There are some days when getting dressed and leaving the house are just too overwhelming for me. It's fine and dandy for me to stay home all day, but it makes Monkey Boy crazy. He has so much energy, so on days when I don't take him outside to run around and be free, I try to come up with a new activity or game for him to play with me inside. With winter coming on, there are more and more fowl-weather days and I know we are going to be stuck inside much more often! I'm working on coming up with new activities that promote play and learning. As I scour the internet, I'll share my favorites here with you!
This week is an activity that I like to think I invented- straws and pipe cleaners. I'm sure someone else has thought of this before, but I'll take credit for it anyway.
Set up is super easy. I keep pipe cleaners in different varieties on hand, and all you need to do is cut up straws into varying sizes. The bendy part of the straw was really fun for Mono.
I usually put the straws in a container to keep them from rolling all over the place while he plays. Of course, they end up getting dumped out.
For a little while, Mono enjoyed trying to thread the straws onto the pipe cleaners. When he got frustrated with that (it takes alot of focus!), he wanted me to thread them so he could pull them all off.
Obviously, threading the straws is great for fine motor practice and teaches patience. For younger kids this can get really frustrating, and until now (20 months), Mono hasn't really tried threading the straws.
When he was done with the threading, he had alot of fun dumping the straws out and picking them up. Whatever keeps you occupied, kiddo!
What do your kids do with pipe cleaners? I've seen so many ideas, but I'm looking for something new. We've done pipe cleaners in the colander about a million times!
