This is a perfect opportunity to teach children how to spring clean and there are jobs for all ages, if they can stand up and hold a cloth, they can help with the sprucing! They may not do a perfect job at first but try really hard not to step in and take over and you’ll soon reap the dividends. All vacuuming at Climbing Rainbows is now done by our teenage boys and, to be honest, they do a better job than I do!

A good starter job is window cleaning. Fill a misting bottle with water and a splash of washing up liquid, give them a cloth and send them outside to do the windows they can reach! They’ll be busy for hours! You can even rope in your friends’ children to help and make it a game! When the novelty of a squirty bottle wears off, a large water pistol does the same job!

Here’s a list of other jobs you can encourage children to do!

Spring Cleaning Jobs for Children

• Wood polishing – Once they’ve mastered wielding a cloth, give them some polish and a duster. Show them which things need polishing and how much polish to use and set them off. Mine have always loved doing this!
• Wiping down the kitchen cupboard doors
• Emptying the kitchen cupboards, wiping the shelves and putting everything back. Older children can check date labels on food stuffs and make sure the ones which need using up first are at the front – a good maths activity!
• Collect a bag full of toys and books from their own room to pass on to charity
• Washing the car – another one where it’s fine to make mess and get a bit wet and always a hit with younger children

!

• Wiping round any sinks, baths or showers. I used to spend hours sitting in the bath at my Granny’s wiping down her tiles with a flannel and my youngest loves being allowed to climb into the shower with his clothes on to wipe down the walls!

There aren’t many jobs children can’t have a go at and, if you make it a game, don’t worry too much about the outcome and do it regularly so that it becomes routine and just ‘something we all do’ you will reap rewards when they are older!

Disclosure: This is a sponsored post.

There is so much potential for family fun in this story, across the ages! Here are a few ideas.

• Young children love packing a bag with a few bits and exploring the house. Each room can be a different part of the desert island and you can go on an adventure to see what you can find. You could have the jungle out in the garden, they can fish in the bath, set up camp in the sitting room, climb the stair mountain and see what they can see from the top. Perhaps they could ‘make a fire’ outside or in with a pile of sticks/toy bricks (which they can go and collect first) and a pretend match. These two have spent many happy hours in the woodland ‘building fires’!

• There is a fabulous book called Miranda the Castaway which should provide you with some more ideas.  Miranda is a resourceful little girl who is shipwrecked on a desert island. She quickly sorts herself out and builds herself a set of tree top rooms. She has to work out an ingenious way of transporting fresh water from the spring to her ‘kitchen’ which involves a lot of bamboo sticks zig zagging through the jungle. There is a lot of potential for some junk modelling on a big scale here! A cardboard box treehouse serviced by a long tube made of loo roll tubes stuck together would be fab and if a marble could travel along it (proving that water could but without a papier-mache mess!), so much the better!

• With older children you could play a version of Radio 4′s Desert Island Discs. Pose the question: If you were to be stranded on a desert island which 10 things would you want to have with you to ensure your survival (no electrical goods allowed) and which one luxury would you have to have?

• A treasure hunt is always fun. If you have a collection of seashells, hide them around the house for children to find and reward them with some survival essentials when they have found them. You could have a ‘treasure box’ filled with fruits, nuts and vegetables for them to make a meal, sticks and ‘matches’ to make a fire, fabric and rugs for them to make ‘tree houses’.

Enjoy! If you have any ideas for some Crusoe adventures do pop them in a comment!

Then we made a caterpillar and a dragonfly, just because we can! He did the caterpillar and his lovely sister made the dragonfly.

To make the caterpillar we used 5 cardboard inners from loo rolls which he painted a lovely vibrant spring green.

He painted a smiley face on and we joined it all together with a piece of garden twine so that it wiggles nicely.

To make the dragonfly we used 2 pipe cleaners. We took the first one and bent it in half, twisting it together and leaving the top bit untwisted to make the head.

Next, we cut the other pipe cleaner in half and twisted one a third of the way down the body and the other a further third along. We bent them upwards and stuck wing-shaped shiny pieces on to them.

This post first appeared on my family life blog Thinly Spread

Things to Do with Children Inside in Winter

Winter Crafting

When it’s too cold to be outside but you need to keep little hands busy why not have a go at making snowflakes? Jane Hissey’s lovely Jolly Snow is a great starting point and it’s a book we return to again and again. Jolly the Giraffe is desperate for it to snow so his friends try to make him happy by providing a variety of snowy substitutes. Paper snowflakes are simple and satisfying (and fairly mess free ), although a flurry of flour, icing sugar or glitter is very exciting!

How to Make Paper Snowflakes

Really effective but simple snowflakes can be made using paper doilies. Simply fold one in half and in half again and again until you have a neat paper triangle then cut shapes out of the edges making sure you keep a bit of folded edge intact so it doesn’t all fall apart when you unfold!

How to Make Inky Winter Trees and a Paper Lantern

Once children are old enough to understand how to blow through a straw rather than just to suck everything up it you can have a go at making inky winter trees.

Drop a blob of watery ink (or watered down paint) onto a piece of non absorbent paper, give the children a straw and let them blow!

If you want trees, rather than alien blobs, encourage the children to blow a long straight line to start the trunk and then follow the ink blobs out onto branches and then to twigs.

We poked holes though our paper once it was dry, wrapped it around a glass jar and popped a tea light into the jar, they make fantastic paper lanterns to shine through the dark evenings of winter!

If they need to burn off a bit of energy and it really is too grim to get outside

• construct a giant assault course using furniture, cushions, boxes, blankets and their imaginations
• Play islands, you have to get from one side of the room to the other without touching the floor (make it harder by asking them to get from one room to another or even to get upstairs)
• Make a den
• Play pass the balloon. Start with an inflated balloon between two chests (if you are different heights, so much the better!), you have to move it from your chests to the other person’s back without using your hands. If you have several people available see if you can pass the balloon along the whole line of you without touching it with your hands!
• Play Twister!

Things to Do Outside with Children in Winter

Getting children out for a bit of fresh air whatever the weather can be a sanity saver, the Woodland Trust’s fabulous Nature Detectives website is jam packed full of ideas to keep you playing outside through the seasons. Their downloadable Winter booklet contains everything from ice art to tree faces, scavenger hunts to stick weaving as well as a very useful spotter’s guide.

Vary where you go to keep it interesting, visit the park, a woodland, the beach, a different town. Take a treasure bag with you to carry any special finds, take crayons and paper too so you can bark rub in the woodland, fossil rub on the beach or brass rub in a church. Make sure you have snacks and spare clothes so you are fed and warm and don’t forget a flask of hot chocolate!

Most of all enjoy these short winter days, make the most of the light and celebrate the dark – we’re already on the turn and spring will soon be here!

Have you got any suggestions for winter fun? What is your favourite indoor winter activity and how do you persuade children to get outside?

Picture Credit

Returning for a third year this fantastic programme runs over three nights next week (8th – 10th January 2013) and aims to encourage us all to get out there appreciating the night sky. Children are naturally curious about the wonders of space and January’s dark early evenings are crying out for a bit of stargazing so wrap up warm, grab binoculars, a telescope and a flask of hot chocolate and look heavenwards!

You can stargaze anywhere from your back garden to your local park but light pollution will limit how much you can see. While younger children are probably best wrapped up in a sleeping bag lying in a deck chair in the back garden, it is well worth making the effort with older ones to find somewhere free of artificial light. In the summer camping trips make for ideal stargazing opportunities but in the winter get out into the countryside and climb a hill.

You can download an app to your phone which uses GPS to show you what you are looking at, I have SkyView Free on my iPhone and there is a list of suitable apps over on the Stargazing website as well as a really useful downloadable star guide.

You can, of course, also take a book or paper map with you. I gave Philip’s Stargazing 2013 to my husband for Christmas but he is well aware that he is expected to share! It’s a month by month guide to the sky so it should keep us busy!

We also have this book which is packed full of space activities to do with children from about 7 years and up

Tune in to BBC2 at 8pm every Tuesday for the next three weeks to watch Professor Brian Cox and Dara O’Briain broadcasting live from the Jodrell Bank Observatory. As well as answering some of the Big Questions about space they, and various experts, will be offering hints and tips to get you started with star gazing and to help you navigate your way around the night sky.

As in previous years there are a variety of events being held up and down the country organised by the BBC and by their trusted partners. Look here for the full list and to find out if there is an event in your neck of the woods (or atop your nearest hill!)

For more space science activity ideas have a look at Science Sparks, as well as having a go at making your own craters there is a long list of  games, crafts and science stuff to keep them busy!

Seeing a shooting star or gazing in wonder at the vastness of the Milky Way for the first time, spotting Jupiter from your garden (as our soon to be 7 year old did last week) or identifying craters on the moon is not a bad way to pass the time!

Happily Shared With

Why not celebrate apple season with a simple printing craft? Simply slice an apple in half horizontally and you will expose this beautiful star shape.

Remove the pips if you like to see if you can grow an apple tree, pat the apple slices dry and pour some ready mix paint into a small tray. Brush or sponge the paint evenly onto your apple slice and press down onto your paper!

The beauty of printing with children is that it is a quick and easy craft with a result which pleases them enormously. With Christmas beginning to wave its hand at us on the horizon why not use the apple star print to cover a large sheet of paper?  ‘Hey Presto’ you have ready made Christmas wrapping paper! Green and red would look lovely and gold and silver would be very classy!

When you’ve finished printing you can continue your apple day theme with some home made toffee apples for a perfect end to the day!

Go Foraging for Free Food

It is a time of lavish pickings for the wild harvester! Hunting for mushrooms, blackberries, sloes, elderberries and sweet chestnuts should be a major feature of autumn childhood days. If you’re not a happy forager and not sure what you’re looking for lots of places do organised forays and many welcome accompanied children. Wilderness Wood have two family fungi foray days, the National Trust have foray events at many of their properties as do the Wildlife Trust.

Scare Yourselves Silly for Halloween!

English Heritage have several spooky experiences on offer. How about a family Halloween sleepover at Portland Castle in Dorset (suitable for families 8+), Dracula at Night at Whitby Abbey (suitable for families 8+) or a Halloween Family Fun Trail at Kenilworth Castle and Elizabethan Garden (suitable for all)?

Sussex Wildlife Trust is offering The Adventures of Stickman and The Gruffalo’s Child as well as torchlit Halloween Horrors trails through the wood – all suitable for young families. Checkout the Wildlife Trust  for your area to see what they have on offer.

Visit a Museum

Most museums are beginning to cotton on to the need to encourage families in and nurture children’s interest, thanks in large part to the marvellous Kids In Museums.

The London Transport Museum, for example, have a week of family fun planned from 29th October until 2nd November 2012. Children can join in make and take arts and crafts workshops and story telling sessions inspired by the new temporary exhibition Ahead of the Games. A must for all of us who got caught up in the magic of the Olympic and Paralympic Games over the summer; families will meet Bellboy Bob and his friends (characters from the posters which were all over the London Transport network) and can leave behind their own memories of travelling during the Games for future generations to find out what it was like during 2012.

Of course, there are also lots of lovely transport exhibits to look at and explore while you are there!

Check out your local museum and museums in towns and cities nearby to see what they have on offer this half term!

But it really doesn’t need to be like that. Children like carving pumpkins, playing games and eating stuff. It doesn’t need to cost the earth! Here are our top tips for a Happy Halloween Party which is easy on the pocket and lots of fun for everyone!

Gigantic pumpkins may be tempting but they taste revolting.

Go for a selection of small ones instead, hollow out the middle reserving the flesh for spicy pumpkin soup and carve gruesome or not so gruesome designs on to the shell!

Food doesn’t have to be commercial jelly sweets and chocolate eyeballs

• Halloween Cookie Cutters are relatively inexpensive and kids have lots of fun decorating biscuits with writing icing, hundreds and thousands, silver balls etc and then scoffing them!
• Cobweb cake always goes down a treat as do pumpkin pasties a la Harry Potter!
• Cake pops, all the rage at the moment, are crying out for the Halloween treatment
• Pumpkin soup is a must or you can keep your spidery theme with Cobweb Soup!
• Have a look here for lots of easy foodie ideas, the possibilities are endless!

Games can be as simple or as complicated as you like depending on the ages of the children involved:

• Tie ring doughnuts onto a piece of rope, have an adult at each end. The aim is to eat your doughnut without using your hands. The rope holders can make this harder by moving the rope up and down!
• Hold a Halloween Olympics, try: pumpkin bowling using the pumpkin as a ball and empty plastic bottles painted as ghosts/skeletons/witches as the skittles, a pumpkin slalom, limb limbo (under a cardboard bone), apple bobbing, a Halloween assault course – scramble through The Tunnel of Doom, cross the zombie swamp, bat the bats (table tennis bats or rolled up newspapers to bash cardboard bats strung in a doorway) etc!
• Make Halloween Lanterns with clean jam jars, stickers, tissue paper, cellophane and night lights
• Play Sleeping Skeletons, Musical Bumps in the Night or Pass the Head (two teams, a balloon each with a face drawn on it, the object is to pass it down your line without using your hands or teeth, first team to finish wins)
• Get Crafty! Have a look at Red Ted Art’s round up of 50 Halloween ideas for inspiration.

Costumes don’t need to be complicated or expensive.

Black fabric is a cape for a witch or bat (paint on glitter stars for some sparkle or some cobwebs for a shudder), a white sheet is a ghost, a bandaged body is a Mummy, if you are artistic bones painted on old black trousers and sweatshirt makes a very passable skeleton. Face paints can turn anything into a ghoulish delight!

Decorate the house

You can decorate the house with black cardboard bats and spiders, make a spooky Pinata, dot pumpkin lanterns around and turn off the lights. You can use torches and a camera to make some spooky light art, tell ghost stories or make spooky music with percussion instruments, pots and pans.

Make memories, they don’t need to cost the earth!

What will you be doing this Halloween? Are you a trick or treater or do you prefer some stay at home fiendish frolics?

Ingredients

For the Cake, you will need:

2x 20cm sandwich tins, greased and base lined

180g (6 oz) plain flour

2 level tablespoons cocoa

1 level teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

1 level teaspoon baking powder

150g (5oz) caster sugar

2 eggs, beaten

150ml (¼ pint) sunflower oil

150ml (¼ pint milk)

For the icing you will need:

225g (8oz) plain chocolate

100g (4oz) butter

50g (2oz) white chocolate

1 plastic spider

Method

• Heat the oven to 160°C (325°F, Gas Mark 3)
• Sift the dry ingredients into a large bowl
• Beat the eggs, oil, syrup and milk together in a smaller bowl/jug
• Make a well in the dry ingredients and pour in the egg mixture
• Beat well and pour into tins
• Bake for 30 – 35 mins until the cake springs back when pressed with a fingertip
• Turn onto a wire rack to cool.
• Melt the dark chocolate in a small bowl over a pan of hot water
• Add the butter in pieces and mix well
• Allow to cool slightly
• Spread half the icing on to one of the cakes and sandwich the other on top of it
• Cover the cake with the rest of the icing (you will need to do two coats, pop the cake in the fridge to set the first coat before adding another, keep the chocolate warm over the pan while you do this)
• Break the white chocolate pieces into a clean bowl and melt over a pan of hot water, stirring gently
• Leave to cool for a few  minutes and spoon into a piping bag/ small plastic bag with a tiny corner snipped off or one of these child friendly piping nozzles
• Gently squeeze a spiral design on to your cake
• Feather the cobweb out with a cocktail stick

This cake works much better if you can find a mini witch or wizard to stir the cauldron!

Happy Halloween baking!

When you’re done, log on to The Big Butterfly Count and record your sightings. Sir David Attenborough and Butterfly Conservation have teamed up with Marks and Spencer to make this year’s count bigger than ever and to get a really good picture of how our butterfly population is getting along. Some species are dwindling and some are facing possible extinction. Butterflies are a hugely important part of our ecosystem and they are beautiful to boot!

You can do your count anytime between now and the 5th August. Download an identification sheet here and find yourself a sunny spot to sit and count. Not a bad way to pass fifteen minutes!