Next Wednesday, October the 4th, is World Animal Day. What started in 1931 as a way of highlighting the plight of endangered species has grown to encompass all kinds of animal life and is now widely celebrated alll around the world.

The World Animal Day mission statement is as follows:

“To celebrate animal life in all its forms

To celebrate humankind’s relationship with the animal kingdom

To acknowledge the diverse roles that animals play in our lives, from providing food, through being our companions, to supporting and helping us, to bringing a sense of wonder into our lives

To acknowledge and be thankful for the way in which animals enrich our lives”

The WAD website has lots of suggestions for how individuals can mark the day including ideas such as donating food and bedding to animal shelters, looking at your garden and thinking about how you could make it more wildlife-friendly or treating your own pet to a special day.

Tags: 11yrs+, 5 7yrs, 8 10yrs, animals, preschoolers, toddlers, zoo

Making a simple board game is one of the easiest and fun things you can do on a rainy afternoon.

You will need:
4 pieces of different coloured A4 (or Letter) sized paper
A large game board sized piece of heavy card
Felt tip pens
Glue stick
Glue
Dice

First, cut a strip off the length of each piece of paper about five centimeters (one inch) wide. Cut each of these strips into small squares.

They don’t have to be particularly uniform, in fact it’s better if there are a few smaller pieces as well as a bunch of bigger squares.

Draw a line around the piece of cardboard which will be the track of your game play. Stick a start and finish square at each end:

Then glue all of the little squares side by side along the line…

…until the entire line is covered. It’s best if you mix up the colours so that not too many of the same colour are sitting next to one another - but it doesn’t really matter if they do.

Make a couple of “short cut” places to give the game a bit of interest:

Decorate elaborately or minimally or not at all. You could number the squares if this takes your child’s fancy.

Take the remaining coloured paper and cut each sheet into uniformly sized rectangles:

On the backs of these write your game playing instructions such as “Miss a turn”, “Move forward three spaces”. Obviously it’s more fun to elaborate a little so that they say things like “Win Australian Idol! Move forward two spaces” or “Slip on a banana peel, go back one space” etc. AJ and I came up with the card ideas together - so they were all familiar concepts to a preschooler - “Mummy has a nap, miss a turn”, “Pancakes for dinner! Move ahead three spaces,” but of course they also got faintly ridiculous such as “Meet a monkey who eats your teeth! Go back five spaces”. Because a card will be picked up on every square, I also included a lot of “Stay where you are” cards just so that the game play doesn’t go too quickly.

Our game was vaguely family themed, with pictures of relatives hastily drawn on the squares and on the board. You could come up with all kinds of different themes and looks. I remember when I was a kid we did a similar thing but we made it look like a haunted house and all the instructions were spoooooky. Take you child’s topic du jour (pirates, Wiggles, Thomas, bugs, etc) and make the game board and card instructions fit in.

Make a couple of counters out of rolled up scraps of paper and you are ready to play! Our rules (and they seemed to change with every minute) were simple. The youngest player starts. She (or he, but it was she for us) rolls the dice and moves the number of spaces shown. She picks up a card of the corresponding colour to the place she has landed on and follows the instructions. If she is told to move ahead or back she does so, and her turn ends without picking up another card. Move to the next player.

The older the child the more complicated you might like to make the rules. If you land on a square occupied by another counter, you have to do 20 star jumps or maybe if you land on a square marked with a star get a special star card which you can use to avoid squares marked with aliens (and alien marked squares might mean you have to change counters with another player or something) — really, there is no limit to how wild it could get.

Tags: 11yrs+, 5 7yrs, 8 10yrs, board game, preschoolers

We have an ever growing pile of stuff at Kiddley HQ sitting in a box whistfully referred to as the ‘destined for eBay box.’ The chance of any of the items in it turning up on eBay is very slim, mostly because it seems like too much work to actually list them. One of the things in there is a Nintendo 64 and a pile of game cartridges which we recently hauled out of the box and hooked up to the television. The controllers were a bit tricky for AJ to get the hang of, but slightly older kids shouldn’t have any problems. We spent an afternoon playing Yoshi’s Story, which is a great game for younger kids, and checking out some of the other games, like Mario 64.

Claire also recently unearthed some terrific Nintendo Game & Watch handheld games from the 80s. Amazingly, they still worked with their original batteries.

Although they seem primitive compared to modern game systems, there’s also something really charming about ‘antique’ game systems and consoles, and they have terrific novelty value that will appeal to kids. We’ll be unearthing these gems again when the kids are a bit older and can get more out of them. If you haven’t already sold them on eBay, you may want to hunt down and dust off your old and neglected games and give them another whirl; you might discover some new old family favorites.

Tags: 11yrs+, 5 7yrs, 8 10yrs, gadgets, handheld, nintendo, video games

AJ has been keeping a journal for the last five weeks, specifically to share with my parents when they return from their overseas trip tomorrow. Every evening before dinner she has sat at the kitchen table and recalled the most important event (or two or three) of the day as she remembered it and has drawn it in her pink covered sketchbook.

Some days she manages a mere five minute scribble before dashing off to some other exciting activity, while other days she has taken great care to include tiny details and lots of feeling, as well stickers and the odd leaf or flower stuck in with vast amounts of sticky tape. Major events have been noted, such as the first hot day of the season accompanied by the joyful illustration of being able to wear shorts (above left) but also little things like choosing apples at the greengrocers, a cuddle on the couch and Daddy cooking risotto. I write in the date and a dictated description to finish the entry.

I can’t imagine AJ wanting to continue keeping a journal so regularly at this age, but because this had a point to it that she could grasp and because it was a nice way for her to think of her grandparents other than just missing them, it was a great short term project… and what we have is a wonderful snapshot in time of a month just before her fourth birthday.

Sometime soon I am going to scan in some of the pages and email them to AJ’s other grandparents who live overseas.

You could easily adapt this kind of activity for older kids - they might want to keep a photo journal, a highly decorated scrapbook or a more traditional written journal.

Related links:

Useful tips about journalling for kids on the Hallmark site including “Don’t criticize, edit, instruct or imply that there is need for improvement.” which is sometimes tough when they are taking their entry off in a seemingly bizarre direction. Try and go with the flow!

Tips from the DIY Network on scrapbooking for kids.

Tags: 11yrs+, 5 7yrs, 8 10yrs, journaling, preschoolers, scrapbooking

Most bigger towns and cities have tourist buses or guided walking tours. Book one in for your family or find a brochure of walks from your local tourism office for a fun day out. You never know what you might uncover in a town you think you know well. When AJ and LJ get older and less prone to nightmares (we may have to wait until they are 20 or so!), Melbourne has a particularly spooky sounding evening ghost tour through the historic backstreets and buildings in our city… I can imagine lots of fun to be had especially if it was followed by a dessert or a stack of pancakes at a cafe.

Finding something to do can be as simple as typing the name of your town and then “tourism” into google and see what you can find.

Some other ghost tours in Australia.

Find something new to do in your city by “exploring the world” at Lonely Planet.

Tags: 11yrs+, 5 7yrs, 8 10yrs, exploration, ghosts, tourist

There is a pile of laundry that needs doing, dinner is still a figment of your imagination, there are emails to answer, and a pile of work notes that need going over after the kids are in bed. How on earth does anyone expect you to add in some crafting, exploring, playing, doing, making, cooking, experimenting with the kids? Seriously?

I know. I hear you. Right now AJ is watching more TV than usual, LJ is requiring as many feeds, sleeps and nappy changes as expected and both Phil and I are running on empty.

So how do we find the time to start doing some of the fun stuff again?

Here are my tips that seem to work (some days anyway):

1. Sleep. This seems to be the deciding factor in whether I am going to have any energy to do anything positive the next day or if I am going to put on one too many dvds to get us through. It’s hard to get excited about lego or playdough or even a trip to the zoo when you are feeling that grumpy, heavy, mean-spirited feeling that comes with not enough sleep. Try going to bed half an hour or even an hour earlier. If you’re staying up late and watching awful TV or browsing inane websites because you’re too tired to get up and go to bed, force yourself to get up and turn it off.

2. Forward planning. The best days I have with AJ are when I think about the activity we are going to do before hand. That way I can have all the materials assembled or the arrangements made (even if it’s just in my own head) and the day seems to flow much better. There is also something to be said for positive thinking… write down your day’s plan… imagine it getting done and sometimes it just does.

3. Turn your kitchen table into the kids’ arts/crafts/science experiment hub. While you are making dinner or washing the dishes or sitting with your laptop or whatever, your kids can be tinkering away at the kitchen table with your input when they need it while you get your chores done. We have deliberately bought a very cheap kitchen table from IKEA and the surface is slowly but surely being completely ruined. It’s covered with glue and bits of dead playdough, felt tip pen marks and blobs of dried paint. Our idea is to let it be and not worry about it for the time being and then eventually we will either replace it with a more expensive, more permanent table or we can sand back the surface and start all over again.

4. Find activities that you enjoy doing too. There’s no point feeling guilty about not taking your kids to the playground and pushing them on the swings every day if you just don’t enjoy it. Find an alternative that you will all enjoy - maybe a walk in a national park, or shoot hoops or try some crazy dancing in the lounge room.

5. Relax about the mess and the cleaning up. Let’s face it, having kids around the place means there is going to be a lot of mess and that’s just part of it. If it doesn’t all get packed away by the end of the day it doesn’t really matter all that much. Likewise, think about which chores really can wait. That pile of clean laundry that needs folding can sit there another day if you would rather be putting together an ant farm or making that papier mache space ship.

6. Turn off the TV! If you are in the habit of watching TV with dinner or for long stretches of time in the evening, and everyone sits there glued to whatever show happens to be on because that’s the way it has always been, then try turning it off. Instead, have a conversation, play a game, go for a walk or sit out in the yard and enjoy the last evening light or the first stars. If you are stuck for ideas, there always plenty of stuff to be found on Kiddley!

Some other and similar ideas:

Making time for project making on 52 Projects (which inspired this post).

Write a NOT-to-do List again on 52 Projects.

Tips for being a more light-hearted parent (via Parent Hacks)

Tags: 11yrs+, 5 7yrs, 8 10yrs, organisation, parenting, preschoolers, time management, toddlers

The topic du jour is school lunches… part one was all about links to inspiring lunch box ideas, but this time here is one of our own, inspired by one of my favourite kids books Yoko by Rosemary Wells.

As I mentioned on Loobylu some months ago, Yoko is an infinitely readable story. Every day, Yoko is lucky enough to take a bamboo cooler full of her favourite sushi for school lunch along with a snack of something as delicious as red bean ice-cream; much to her “squeeze cheese on rye” munching class mate’s horror. Her kind teacher decides to hold an “International Food Day” where each student is required to bring along a dish from a different country, and each child must try a taste of everything. Unfortunately the sushi goes pretty much untouched, but Yoko finally makes a new friend from a hungry little critter whose hunger overcomes his reservations about trying something new.

A fun way to spice up a tired lunchbox routine might be to have your own International food day perhaps once a week or once a month. Choose a different country and explore the cuisine in lunchbox style. Martha Stewart has a bunch of international recipes on her site at the moment - not designed specifically for lunchboxes or kids but if you include an icepack for keeping some food cold or a thermos for keeping other foods warm then with a little imagination they could be easily adapted.

I like the sound of Crisp Spring Rolls from Vietnam, Shrimp Potstickers from China and the Spanish Onion and Potato Torte. Obviously these need to be prepared in advance, maybe for dinner the night before but a Greek Salad or some Guacamole served with toasted pita bread could be a quick solution.

Tags: 11yrs+, 5 7yrs, 8 10yrs, books, food, lunchbox, nutrition, preschoolers, school, snack

Thank you to Amy who left a comment on our post the other day about kids’ rooms on Flickr. She pointed us to two other groups full of inspiring photos: “Go to Your Room!” Kids Rooms at home and The Nursery: Baby Rooms at home. Lovely stuff.

Tags: flickr, interior design

This is simple playdough activity with a theme - playing bakery!

You will need:
For the dough:
1 cups of flour
2 cups of oats
1 cup of water
A bowl and wooden spoon

For play:
Playdough tools (blunt knives, cookie cutters, rolling pin etc)
Paper patty pans
Cheap coloured cake decorations (sprinkles, hundreds ‘n’ thousands, etc)
Scraps of paper
Cardboard boxes of various sizes

You could also use paper plates, paper doilies, cake plates, tea sets and so on to add to the fun and chaos.

Firstly, this playdough recipe is simple and safe enough for even a preschooler to make, as it doesn’t need heating or contain any salt. Unfortunately, it doesn’t keep very long, and becomes wet and soggy after an afternoon, but it’s so much fun to use as an alternative to the smooth, super-coloured playdough that it’s quite worth it.

In a large bowl you child can add all the ingredients and mix them all together, just like a real baker. You may need to give it a good final mix and add either a little more water or flour at the end depending on the consistency. Turn it out on a table top or bench and you or your child can give it a good knead to bring it all together.

Once you have a nice lump of playdough (it won’t be smooth but shaggy and lumpy due to the oats) encourage the kids to make pretend cupcakes, bread, pastries or whatever takes their fancy. Cake decorations seem to be a big hit in all of this although quite a lot seem to get eaten. Use a largish cardboard box as a pretend oven for cooking batches of goods, and then display them on tea set plates, cake plates and doilies on shelves made of other boxes. The scraps of paper can be turned into price tags and money for great retail role-playing. I placed an order for 14 elaborately decorated cupcakes which kept AJ occupied for a good hour. After a while things (as usual) get more creative and more messy but it’s all part of the fun.

Tags: 5 7yrs, bakery, play dough, preschoolers, role playing

There is a wonderfully inspiring flickr group called “Corners of my home” which is full of beautiful interior vignettes from around the world.

To date there are 5,389 photos in the pool so there is a lot to sort through, but there seem to be lots of lovely pictures of kids’ rooms full of great ideas. In the group discussion there is a currently a kids’ room decorating thread running which will point you in the right direction more quickly if you don’t have the time to browse.

Images reproduced with the permission of Sara_with_an_h (top) and Esther Veereschild (below).

Tags: colour schemes, flickr, interior design