I am amazed at the creativity of my kids sometimes! They come up with the craziest of games! We have been getting a number of boxes in the mail lately (giveaway bonanza is coming up celebrating our upcoming Tips and Toys Guide!!!) and with all the boxes we’ve gotten, we have amassed quite the mountain of packing supplies, crumpled butcher paper, bubble wrap, those air pocket things, boxes, etc. The kids were begging me to play with the mound heading for the recycle bin and I couldn’t resist! We discovered that packing materials are a great resource for developing gross motor skills! Here are five things my kids thought of as ways to amuse themselves with the packing materials:
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1) Dodgeball! We made “snow balls” and had fun pelting each other. Then we tried to see who could throw the farthest, who could throw the “balls” into the basket, etc.
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2) Sword fighting. The revolution of the ball game into a sword fight was a bit of a stretch for me to follow. Z has recently moved on from his obsession with firefighters to a love soldiers. And Mom, don’t you know soldiers have swords. They made a “snake” with some of the paper and had fun wacking each other with it. Sorry, no photos, too busy acting as referee.
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3) Pretend play. First they used the paper to create a tent, then a sleeping bag and finally to pretend that they were turtles as they creeped along the floor with “shells” on their backs. I am sure they could have come up with more pretend uses for the paper but it was slowly and surely being ripped to bits.
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4) Stomping. Bubble wrap is fun! Popping it with your hands is fun, but it is even more fun if you stomp on it! We even tried to stomp in a rhythm.
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5) Clean up! Even the clean up of this activity was a lot of fun as they raced around to collect all the little scraps and stuff them into the recycling bin.
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Who knows, maybe someone else out there has a ton of boxes coming their way and wants a way to entertain the kids for a morning. Our kids had a blast!
I am amazed at the creativity of my kids sometimes! They come up with the craziest of games! We have been getting a number of boxes in the mail lately (giveaway bonanza is coming up celebrating our upcoming Tips and Toys Guide!!!) and with all the boxes we’ve gotten, we have amassed quite the mountain of packing supplies, crumpled butcher paper, bubble wrap, those air pocket things, boxes, etc. The kids were begging me to play with the mound heading for the recycle bin and I couldn’t resist! We discovered that packing materials are a great resource for developing gross motor skills! Here are five things my kids thought of as ways to amuse themselves with the packing materials:
.
.
.
1) Dodgeball! We made “snow balls” and had fun pelting each other. Then we tried to see who could throw the farthest, who could throw the “balls” into the basket, etc.
.
.
.
2) Sword fighting. The revolution of the ball game into a sword fight was a bit of a stretch for me to follow. Z has recently moved on from his obsession with firefighters to a love soldiers. And Mom, don’t you know soldiers have swords. They made a “snake” with some of the paper and had fun wacking each other with it. Sorry, no photos, too busy acting as referee.
.
.
.
3) Pretend play. First they used the paper to create a tent, then a sleeping bag and finally to pretend that they were turtles as they creeped along the floor with “shells” on their backs. I am sure they could have come up with more pretend uses for the paper but it was slowly and surely being ripped to bits.
.
.
.
4) Stomping. Bubble wrap is fun! Popping it with your hands is fun, but it is even more fun if you stomp on it! We even tried to stomp in a rhythm.
.
.
.
5) Clean up! Even the clean up of this activity was a lot of fun as they raced around to collect all the little scraps and stuff them into the recycling bin.
.
Who knows, maybe someone else out there has a ton of boxes coming their way and wants a way to entertain the kids for a morning. Our kids had a blast!
How amny times have you bought them something expensive, and it just didn’t “take”. My daughter doesintricate and complicated things with boxes for hours on end!
.-= Amaria´s last blog ..Brotherly Love! =-.
We lovve stomping on bubble wrap (and my youngest is 9 LOL) There’s just something about bubble wrap that makes everyone a toddler 😉
.-= Loretta´s last blog ..Creative and Crafty Fun for Toddlers =-.
We love those biodegradable packing peanuts…if you lick them with the tip of your tongue, you can stick them together and create great sculptures!
Brilliant! Now if only people would mail me those! haha!
I love this…my kids are constantly rifling through the packing materials when we get a new box mailed to us! Thanks for stopping by my blog during UBP.
.-= Jen´s last blog ..Suggestions for Free/Cheap Orlando activities? =-.
Whenever I get a package with one of those giant sheets of heavy duty paper, we smooth it out and lay it on the kitchen floor and outline one of the children and then they have fun with the crayons and markers coloring on and outfit and drawing their faces, then we find some wall to hang it on for the day… the youngers think it’s a riot, at least ours do anyway, lol!
.-= ali´s last blog ..Multitude Monday 351-360 =-.