooking dinner.

For this game, all I had to do was fill her tea pot with water. She took it from there, filling and refilling cups. Over and over and over again.

We have played this before, and I am always amazed by how this simple activity keeps kids entertained for SO LONG.  And it requires ZERO money.  That’s my kind of activity!

Toy Car Wash – Michael would have been happy pouring into cups and containers, too, but I set him up with a “special task.”  I asked him to bring down a handful of his toys that needed to be cleaned.  Of course, I had to make sure the toys be brought were water proof, but he was super excited to be given a job.

For this activity, I set up one big bowl with soapy water and one big bowl with clean water. By the end, the water was all mixed together anyway, but it made the car wash more realistic to have the clean water.

I didn’t know how long this would keep Bean entertained, but I was really surprised. He played for about half an hour with his car wash. Eventually (like all boy games, I am learning), he just started sloshing and splashing the water all around the bowl and not really paying attention to the toys. But who cares? He was outside and in play clothes, so why not?!

Water Car Races – After about half an hour, Gracie was still going strong with her water activity, but I could tell Bean was getting a little antsy.  This one was not a Pinterest activity, but one I came up with on the spot by looking around on my back deck.

For this one, you need a water gun or squirt bottle or any other kind of water sprayer. You set your little match car up on a smooth surface, and then you shoot it with water to make it go.

And that is it! So simple! But Bean loved it! He tried all different kinds of cars and sprayers. His favorite thing, though, was to run the cars into things like walls and chair legs. Boys are so darn destructive!!!!!

So, those were the activities we tried. They kept us busy for an entire rainy afternoon, and we had a blast! Check back tomorrow when I blog about new sensory boxes I put together for my nephew’s second birthday. New toys for a different age group!