Anonymous wrote:I would kill for a yard and bounce house! We live in an apartment. Our day lacks structure because we are constantly switching off to take calls and handle work. I feel like we are totally messing up our once-well behaved kid. She’s turning into a whiny brat. Ugh.

Same here!

Things she can do reasonably on her own:

- kinetic sand or play dough
- build with Magnatiles (but she still likes us to watch and participate)
- play with magnetic paper dolls from Melissa and Doug
- bead with big beads on a lace
- color or work on tracing worksheets (pre-writing and letters, she asks to do them)
- Kumon Easy Maze book
- TV

Things she likes us to do with her:

- play board/card games (Candyland, Memory, The Ladybug Game, Sleeping Queens, Picture Triominoes, Go Fish)
- play with counting bears in various ways
- listen to us read books: we recently read the Dodsworth In... series, all the Brambly Hedge books, several Petunia books, and started in on Mercy Watson.
- paint
- help bake (mostly mixing dry ingredients)
- go outside and play with the sand table or collect fallen petals fallen from flowers in the yard
- be pushed on the swing

Honestly the best way to keep her busy is to get her older siblings to play with her.

Sidewalk chalk is a big hit with my almost 3.

We make cars and trucks from boxes from Amazon. She loves this! She decorates them elaborately and we race them around the backyard. We made slime, jewelry, had a pedicure and practice writing with shaving cream.

A roll of butcher paper, tape large swath to the wall, let them go at it coloring. 3 hr old here too, it is hard, especially if they aren’t napping.

Love the ideas above. Our kid likes pretend play, but then I feel guilty that she spends so much time just doing the same thing over and over again.

I would kill for a yard and bounce house! We live in an apartment. Our day lacks structure because we are constantly switching off to take calls and handle work. I feel like we are totally messing up our once-well behaved kid. She’s turning into a whiny brat. Ugh.

Dress up box is a big hit. You can fill it with one of your own old shirts, an apron, some scarves, bandannas, plastic bead necklaces, hats, tote bags to be “purses”, bandannas, sunglasses, etc. A stick with feathers glued on it can be a wand. Get an old sheet and cut it in half and make a cape out of it. You can make pirate hats out of newspaper. Just Google it, and then color with markers. Build a fort out of sofa cushions and call it a castle and send the dressed up king or queen inside.

Also, small boxes to use for beds for stuffed animals, with old pillowcases as blankets. That age likes to do a lot of pretend play.

Sink and float in the bathtub with a Tupperware and small toys to sail in the Tupperware boats.

Bowling with a big Nerf ball and empty plastic milk cartons.

I mean the honest truth - a blow up bounce house will save your life - they aren’t cheap but tire them out and they’ll do it forever. Also buy an inflatable backyard pool now for when it’s warmer in a few weeks. Also bubble baths and the bath crayons they can write w on the tub

Luckily we had a large stash of toys given to use by friends. So we pull out a new one every couple of days. Cars, trucks and action figures are the most popular.

ABC Mouse

Arts and crafts from Oriental Trading Company

Drawing pictures for friends that we mail or drop off when we do a drive-by.

Driving by friends houses and talking— kid in car seat, other kid on their lawn. Lots of show and tell going on.

Let them do chores. Load the dishwasher, sweep the floor. Almost anything. Remember not to correct them very often. You aren't looking for it to be done well!

Have structure to the day .. chores, play, nap, quiet time when you are not expected to be "on" .. etc.

Our 3YO is into things that require fine motor skills. So we do things like:

-give a huge pile of coins and a piggy bank
-peg boards
-scissors and paper
-gluestick, paper, and small things to glue to the paper
-connect 4
-he loves to paint but obviously that requires supervision
-kinetic sand and small figurines
-duplos

Indoor obstacle course with pillows and yoga mats etc.
duplos
Magnatiles
Stickers that she's allows to line up and stick to the floor
Digging for worms/jumping in puddles outside
Painting rocks with water and a brush
Balance beam outside (just a long piece of wood)
Bubble machine set outside and she'll run around and catch them
Chalk on the fence (make a pattern with painters tape)

We got some fantastic advice from a local preschool teacher. She advised us that based on our description, our child is still more focused on gross motor skills. Things improved for us after we started focusing enrichment in a way that compliments his current developmental stage, rather than trying to get him to color and do more fine motor activities. We got a trampoline, hover ball, and new bike.

My suggestion is that you reflect a bit on what your child is drawn too, and then supplement accordingly.

If you’re a working parent with a pre schooler, tell me how your kid is spending time. Things that have worked for us:

Watering garden
Blowing bubbles with dish soap and a straw
Craft kits bought on amazon
Coloring
Play doh
Washing car
So much tv when we both have conference calls


We are just barely scraping by with activities and need new ideas. help!