HOW TO ENGAGE KIDS DURING THE HOLIDAYS

Are you worried about how to engage kids during the holidays ? You are not alone ..

The holidays are here and even though it can be a wonderful time to bond with the kids and allow yourself loosen up and really spend some play time with them, it can also be a super stressful time especially for mums.

Managing and ensuring the kids do not misbehave during this period due to boredom put a lot of pressure on parents. To avoid this, it is important to plan ahead and prepare oneself with a list of activities to engage kids during the holidays.

Plan out each day/week in advance. The kids are happier and more relaxed when they have planned activities to look forward to.

Be sure to involve them in the planning process though. To ensure the planned activities are the ones they actually enjoy doing and prevent complains and grumpiness.

Here’s how to engage kids during the holidays.

• Baking and cooking: Plan a cooking/baking day involving the kids in the entire process. From choosing recipe to shopping and if they are of the reading age allow them read the recipe book themselves and help them work through the instructions . Resist the temptation to do it yourself because it may be faster. Adam loves to read cooking/baking instructions to me, while Asher enjoys getting his hands in the actual mixing, and cooking process.

• Swimming class: The holiday is an opportunity to hone in on their swimming skills if they are not so perfect yet! Swimming is big on our plan this holiday . Adam is a lot better with his swimming skills but Asher is still a newbie! Plus swimming sessions have a way of calming kids. They are less active when they return home because of the amount of energy used in the water.
• Visit Nature walks /parks /picnics : Go on adventurous nature walks to a beach, parks like the Lekki conservation centre ! Or the JJT park in Ikeja for a super fun time.

• Organize play dates: Let them have some time to play with friends kids. Plan some play dates and invite friends over. It could be their school mates or your friends/ family kids. This will give you time to yourself and allow you get some work done especially if you are a work from home Mum or allow you connect and network with other parents while the kids play!!

• Visit the library: If there’s a library in your environment, church, or family club, I recommend you take the kids there to encourage their reading habit and interests! This will keep them occupied productively and also create avenue for networking with other kids . Recently my husband and I have been encouraging a reading habit at our home with Adam reading to Asher at night and constantly teaching him how to pronounce words better. Give your children a love of books – it’s probably one of the best gifts you can give to them.
• Fuel their interest: What better way to engage the kids during the holiday than to actually encourage and fuel their interest be it in football, art, music, jewelry making, painting ,music , make up etc. 
• Get them enrolled in schools/ academies that may be offering vocational holiday classes to foster their interest. Busola Dakolo is having a photography class for kids from age 7 and above . Details here. For kids interested in film making and film directing this may be useful  . There is  also a  summer fashion illustration class for teenagers from age 13-18 by popular illustrator LeanKid. Details here 
• Summer Diary: Nothing beats creating memories especially if the plan is to show their friends and schoolmates after the holiday is over ! Encourage them to create a diary of things they did during the holidays .This will keep them busy for hours and can include pictures of special days and activities they got involved in during the holidays that they can show to friends when school resumes.
• Chill day out/Movie: It is important that kids get some chill time after all of the engaging activities planned. Plan days where everyone generally just relax, read a book, watch movies , eat and refresh. Nothing more.
• Short Trips: Travel shouldn’t be excluded from the list of fun-filled activities you should engage the kids during the holidays. You can simply plan a 2-3 days trip away from home with the kids to a not too far destination away from home. If you happen to live in Lagos, one of the places you can go to is Ogun state which has a number of amazing and historical spots you could visit. And with a kids friendly hotel like Park-Inn by Radisson in the city’s metropolis, you can easily visit “Olumo Rock” with the kids and shed off a few pounds of weight while climbing atop the rock.
• Digital/Tech Classes: Nothing beats giving your kids early knowledge about the digital world and tech in general while they’re still pretty young. There are a few tech companies who engage and educate young kids in areas of tech such as coding, graphics design amongst others.

I hope you find this post useful and it helps calm your worries about how to engage kids during the coming holiday . I am absolutely looking forward to the holiday as we have so much planned already.

Kindly let me know your thoughts and if you like me to do more posts like this.

Thank you for stopping by

Be sure to follow me:

Bloglovin ,  Instagram , Twitter , Facebook for updates.

Till next time…..