Family Fun

Tips for Hiking With Toddlers

May 2, 2018 By Terri Thompson

Does the thought of hiking with toddlers send shivers down your spine? Where can you go? Will I end up having to carry my kids half-way through? How can I keep them safe? All. The. Worries.

I’m here to tell you to stop worrying. You’ve got this.

Hiking can be such a fun family activity. It gets everyone moving. You can explore a new place. And, it’s a fun way to learn and explore in nature.

.All the best tips for hiking with toddlers

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How to have fun hiking with toddlers

I took my kids hiking by myself all the time when they were younger. But, here’s the thing, our hikes looked a lot different than they would if it was just me and my husband.

But, no matter how they looked, they were fun and they were valuable. My kids loved a family hike.

The key: keep it simple and keep it on your kid’s level.

You don’t need to hike up a mountain or go deep in the woods to experience all the fun of a hike. For our hikes we often stayed local and would choose a paved path in a wooded area.

We also kept it short, stopping and turning around when the girls requested it. After all, there was no way I could carry both of my kids back to the car if we went too far.

A long hike for a toddler may not necessarily seem long to you and that’s okay.

Let your kids lead the way

Another thing that worked well for me when hiking with young children was to let my girls lead the way. I would stop when they stopped. I would look at what they looked at.

We would examine anything and everything that they wanted to look at. I saw so many nature treasures that I would have missed if I didn’t have the kids along.

We’d look at a cool rock or feel the texture of the bark on a tree. My daughter had an eagle eye when it came to spotting wildflowers.

We picked up sticks and laid them all out to examine and figure out which were the best ones. Apparently there is special 4-year-old criteria when it comes to finding the best stick.

If you look high and look low, you’re sure to find something interesting, like this bird’s nest already abandoned for the winter.We also found bright yellow leaves, a big curvy tree, a small batch of berries (which we learned not to touch since we don’t know what they are), a secret path leading to a dock on a small lake and lots of nature treasures.

We found all of these on small, simple hikes.

Tips for Hiking With Toddlers

Keep it short.
Bring along water and small healthy snacks for energy. (And be prepared to carry your waste until you find a trashcan.)
Keep it slow. Let your kids explore and examine as much as they want.
Go someplace familiar. You will feel more comfortable if you know the area well.
Turn back if the kids start getting tired. You don’t want to push them and end up having to carry an exhausted child!
Use your eyes, ears, and nose to learn a little about the natural world around you. Experience the hike, don’t just walk it.
And the most important… Keep it simple! You will all enjoy yourself more.

Yes, you can go hiking with young children. It's a fun and rewarding family activity. Find all the best tips for a successful hike with your toddlers and preschoolers here so you can plan a successful family hike.

Let’s Go on a Family Hike!

Are you ready? Let’s do this.

Pick a location, get the kids ready, and just go. I guarantee you’ll have fun and want to go hiking over and over again.

Hiking is such a great family activity that you can do with kids of all ages. Keep it simple while hiking with toddlers and then as your kids grow older, you can go on longer and longer hikes.

Get out, explore, and have fun.

Kids to Parks Day

I wrote this post to help celebrate Kids to Parks Day from the National Park Trust which happens on the third Saturday of May of each year. It’s a fun day to get out and have fun with the family. You can attend an official event or do something on your own, like a fun family hike! You can check here to find a local event.

No matter what you do, take the opportunity to celebrate the outdoors and to celebrate your family. Have fun! Share your adventures with the #KidstoParks hashtag on social media.

Yes, you can go hiking with toddlers! Find all the best tips for a successful hike with your young kids here so you can plan a successful family hike.

Do you want to do more fun activities with your family?

Join our fun Facebook community, Creative Family Fun for Busy Families, for daily activities that are great for kids and families. We’ll chat, share, and have fun. It’s a safe and private place to share ideas for family and kids activities.

I’d love for you to join me! Just click the link below, request to join, and answer the questions (they’re easy, I promise). Come join the fun! Join the Creative Family Fun for Busy Families community here.

Fun Ways to Help Your Local Animal Shelter

April 10, 2018 By Terri Thompson

We’re a family of animal lovers. We have two pets of our own (a dog and a cat) and are always looking for ways to help other animals.

One of the best ways is through our local animal shelter. Supporting your animal shelter (or Humane Society) is a great way to make a difference in your own community.

Whether you volunteer to walk dogs, pet cats, or make monetary donations, every little bit helps. Here are some fun ways your family can do together to help your local animal shelter.

It’s so valuable to spend time together as a family doing service projects. Are you ready to help some animals? We are!

Fun Ways to Help Your Local Animal Shelter

Make a Birthday Donation

My kids’ wish lists are getting shorter and shorter over the years because they have so many things. So, if you’re anything like us, use your next birthday to help raise money for your local animal shelter.

Instead of gifts, ask your friends to bring a small donation or, if you don’t want to ask for money, ask them to bring dog toys, cat litter, cat toys, food, scratching posts, rawhides, or collars.

Check with your local shelter for specifics. Most have wish lists available online or will provide you one if you call.

Volunteer Together

Animal shelters can always use volunteers. You can walk dogs, pet cats, help clean, or even stuff envelopes. There are plenty of jobs for volunteers.

But, it’s likely that your local animal shelter has an age limit for volunteering so check first. If you child is old enough, go visit the animals together. This is a great way to spend family time with a tween or teen!

If your kids are still too young, there are plenty of other ideas in this post that they can do!

Collect old blankets or towels

Start a small donation drive to collect blankets and towels. Shelters can use these in so many ways.

Go through your home and see what you can donate. Involve your kids and let them call grandma or grandpa to see if they have any old blankets or towels to donate. You can also ask other family members, neighbors or friends.

Finally bring the kids along when you drop your donations off so that they can see this service project from start to finish.

Start a small fundraising campaign

Brainstorm some ideas for ways you can raise money for your local animal shelter.

Have a bake sale, a garage sale, collect change, have a lemonade stand, or whatever your creative minds can come up with.

Involve the family from start to finish as you plan, implement, and have fun with a small fundraising campaign.

Go shopping!

Grab your local shelter’s wish list, set a budget, and go out shopping. Let your kids pick out items to donate while staying within the budget. Before you go home, stop off at the shelter to donate all your purchases.

Get crafting

Do you like to craft together with your kids? Why not make a few things with your kids to donate to your local animal shelter. Here are a few great options:

Simple No-Sew Fleece Blankets from Mama Smiles

T-Shirt Braided Dog Toy at Kitchen Counter Chronicles

Catnip Filled Junk Food Cat Toys at A Beautiful Mess

Felted Wool Balls at Happiness is Homemade

Dog Wreath Pull Toy at Kitchen Counter Chronicles

Foster an animal

If you’ve got the time and the space, your family can serve as a foster home for animals. Sometimes shelters don’t have enough space for all the animals that need help and could use your help.

This is a much bigger commitment than the other ways to help your local animal shelter, but it’s an incredibly valuable experience. If you are interested, contact your local shelter or rescue organization and they will help you determine if your family is a good fit for fostering and will often provide training.

What are some ways your family likes to help your local animal shelter?

Let’s Go On a Listening Walk

March 22, 2018 By Terri Thompson

If you want to add a peaceful element to your next walk with your kids, go on a listening walk.

Take the time to enjoy the peace and quiet or even the hustle and bustle of your neighborhood with this fun walk idea for families.

Listen carefully… what do you hear?

You can take an informal walk where the goal is to see just how many things you can hear.

Do you hear a cricket chirping? A car horn? Tweeting birds?

Emphasize quiet where the only time someone talks is when they want to share what they hear.

This is such a nice way to wind down together as a family at the end of a busy day. Or, it’s a fun morning activity to get the day started.

Use your ears to go on a fun listening scavenger hunt while you walk around your neighborhood with this fun walk idea for families, a listening walk.

You can also bring along a list of items to create a listening scavenger hunt.We keep a stack of lists on a small clipboard that’s easy to grab and take along outside. You can print out our list here or you can make your own lists.

Here are some ideas you can add to you listening walk list:

A dog barking
Cars driving by
An airplane flying overhead
Geese honking
People talking
Children giggling
The wind whispering
Buzzing bees
Crows cawing
A car door slamming

Use your ears to go on a fun listening scavenger hunt while you walk around your neighborhood with this fun walk idea for families.

When making your list, think about the sounds you often hear in your neighborhood. If you live in the country, add a lot of nature sounds. A city walk could include vehicle noises, people, or construction noises.

Print your list here. Prints in landscape format.

Listen and learn about your neighborhood! What sorts of noises would you hear on a walk around your town?

You may also enjoy one of these outdoor family fun ideas:

Go Outside! Cards

Go Outside: Counting Walk

10 Ways to Make a Walk More Fun

My Five Senses Walk at Great Family Reads

Originally published 8/5/2013, updated March, 2018.

Easy to Play Card Games for Family Game Night

January 18, 2018 By Terri Thompson

My family loves card games. Does yours?

We’ve acquired many fun card games over the years and we often pull them out for family game night.

Do you have any favorite easy to play card games for families? Here are some of our favorites that would be perfect for your next family game night.

Easy to play card games that are fun for preschoolers

So many of our card games are perfect for older kids and tweens (ages 8 and up), but you can still find some fun and easy to play card games if you have younger kids. All of the ages mentioned are the manufacturer recommended age ranges.

One of the biggest struggles with card games for younger kids is that it’s so hard to hold onto the cards. We had a set of these Little Hands Playing Card Holders when my girls were younger which solved that problem for us.

Classic card games are a great place to start with younger kids. This set of card games from Melissa and Doug has Old Maid, Go Fish, and Rummy. (Ages 3 to 8)

This fun Animal Go Fish Card Games takes the traditional game and adds bright and beautiful animal pictures that makes it perfect for kids who aren’t reading yet. (Ages 3 and up)

The focus of this Untamed America 3-1 Classic Card Game are the fabulous North American animal illustrations, but I also love that you can play three different games with this one deck, Go Fish, Old Maid, and Animal Match. (Ages 4 to 9)

We had this fantastic version of Crazy 8 when my kids were younger. The rules of Crazy Faces are exactly the same as Crazy 8, but the illustrations on the cards are so much fun! (Ages 5 and up)

Fun and easy to play card games for younger kids (ages 6 and 7)

Spot It! is a fun game of visual memory that is great for all ages. There are so many versions from Spot It! Jr. Animals (ages 4 to 6) to Spot It! Sports and Spot It! Holidays (both ages 6 and up).

Rat-A-Tat Cat is a fun (and quick) game that combines strategy, memory building, and addition. It’s a great choice for when you only have a short amount of time. (Ages 6 and up)

Wig Out! A Wild and Hairy Card Game is another quick and fun choice that will have you racing against your opponents. My favorite part is all the fun illustrations! (Ages 6 and up)

Slamwich is fast, fun, and can be loud! It’s a great choice for family game night. (Ages 6 and up)

The Professor Noggin Card Games are part card game, part trivia games. I love that there are so many versions and that they cover specific topics such as the human body, reptiles and amphibians, and wonders of the world. (Ages 7 and up)

Have you played Exploding Kittens yet? Oh my goodness, this is probably the most hilarious game on the list and the one that shows up most often during family game night. (Ages 7 and up)

Skip-Bo is a classic game and it was one of my favorite games from childhood. This sequencing game is simple to play and so much fun. (Ages 7 and up)

Uno is another card game I played a lot while growing up. You can play with 2 players, but it’s more fun the more players you have. (Ages 7 ad up)

Phase 10 is a fun rummy style card game with a twist. It can be lengthy, but it’s great fun! (Ages 7 and up)

Fun card games for older kids (ages 8 and up)

I love the idea that someone decided to create a card game inspired by sushi. Fun! Sushi Go! is a quick and easy to play card game that involves passing cards and creating sets. (Ages 8 and up)

Sleeping Queens is unlike any card game I’ve ever played before. And, it’s tons of fun (it’s one of my favorites on this list.) It’s a great game that uses strategy and a little bit of luck. (Ages 8 and up)

Despite that fact that Rack-O is over 50 years old, I hadn’t played it until recently. Boy, was I missing out! This is a fun game that involves sequencing. (Ages 8 and up)

The Scrambled States of America Game is fast and wild and tons of fun. It’s not the best for younger kids because you need to be able to read to play, but for older kids this geography game is tons of fun. (Ages 8 and up)

Card games on our wish list

Set: The Family Game of Visual Perception (ages 6 and up). This award winning game always comes highly recommended. I’m not sure why we don’t have it in our game collection yet!

Five Crowns. This is a fun rummy style game that also comes highly recommended. It’s high on my with list!

Zeus on the Loose. We’ve got several Gamewright games that we love. This mythology themed game looks like so much fun.

What other easy to play card games would you recommend for family game night?

Gratitude Conversation Starters for Families

October 30, 2017 By Terri Thompson

How often do you talk about gratitude with your kids?

I try to make gratitude an ongoing conversation at our house. But it’s not always easy. Thank goodness for these gratitude conversation starters.

I don’t ever want my girls to take our wonderful life for granted. Even though we have had some trials and some not-so-good days, we are still very fortunate.

It’s not always easy to have that conversation and sometimes I’m at a loss. I don’t want to ask the same questions every day. That’s an easy way to get everyone to lose interest! I want to get my girls thinking and looking at all areas of their life. I want them to look at the little things, not just the big picture.

So, I started brainstorming and jotting down questions. When I was done, I had a set of conversation starters to use to get us talking.

The Benefits of Conversation Starters

I love conversation starters because they take all the awkwardness out of starting a conversation. Just grab a strip and read the question out loud.

Mom and Dad can ask the kids or the kids can ask the parents.

They give you things to talk about that you may not have thought about before.

Gratitude Conversation Starters

Here are some examples of the questions your will find in this set of gratitude conversation starters:

What is your favorite part about your home? Why?

What abilities do you have that you are grateful for?

What is one of your favorite things to do? Why are you grateful for it?

What is something about your teacher that you are grateful for?

Who did something nice for you today? What was it?

What is something you love doing with your parents?

This is just a sample of the questions I came up with. In all, I have 20 questions covering the big and little things in life. Keep scrolling to “How to Use Your Conversation Starters” for a free pdf you can download and print.

How to Use Your Conversation Starters

Print off a set of conversations starters (it will take 2 pieces of paper). Cut the strips apart and find a fun way to display them.

You can put them in a cute thankful jar or fold them up and put them in a bowl. Place one in front of everyone’s plate at dinner time. It really doesn’t matter. What’s important is the conversation that develops.

You can find your free pdf of the Gratitude Conversation Starters here.

These are perfect for dinner time or even a long car trip. Pull out a strip and have everyone answer. Let the conversation flow. Remember all the little things and be grateful for your wonderful life with these gratitude conversation starters.

Incorporate Your Gratitude Conversation Starters Into Your Dining Room Decor:

Store your conversations starters in a pretty container such as:

A pretty jar with a chalk label that you can personalize.

An elegant blessings bowl with gold accents.

A rustic “Count Your Blessing” ceramic gratitude jar.

Or use a simple and colorful gratitude coffee mug.

Get your kids started talking about gratitude with these printable Gratitude Conversation Starters that are perfect for family time. #Thanksgiving #gratitude #familytime #CreativeFamilyFun

More Gratitude Activities to Do With Your Family

Acorn Gratitude Banner

Volunteer as a Family: Support Your Local Food Bank

Thanksgiving Gratitude Acrostic Poem at School Time Snippets

How to Give Thanks With an Obstacle Course at Thriving STEM

30+ Thanksgiving Activities for Kids at The Artful Parent

Get your kids started talking about gratitude with these printable Gratitude Conversation Starters that are perfect for family dinner time.

Countdown to Christmas

If you’re anything like me, I know you’re looking for fun family activities to do this Christmas. But, not just anything. I’m not looking for elaborate and I’m definitely not looking for something that would require a million trips to the craft store.

That’s why I just love Countdown to Christmas – 24 Activities, Crafts, and Recipes to Countdown to Christmas by Cerys Parker from Rainy Day Mum. The activities are simple (you won’t find anything elaborate) and definitely fun. They’re perfect for families. And, they’re perfect for the advent season.

This fabulous resource for Christmas family fun can be purchased here. Take a peek, you’ll love it!

Family Fun

Tips for Hiking With Toddlers