Holiday time is the perfect time for your children to be creative. There is something magical about going away to a new and exciting place that just sparks your little one’s imaginations and gets their creative juices flowing. Watching my children explore their new surroundings and creating little worlds out of items they find is just one of the many reasons why I was so looking forward to our holiday to Dullstroom this September.
What I most certainly was not looking forward to was the predicted weather: three days of freezing cold temperatures accompanied by rain. Those of you who have been to Dullstroom before know that you can quite easily experience all four seasons in one day (I may or may not have had the Crowded House song going through my head when I wrote that line). Still, I held out that the forecast was wrong and that half of our holiday would not be spent indoors. Sadly, I was the one who was wrong.
With a maximum temperature of 6 degrees and pouring rain I didn’t see us getting outdoors any time soon. Fortunately I had enough warning to come prepared and I packed some creative arts and crafts kits for the children to at least take up some of the time (yay me). If you look around you can find these kits and ones just like them in most toys stores as well as some stationers and grocery shops.
I chose Mess-Free Glitter Adventure Foam Stickers; Simply Crafty Precious Purses and Simply Crafty Whimsical Wands all from Melissa and Doug. I also found some colouring in soft toys that I found at a chemist (these came with fabric markers however I replaced them with some washable markers in case the little ones decided to colour in anything else. Ok at home but not ideal in a holiday house).
We didn’t do all of the activities at the same time as there was rain forecast for a few days and I thought spacing them out would be a better option.
Sticker selection is a serious business.
Pretty purses.
Glitter isn’t only for girls.
Butterfly wands. These were really wonderful as the children played magic games with them afterwards.
Colouring in soft toys.
If you are away from home without your usual craft supplies or ideas and the weather turns on you it isn’t all doom and gloom. Just remember that being stuck indoors on a rainy day without backups like the television, computer or iPad actually makes for a wonderful opportunity to encourage your children’s creativity.
Because they don’t have the easy entertainment option to keep them busy they have to make up their own games to keep them occupied (kind of like we did when we were children). One of the highlights for our lot was making blanket forts between beds and various other items of furniture (these were destroyed before I was able to take photos).
And when the rain finally does stop, forget about clean clothes and dry children and let them loose on those muddy puddles. It is a wonderful way for them to get dirty, messy and work off some of that pent up energy!