Help me make a half term plan...

[FlowerFluffer]

... that respects that everyone basically just wants to stay in bed, but doesn’t entirely surrender to winter lockdown gloom....

5 kids aged 5 to 16.

So far I have buy in on ‘anti school’ (which means no screens until 4pm each day - cos they've had compulsory screens all day everyday pretty much this half term).

Today we will do Valentines things (but I don’t know what those things are yet...)

Tomorrow we will make pancakes

I am pushing for one day to be ‘walk with a friend in the park’ day - but my middle kid pretty much called me a Covidiot for that idea - they haven’t seen F2F anyone since school broke up).

We gotta do ‘cleaning’ as an intense thing at some point.

‘Walk’ I guess - but that’s now starting to be seen as a punishment after a few too many forced marches last month.

I tried to get my eldest enthused to make a mural for my youngest - but the response I got was ‘I slept 14 hours last night’ - so I guess no one wants to be on the hook for anything ambitious...

What are your DC interested in?
I don't know what to do to entertain older DC as my eldest is 9, and a lot of my ideas are sort of screen-based.
We started this
pawprintfamily.com/product/pancake-day-challenge-pack/
by making masks yesterday (they were supposed to be Mardi Gras masks to fit in with the theme but my DC have made very glittery cat masks).
I found a variety of online activities from museums, mostly art-based. I got most of these from a thread here last week, especially a post by museummum, linking to her blog which was full of ideas. I can't remember what it was called but I searched museummum blog and found it.
There are also theatres that have put children's shows online but that is screen-based.
If your DC are interested in nature other than 'forced walks', someone in another thread mentioned the Royal Parks are doing a week of daily activities that you can sign up for for free.
We will makes biscuits or cakes and might make our own hot cross buns (that might be a bit too ambitious).
Play some board games, do scavenger hunts round the house for very random things.
And some days I will give up and they will watch annoying youtubers on tv in their pyjamas.

Why don't you let them decide what they want to do? They might appreciate that more.

Maybe do some cookery. One child per day bakes. Younger ones - cakes, older ones, meals.

What about a 'coin toss adventure'? It's basically a walk but they don't need to know that! At every part of your walk where you have to pick left or right, you toss a coin and heads=go left and tails=go right. This gets my kids out of the house for the much needed walk but there's more of a buy in from them as where they'll end up is a mystery, and they like taking it in turns to be the one that throws the coin

I've no idea. Mine are young, and I REALLY want to get them out if the house now it's not bitterly cold. But we live rurally and have done the local walks to death. I usually try not to do too mich in half terms, as they like the chill out but but theyve been chilling out for almost a whole year now.

We've just discovered geocaching. Fun, free, outdoors. You just need a few party bag type toys to replace the prizes you find.

Unlimited screen time here. DCs have been in key worker school so it's more of a novelty for them being at home. They'll do a bit of gaming then play with lego etc after a while.

Painting by numbers sets-we have two on the go. Pleasingly time consuming! No thinking involved, just paint the sections.

Baking-banana bread today, pancakes tomorrow, cookies later in the week.

I'm going to clean the oven. Fun times.

Salt dough?! One day make and bake them off then paint the following day?
Board games tournament... Get a load of treats in and have an afternoon playing all the games and winner picks takeaway?
Make a treasure hunt for your walk... Just simple things like a green car, tree, bird, dog etc. I find it keeps mine more engaged and prevents the requests to go home.
Google pancake day crafts for tomorrow... We're making a spinner to pick toppings.

Ooh, salt dough. Good plan.

Mine also love a hotdog walk basically take some precut finger rolls, a bottle of ketchup and pre-warmed hotdogs in a flask... Walk for a bit, find a bench and whip out a hotdog for them!!
I don't know if it's because they dont get hotdogs at home or the novelty of eating outside but mine love it!!

Found this plan on FB. Think it might work for us.

Mine are younger (5 and 7)and we're going to do-
A picnic and scooting in the park
A nature day. I've bought some bird feeders that they can make and a bug hunter kit
A crafty day. We have dome family birthdays coming up so they'll make cards. I've bought a few bits from Hobbycraft, a canvas to colour, soap making etc.
A science day. Ds still has some GALT sets from Christmas to do and I've bought an experiments to do at home book.
Friday is party day do we'll bake and make decorations for that.
I'll have to clean one day. We'll do something pancake related tomorrow. I find that if I do one or two activities with them a day they're happy to play together for the rest of the day.

We do screen free 9-3 (better post this soon and move my bum!).
Aim for some form of excercise each day.
I've ordered some craft kits, and will aim to do something creative each day (this is likely to fail).
I too used MuseumMums blog, and we are doing stuff with the Jorvick Viking Centre and NASA.
Cooking will feature, as will endless rounds of Hive, which was the hit Christmas present.
Reading, cleaning.

I love hot dog walks idea!

www.sunspaceart.org/school-workshops/sunspaceart-steam-festival/

I just found this via a Facebook group. It has activities for all ages. If you click on the draft timetable, it tells you timings and whether the activity is for key stage 1, 2 or 3. It is screen-based though.

We broached the idea of everyone each cooking a meal for dinner this week. I just wanted the DC (9 and 10) to get some experience while we have nothing on, but it has exploded into a full on Come Dine With Me competition, with planning and cooking and "shopping" (online) and possibly prizes by the end of it...

Would yours be up for something like that?

I'm watching for ideas, particularly for my 13 year old. I'm finding it really hard now she's too old for craft kits and toys etc. The 11 year old is a bit easier so far!

My middle teens are into Warhammer - So a couple of new sets are motivating them to spend the time lying on their tummy playing with each other & painting the figures and such - which does help.

The eldest literally sleeps constantly - But she can be engaged into helping the younger ones if there is some specifically defined activity going on.

Cooking maybe ... not exactly adventurous eaters - But they do enjoy feeling independent and self-sufficient - so maybe if we work on some basic recipes and core cooking skills. I think one of the stresses of this last year has been the “arrested development” “babying”of being stuck in the house with me a lot more than they normally would have done.

DS (13) likes to tinker with stop motion so I’ve ordered him a green screen and challenged him to watch tutorials and do a big project. It means there are Lego and action figures everywhere but he seems to be enjoying it.

Thanks so much for the mention @badlydrawnbear, my half term blog post is museummum.com/2021/02/09/february-half-term-2021-virtual-things-to-do-with-kids/

It's got over 40 ideas in - I added new ones yesterday too. Most of them are free, so may as well try them. We've signed up for one zoom a day just as a bit of structure in the day, plus there's some you can do anytime. We have storytime, replica poo making, theatre, drawing, Royal Parks nature activities and Westminster Abbey Commonwealth open day booked.

We're also doing Pawprint badges and highly recommend their downloadable activity packs, which are free. We're doing the Year of the Ox - the free museum events we've signed up for count towards those; Keep connected - so sending things in the post to family and doing some online games with friends, painting stones or decorating our window as part of a larger Art Show; the Big Yolker badge for pancake day - we've already made two types of pancakes and will do some games tomorrow... They do a FB/IG live every day at 12 which showcases a new activity.

Hope this helps, and best of luck with it all. I have a large age gap with a now adult teen so know how much harder it is to get teens to engage with activities.

An animation app like Stop Motion Studio is fun on wet days. Use Playdoh, lego, paper cut outs, Stikbots, or pipe cleaners to make your figures. Screen them for the family at the end of the day.

Make pizzas from scratch. If they want dinner they'll have to get involved ;)

Pizzas are a good idea. Selection of toppings. Kneading the dough is good stress relief.

Final plan:

Monday: ‘Valentine’ (crafts & writing each other letters of appreciation)

Tuesday: ‘Pancake day’ (Make batter/design your own flavour/walk to shop to get extra toppings/ cook and ear)

Wednesday: ‘Self care day’ (Haircuts/skincare/yoga/feng shui their bedrooms)

Thursday: ‘Art Day’ (Make art and tidy up art cupboard)

Friday: ‘1:1 walks with a friend’

Saturday: ‘Science day’ (Watch some documentaries/ maths clinic for teens to check they are secure with last half term maths/ some science experiments)

Sunday: Chill day

It sounds a lot - but the ‘activity’ won’t actually take much time - and my expanded schedule also includes the house cleaning schedule (cos this morning I’m pissed off at doing way more
than my fair share).