So the holiday rush is over....we made it! Congrats!!!
Now that leaves about 3 looooooong months of cold weather, snow and lots of time indoors with children. That is potentially a recipe for losing your mind as a parent (ongoing chorus of "I'm bored!", bickering siblings, too much TV...)
So, I've decided to find activities to do with the kids that look fun and then rank it based on success of the activity with the kids, amount of prep required, level of mess, level of hands on Mom, etc.
This first activity was making Sock Puppets and Puppet Show.
Ratings:
Overall Score - Would definitely do again
Cost of Materials - about $20
Prep Time - Virtually None
Level of Mess - Some Mess
Level of Hands on Mom - Pretty High
Kids Engagment Level - Pretty High
Part One: Make the Sock Puppets:
I bought this sock puppet kit at Joanne Fabrics from Creativity for Little Kids. So, there was no prep involved (with a coupon, I got 2 kits for $11 each - it made 6 sock puppets). If you have your own sock puppet materials, you can probably get this to be cheaper (I also have materials left over so we can do this again, which would further reduce the cost).
My 7 year old was able to do this on her own, but she flew through the craft portion in about 10 minutes. My two 4 year olds needed me to work with them on their puppets, but they really loved figuring out how they wanted their puppets to look and they picked out all the decorations for their puppets. However, I did have one minor temper tantrum when I placed a felt decoration in the wrong spot and found that the adhesive was pretty strong...it was there to stay, not to the liking of my son!!!
It took about an 50 minutes to make the sock puppets for the younger two (I sent one to play while I worked with the other one, so it was more like 20-25 minutes per pre-schooler).
They puppets came out cute but there was a little clean up involved with all the adhesive backings. I had to do a quick vacuum - but not too bad.
Part Two: The Puppet Show
We just got an air popper machine for Christmas so I made a big bowl of popcorn for a snack (the kids love watching the popcorn pop!). Then I made a make-shift stage with two chairs and a blanket. Each child was given 5 minutes to perform a "show" with their puppets while the rest of us watched. One show included all the kids and their puppets and that turned into a minor meltdown - highly recommend the solo performance unless your children just LOVE to share the stage together!!
Overall, a good activity for today! If you have any tried and true indoor activities for your kids, I'd love to hear them!!!!
So the holiday rush is over....we made it! Congrats!!!
Now that leaves about 3 looooooong months of cold weather, snow and lots of time indoors with children. That is potentially a recipe for losing your mind as a parent (ongoing chorus of "I'm bored!", bickering siblings, too much TV...)
So, I've decided to find activities to do with the kids that look fun and then rank it based on success of the activity with the kids, amount of prep required, level of mess, level of hands on Mom, etc.
This first activity was making Sock Puppets and Puppet Show.
Ratings:
Overall Score - Would definitely do again
Cost of Materials - about $20
Prep Time - Virtually None
Level of Mess - Some Mess
Level of Hands on Mom - Pretty High
Kids Engagment Level - Pretty High
Part One: Make the Sock Puppets:
I bought this sock puppet kit at Joanne Fabrics from Creativity for Little Kids. So, there was no prep involved (with a coupon, I got 2 kits for $11 each - it made 6 sock puppets). If you have your own sock puppet materials, you can probably get this to be cheaper (I also have materials left over so we can do this again, which would further reduce the cost).
My 7 year old was able to do this on her own, but she flew through the craft portion in about 10 minutes. My two 4 year olds needed me to work with them on their puppets, but they really loved figuring out how they wanted their puppets to look and they picked out all the decorations for their puppets. However, I did have one minor temper tantrum when I placed a felt decoration in the wrong spot and found that the adhesive was pretty strong...it was there to stay, not to the liking of my son!!!
It took about an 50 minutes to make the sock puppets for the younger two (I sent one to play while I worked with the other one, so it was more like 20-25 minutes per pre-schooler).
They puppets came out cute but there was a little clean up involved with all the adhesive backings. I had to do a quick vacuum - but not too bad.
Part Two: The Puppet Show
We just got an air popper machine for Christmas so I made a big bowl of popcorn for a snack (the kids love watching the popcorn pop!). Then I made a make-shift stage with two chairs and a blanket. Each child was given 5 minutes to perform a "show" with their puppets while the rest of us watched. One show included all the kids and their puppets and that turned into a minor meltdown - highly recommend the solo performance unless your children just LOVE to share the stage together!!
Overall, a good activity for today! If you have any tried and true indoor activities for your kids, I'd love to hear them!!!!
No comments:
Post a Comment