Are you leaving all of the entertaining of your children to the television? I don't blame you. Watching television is so cheap!
Some recent studies show that now as many as 83 percent of kids are watching two hours of television or more each day, while an incredible 90 percent of toddlers spending that much time around the tube. That does not give them that much time to interact with people.
Activities with others and in the great outdoors allow for happier, less anxious kids that feel better and are more relaxed. A sedentary kid is going to be a fat and unhappy kid.
You do not have to spend a fortune to play with your kids or make them feel more active. All you have to do is make them simple forts out of boxes and blankets. Any big cardboard box can easily be turned into a castle or a fort. Cardboard boxes and tubes also make great rocket ships. You can make your little girl a kitchen complete with fridge and stove out of cardboard boxes.
It is not that hard to find large boxes. You can find them at stores that carry appliances.
One warning – if you are cutting cardboard, do it by yourself. Your child's safety scissors cannot handle thick, stiff cardboard.
There are also hundreds of fun crafts that your kids can make. You can find instructions for most of them online. You can have them build their own kite and fly it in the back yard. You can have them put together a popsicle stick house or have them build a boot scraper mat out of bottle caps. One of the most fun and simplest of toys is a phone connected by a string and made out of two empty tin cans.
Awakening your kid's creativity is as simple as giving them some paper and colored pencils. You can also let them decorate their own room using washable paints. They can draw all over the walls and you can wipe it clean later.
To get your kid off the couch and walking take a field trip to somewhere free. Go view the nearest public government buildings or take a walk in a part. Some kids enjoy strolls through cemeteries. Basically a kid will go anywhere with you. For them, the quality time has to do with the connection to you. So it does not really matter where you go as long as the two of you are together.