Now that warm weather is here, many families are spending more time outside. If you have small children, however, the days of sitting in a lounge chair and just enjoying the sun are probably on hold. Instead, your time outside is spent playing, exploring, and discovering new and exciting activities. While hide and seek and nature walks can last you quite a while, sometimes you want to mix up your routine with new experiences. When you find yourself in that situation, here are five inexpensive outdoor activities for you and your child.
Sidewalk Chalk
Sidewalk chalk holds endless possibilities. First, you can always take advantage of sidewalk space for your own personal art gallery. Secondly, when you get tired of drawing pictures, use the chalk to design games and imaginative play. Make a racetrack for your toy vehicles, draw a hopscotch board, or play a huge outdoor game of Pictionary. Finally, when everyone is tired of drawing, you can clean up your mess with buckets of water and paintbrushes. Brushing water over the chalk erases it, making these the perfect outdoor activities for families in a shared outdoor space.
Take a Park Tour
The city of Frisco offers a wide variety of community and neighborhood parks for families to enjoy. Perhaps your family will make a goal to visit every local park throughout the summer. Or you could have a park day when you visit three or four different parks in a row and everyone discusses which was their favorite and why. And don’t forget, picnics are always a great addition to inexpensive outdoor activities!
Bubbles
Bubbles are a classic among outdoor activities, delighting children and even adults. Additionally, they are very inexpensive, easy to find, and require no preparation or clean up. Of course, you can always spend time blowing bubbles for your children to chase and pop. But the fun doesn’t need to end there! As a family, try making different sorts of bubble wands out of pipe cleaners and seeing which shapes work better than others. Or have a competition to see who can blow the largest, smallest, most, and fewest bubbles. Finally, give everyone a bubble wand and instead of chasing the bubbles to pop them, see how many they can catch!
Water Play
There are few things as exciting and more representative of summer than playing in water. This can mean all sorts of things! Turn on the sprinkler and let your children run around. Fill buckets and use cups and scoops to pour water back and forth. If your child has play cars of kitchen toys they love, set up a washing station and watch your child get everything sparkling clean. It is important to note that children should never be unattended with water because of the risk of drowning.
Fly a Kite
Assembling, learning how, and then flying a kite are great outdoor activities for families. Successfully keeping a kite in the air takes strategy and encouragement. This is a good opportunity to teach your children about the science of flying as well as working on a project as a team.
Outdoor activities for families don’t need to be expensive or require a lot of preparation. In fact, all of these simple, low-cost activities can be ready in a moment. With that in mind, use them to create fun memories this summer when you need more than just downtime. If you are looking for childcare in the Frisco area, consider Legacy Academy. We would love to meet you and your child. Simply call or visit today for more information.
