Life as a part-time worker and single mother allows me to balance work with kid-focused activities, but it isn’t exactly lucrative. Over the past couple of years I’ve settled into a groove of budget-friendly activities that are not only a hit with my son, but me too.
With school holidays here again – so soon? – it can be a scramble to find ideas to entertain younger kids. But I have a few favourites I always fall back on. They may be simple things, but my son really loves them and, even better, I really love doing them too. It’s a win-win for all.
Buy secondhand Lego
Cost: From $10
Lately when my kid unboxes a Lego kit, after meticulously following the instructions in ever-quicker times, he abandons the new-build within a day or two. Sick of discarded Lego littering the living room floor, I stumbled upon BrickTastics, a seller of secondhand Lego. It’s been a gamechanger.
There are large bags of Lego bundles, grouped into themes like Technics connectors, or animals, and they arrive in the post in a large sandwich bag with no instruction booklet in sight. In my house it has ignited hours of tinkering with gears and axles to make complicated contraptions and expanded on existing completed builds. I was left totally confused when presented with these pieces, but my son had endless ideas.
Rummage through the local swap meet
Cost: $5 plus transport
This is a day trip, with a prize at the end. We like to visit our local weekend swap meet on a Sunday morning. I encourage my boy to spend $5 of his pocket money and we decide on the drive what to watch out for. It becomes a treasure hunt to scour the market, and when the toy is found he waves it victoriously in the air. I have taught my son the fun of bargaining, which has boosted his confidence.
He feels so proud when he’s clutching his new find after some serious negotiating with a friendly seller. There’s often new treasures for me to find too.
Do a toy clearout
Cost: You make (some) money
This can easily take a whole morning – negotiating with what to keep or sell, taking the photos and listing the toys for sale online. The cold hard cash is absolutely worth it, and we split the takings 50-50. The decluttered bedroom is just a bonus.
Find a new playground or nature reserve
Cost: Free
We like to jump on our bikes and go for a cruise to any new spots down by the creek, or playgrounds we haven’t explored or been to in a while. If we really want to throw ourselves into the planning, my son will draw a map of how to get there, and if I’m feeling enthused I might bake a treat to take with us.
We grab the dog and head off for an afternoon. After our expedition we give star ratings to various elements of the outing, like climbable trees, animals spotted and playground equipment.
Buy a ream of A4 paper
Cost: Under $10
There’s 500 sheets in a ream of plain A4 paper, equalling hours of activities for a one-figure sum. Meanwhile coloured craft paper can cost twice as much, or more.
We’ve been really into Mr Squiggle lately – taking turns drawing a squiggle then watching as the other person turns it into a drawing. Just like the children’s show, the squiggle-maker tries to guess what the drawing will become.
Or we pop on blindfolds and take a minute or so to draw an object or animal. Giggles guaranteed. We also do drawing challenges where we give each other mythical creatures to draw, then put our drawings up for critique. My highest praise from my son so far has been “pretty good” – and, considering my drawing skills stunted around age five, I’m chuffed.
Learning origami together is great too. Those nimble kid fingers are well suited to the smaller folds. Origami jumping frogs are a favourite – as it quickly segues into a frog race across the dining table, we’ve also broken out the ruler to see whose frog can jump the highest.
Then there’s paper planes to really test the engineering minds, and with hundreds of different types, it can involve numerous test flights and tweaks with deep discussion, analysis and fine-tuning.
You could of course go wild and introduce scissors and glue and sparkles to any of these activities, but by keeping it simple the cleanup is way easier.
