OT: Suggestions for Indoor Activities to Tire out a Little Kid?

[muppetquilter]

I have a six year old. We have some songs (though you can do it without music) along the lines of "can you hop like a frog across the pond, now, hop.... can you fly like a bird...." etc.

My girls like to put on shows for us-- they sing and dance and we sit and watch (a nice mom break).

If you have a vaguely open space (a hallway will do) try some races-- running, power walking, skipping, hopping, crawling, etc.

You can set up an obstacle course in the house-- crawl over this chair, under that table, go around the corner and tag the door....

Hide things for her to find-- cut shapes out of construction paper and hide them in places she's likely to stumble on them.

Make up a scavenger hunt where each clue leads to the next clue with a surprise at the end (coloring book, storybook, coupon good for a trip to the ice cream parlor...).

Art projects are great as they can get really caught up in them and the brain use can tire them out.

Hope some of that helps.

[joelanddeborah]

Little kids love to help make cookies or snacks!

[becnicjamsar]

My daughter loves to dance to Disney's silly song videos that we have or just music in general. You can also play statue. You start music and have her dance. When you pause it, she needs to stop in whatever pose she is in.

For things that might not tire her out, but are fun, any craft idea is great. I just had my dd and some friends make I Spy shakers. You take a bottle (like a water or soda bottle that is washed out). It must still have a top. Put layers of sand (you can get bags of colored craft sand at AC Moore for a dollar right now) and little things (I bought a bag of small shells from AC Moore, but you could also use little toys or beans or beads or buttons). After you've filled it up about 2/3, you close the top. Each time you shake it, you see different things.

Of course...dolly play can also take up a lot of time *grin*.

Good luck

Sarah

[jerseycow6]

Hehe... dolly play with Aunt Katie is not quite advisable at the moment... Plus, all the girls are in hiding now so we don't tease her with my whole collection.

Statue sounds like a fun twist to the usual "tire her out with a dance party" idea.

Everyone has such great ideas!

So... we just finished picking out some of her favorite songs... lots of Hilary Duff and Hannah Montana and such... she's napping while I burn the cd off... then I'm sending her downstairs with the cd to make up a dance to perform for Grammy when she gets home from work. (While I actually use the laptop to get work done!) Hopefully, this will work out for a little while.