This post may contain affiliate links. If you click and make a purchase, I may receive a small commission, at no extra cost to you. I only recommend products and services I use and love. Thanks for supporting our little family!
We are coming up on a winter in a pandemic and I am totally not panicking. Living in Wisconsin has a few challenges, but my biggest might be entertaining children indoors on snow days or during arctic temperatures. Shoot, these are just great activities and toys for rainy days.
I wanted to start this off by saying it does not cost a single penny to be a great parent. You can make all kinds of fun activities up with things you already have. I am sharing links to some favorite things on our wish list just in case you want to see some ideas but please don’t feel that you are not enough if you never buy 1 thing here. YOU ARE ENOUGH. Your home is enough. Your parenting is enough.
One of our favorite indoor, energy spending activities is to put every pillow, stuffed animal or big blanket in a pile under the couch and jump off into the nest of soft stuff. We also like making tents. Find any tall item you can easily move (we use chairs) and spread a bed sheet over it. Hide and seek with toys – we like to hide puzzle pieces and then they have to complete the puzzle once they find them all. Cutting out circles of construction paper that are “rocks” and the rest of the floor is lava is a fun activity. We also swap some toys out each season so that they seem new again. Storage bins in a closet are perfect for that. At home scavenger hunts are really fun too! Feel free to share more ideas for free activities in the comments!
My kids love play tunnels. Hiding in them, crawling through them, making tents, you name it, they love it. Sometimes we make a scavenger hunt and mom hides little toys through the maze of tunnels for them to find: magnetic alphabet letters, dinosaurs, bugs, and then we play or learn with them. Here’s a deal on a really awesome tent and tunnel set! Another option without the ball pit here. < just click the links to see any of our favorites 🙂
A great energy burner is an indoor trampoline. We store our little one in our garage to save space in our house. This one seems safe to me because of the netting. Make sure you check out all of the small print to see if this is a good fit for your kiddo(s) but we love ours. It’s on sale and in stock as of posting time.
This one is such an old classic but so much fun! The colorful, flowy parachute you used to play cat and mouse with in gym class. This one is only 6 ft across so it’s a perfect indoor option. You can hide toys under, play peek a boo, roll a ball back and forth on top, so many fun play ideas with this parachute.
Not so much a toy, but an amazing storage solution for toys! We love these for dinosaur sets, legos, building blocks, or other small toys. You can take them out and then hide them away when you’re not playing with them. We like to make toys like this special occasion toys so that they don’t get sick of playing with them.
Energetic kid mamas – this one is for you! We don’t have this foam pogo stick yet but it’s on our winter fun wish list for sure. It looks like it could be a really good tool to get energy out. It holds up to 250 lbs so mom and dad can play too if they want.
This one might be my favorite on this whole list. Build your own fort with connectable, heavy duty tiles. The possibilities are endless. The price is reasonable too. The reviews look good. This one is on our list for Christmas.
This one won’t get out the most energy but it does occupy my kiddos for hours. This play table can be used for legos, trains, games, blocks, puzzles, you name it. It has hidden storage which is a winner for our house.
is the perfect get-out-energy activity. It lets you safely take out aggression towards your family members (lol jk). I like to catch my kids off guard or slide them quickly out of a bad mood by dumping these in the middle of the room and yelling “SNOWBALL FIGHT!”
If you have smaller kids (3 and under) this is a fun activity center for them. I like it for indoors because it has more than 1 purpose and use. It has good reviews! It’s a slide, climber, basketball hoop and teeter totter for little ones.
This thing might be the coolest ever. I like things that adults can participate in and I also like naps, so this is basically my dream. It’s a giant floor cushion and it is filled with rectangular foam pieces. Fun for kids, parents, pets, everyone. Your children can (kinda) safely launch themselves off of furniture without you cringing that you’ll have to mid-pandemic rush to the ER. #winning
Other favorites:
- Fat Brain Toys Teeter Popper
- Indoor Scooter
- Tent Clubhouse
- The Coolest Teeter Totter – if you have the space
- Seesaw Rocking Chair
I will add things on to this list as I see them! Keep the comments coming with your own ideas, too! Thanks for following us on this crazy journey we are living through together. We are glad you’re here with us.
Making it up as I go,
Monica ❤
Ellie Joe Design Co 