Time with children is about the quality of the interaction together. Good experiences and lasting memories have no relationship to the amount of money invested. The payoff is joyful exuberance, that quality of childhood that is there for your pleasure when you chose to be present in their space. Creating the context for your fun is not difficult or expensive. www.zenhabits.net lists 100 ways. Plan a sunrise breakfast. Let your child help with the menu, help pack the food, select which sheet or blanket you will bring outdoors and what special place in the yard or park you will sit to watch the sky brighten. While you are enjoying this time together, talk about the things you can see, hear and smell from this vantage point. Of course you could plan the same type of event as a sunset picnic. If it’s too late for a meal, bring fruit that you cut piece by piece as you share it.The book THE BIG RED BARN would be a great story to share because it describes the end of the day on the farm and the illustrations get darker as you near the end of the story. Why not bring crayons and a drawing pad. Draw what it looks like from your evening vantage point. Want to see joy and laughter-put on some music and dance together. If you dance well you might want to model some steps for your child to follow. Two left feet-make up some “crazy” dancing and laugh away. Kids just love this one- go play in the rain! Look for some old clothes and put on some boots. No boots- dare to go barefoot or wear just socks. Lay out some towels by the door and a plastic bag to get the wet soggy clothes to the laundry room. A warm bath afterward would be icing on the cake. What to do out there in the rain- stomp a puddle, catch drops on your tongue, spin in a circle with your arms outstretched and your faces to the sky, look for bugs, watch water run down a tree trunk, play with squirt guns. Remember paper airplanes? Make a whole bunch then fly them around the house. Dive bomb some off the top step or hold your child in the air and let it rip. Have a chase to retrieve them, gently tackle your child so you can get to it first, but don’t really. Let them squiggle out of your arms and beat you to it. During this season we remember how much children like to go on a hunt. Don’t wait for egg time. Use straws, paper cups, stones, a stack of washclothes, matchbox cars-anything at all that you have a bunch of -and hide them for a hunt. Indoors or out this is a fun activity. You could even use the airplanes from the previous activity. Remember that you have to pretend to be hunting too, except that you often look in all the wrong places and don’t find them. Be playful-move slowly toward a spot, say you think you’ll find one there, when you do, jump up and down in celebration, when you don’t (because you planned it that way) exagerate your response, Oh Rats!!! I know I’ll find you somewhere!!! Here I come!!! maybe you’re hiding——–UNDER HERE!!! Plan an end to your fun and games. Have a special glass of water together, one that you squeezed an orange into or put a drop of lemon juice in. A bigger treat- share a delicious smoothy. Let your child drop some strawberries and banana pieces in the blender. Add a little juice or water. Make it thin and use a spiral straw for fun. Watch the liquid go up and down each others straws. Make it thick and you can feed it to each other with spoons. Pretend you are going to give the bite to your child, then quickly snatch it for yourself with a hearty laugh, but quickly get the next bite ready for them. Need a calm activity-flashlight to the rescue. Lay on your backs with the lights out. Chase each others lights around the ceiling, or follow the leaders pattern. Great when you want time with more than one child. Turn your light off, ponder aloud where it might have gone-then in a flash- it appears in a new spot. Laugh about how tricky your light is. Flashlights are fun under a blanket together too. Read a book, build a structure or sing songs under there. Are your children older? Write a story together. Take turns adding the next event and laugh when it is goofy. You do the writing—give your child a break from school type work and just let their imagination run wild. Lets get back to basics. This weekend, try a no cost activity and see if you don’t feel great about it afterward.
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