Winter is coming, and with it about a million more steps to getting out the door if you have small kids. Finding the gloves, getting all bundled, unbundling if someone needs to go potty, rebundling, and facing the cold is enough to motivate us to just stay home and skip the snowman-building. I encourage you to plan some activities out of the house and face the cold anyway once in a while, but here are some ideas for how to mix it up a little at home to try to fight the stir-craziness!
Some quality “Me time”
Sometimes we dread winter, but it can feel so good to embrace some things that you’d only think to do this time of year. Buy a new candle, get a cozy sweater, make hot chocolate more often. Carve out some time every day while your toddler is sleeping or while intentionally using screens for them as a tool to recharge by yourself, wrapping yourself in a blanket with a great book or Netflix show. Scheduling it into your day can be a way to prevent guilt, because it isn’t like you’re sneaking away to do something you shouldn’t. Plan for it, allow yourself to enjoy it, and after the show you scheduled, switch gears and do something that your brain thinks is “more productive”. (Psst! Resting and having fun is also productive!)
Read-a-thon
Winter is a fun time of year to get out blankets and pillows, maybe on your bed or your toddler’s bed, and read through a bunch of books together. Or build a little tent with sheets and furniture first and read in there. Let yourself get lost in this if it’s fun. I think winter is a good time to slow down and rest more, if you can.
Destination Day
Feeling stir-crazy? Want to get out? What if you had a destination day once in a while? Think of a place that you’d like to go one day, and learn more about it TODAY. Let yourself dream of what it would (will!) be like someday to go there. Look at pictures, try a typical recipe, watch a YouTube video, maybe even dress up (your littles will like this!). Part of this idea is inspired by my grandma. She used to do this once in a while: when she served tacos, she’d dress up in a Mexican-style dress and have the table decorated with anything she had that would coordinate. The point is to not give yourself more work to do, or to make it fancy enough to show on social media (unless you want to!), but just have a little fun for yourself and your family to mix things up. And then one day when you DO go to that destination in real life, you’ll be a little more prepared because you researched it and dreamed of going one day on a cold, winter day. They say anticipation of a trip is just as wonderful as the trip itself. And there’s no harm in anticipating and dreaming even years ahead of time.
Have an Appreciation Day
We do birthdays, of course, but it’s fun once in a while to do an appreciation day for a person or a thing you love. This could look like a day where you celebrate a certain animal your kids love, for example. You could do a craft with that animal as the theme, make a snack that looks like that animal, or just share what you like about the animal. You could pretend to be that animal.
One day we pretended to be pet dogs and the kids ate their cereal out of a bowl on the floor, just for fun.
Or you could appreciate a person (who better than Mommy!) in a different way than a birthday, because it’s spontaneous. Just take some time to rediscover little things that contribute to you feeling happy and do a few of them, or draw pictures or talk about what is awesome about mommy.
Make a movie
You can make it for a loved one’s birthday “a day in the life of grandpa” or based off of a book or movie your family loves. These can be super fun because it encourages creativity and can be watched for years to come as it’s a way to document where your little family is at right now. We have made some fun movies like these over the years: see one here!
Rearrange furniture for more fun
We have two (mismatched) couches in our main room, and sometimes to mix it up we push them together and turn them into a “boat”. The kids love pretending to be pirates, and if I’m not playing with them, I get a chance to clean up what has crept under the couch and vacuum where I don’t normally to do a deep-clean. Don’t have two couches? Even just moving the furniture you do have around a little can help you feel refreshed and can inspire new adventures for the kids. The floor is lava, for instance.
Write snail mail
Get some envelopes and have your kids draw a picture to send to a friend or family member that lives far away (or even in the same town!). Then write them a little letter on the back about how you feel about them and what you like about them. This will make someone’s day! We are so used to texting and easy ways to communicate, and just getting bills or junk mail. How awesome would it be to receive a good ol’ snail mail!
You can also write yourself some letters to open in 5, 10, 20 years. That would be super cool to open one day.
Make a time capsule
Get a shoe box and put in some photos, predictions of the future, funny things your littles say, and a few special items. Your kids will love to participate decorating the box and contributing a few things. You don’t have to bury it in the ground either, just put it in your messiest room or in the back of a closet or storage room. And then one day when you’re nesting and end up deep-cleaning your house, you’ll find it again! We do this to open every leap day, and the very best thing is the funny quotes. I just have my kids answer some questions like “What do you like about mommy? What do you want to be when you grow up? What’s it like to be a four year old?” And their answers are gold.
Hide nice notes or $5 bills for your future self or for your partner.
This is also fun to wait til the end of winter to do, and then put money in your coat pockets. You may forget over the spring, summer, and fall, and then it’s a lovely thing when you’re out on a cold day and have an extra $5 to treat yourself to a hot chocolate or something!
Gamify a chore
5 points if you can shoot the sock bundle into the laundry basket across the room! Set a timer to clean up a room with fun music playing, and stop right when the timer goes off. Mop your floor with a little water and socks as you dance around like nobody’s watching.
I’m going to just include one more (bonus) idea that’s outside the house, in case you want to bundle up and try it, because we had SO MUCH FUN doing this last winter.
Caroling
Make some cookies or write some nice notes and go around your neighborhood caroling. This is a pleasant surprise to the neighbors and is fun for littles too! People aren’t used to a knock on the door unless it’s somebody selling something, so it’s a welcome surprise to see little bundled faces, singing Christmas carols or giving a treat. And when we did this, the kids kept running to the next house, saying “just one more!”
I hope you liked these ideas and will try one or two this winter! And if you do feel bored/ down/ stir-crazy, it’s ok. Like winter, like everything, this too will pass.
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