How are you keeping your young kids and teens active?

Laks09 · Jun 12, 2015

Hi all,
We all know that an active lifestyle is the best way to stay healthy. Most of us are trying to inculcate some kind of exercise into our daily lives. I'm curious to see what your kids are doing?

It's summer in my end of the world and I'm trying to keep the older one off the couch as much as possible. We are finally having the time to catch up on park time. My older one has developed a fondness for volleyball and is at the nets all evening long. She is in a swim team so she swims daily. It's getting very hot here and we have stopped stepping outside until 8:30 PM, by which time my son is asleep so it's getting harder to do stuff outdoors. Have you found a favorite indoor activity for your child? I'm looking for something that we can do together. No hiking trails around here and its super hot otherwise I would have done that with the kids!

tuffyshri · Jul 27, 2015

1) Try building a small 'tent' under the dining table. Kids love it
2) Teach them gardening - fun as well as makes them active, develops love to nature
3) soft ball basket ball - i have mounted a small basket on the wall, and kids have to throw the soft ball (non bouncing and safe to use indoor) into it
4) My elder DD loved to create science projects after seeing them in Youtube. Like Volcanoes, lungs functioning, etc. - easy projects with whatever you have at home
5) I dont know if you have heard this game - pallankuzhi in tamil. It is basically with 7 or 8 holes. you can play with 6 coins or 12 coins and you have to distribute the coin from one hole to the rest of the holes. Cant explain well but that improves the math knowledge a LOT
6) try playing golf with a small bat and TT ball with a glass or cup kept in a corner
7) we all love Business board game so endlessly we play it
8) we sometimes end up in pillow fights finally we all three will jump above DH
9) we play these game when we go on car for long trips - a) counting 7 - each one to say the numbers 1,2,3. Whoever gets '7' should not say 7 but some other word like 'skip' or 'next'. Not just 7 but its multiplicatives and additives too like 14,21,28, etc. and 16 => 1+6 = 7, 25=> 2+5=7; AND also numbers that end with 7 like 17,27,37. Tough one but you will love it as the multiplication goes beyond 7*8
b) Guess the person - one has to think of a famous personality. The opponent has to ask for clues and find the personality. The opponent can ask only 15 or 20 questions and is allowed to guess for 2 times. eg. "if the person is a male" or "is he alive?" etc.
The thinking person will only say "yes", "no", 'may be" and nothing else. Very interesting. Once my DH thought of Sakshi (Dhoni's wife) and nobody could find it!!
c) We play I spy as my kids are small enough to play it
d) We speak about Ramayan, Mahabarath, Krishna, etc.

Have fun!

CraftyMom10 · Jul 28, 2015

Hi All,
I try to spend time in doing some craft and science projects with my kids:bangcomp:....even the younger sibbling joins us and it is a great activity with lots of FUN and learning around.

Enjoy SUMMER !!!:goodidea:

---CraftyMom10