How to pass away the holiday with a child with few friends

[Ilovehatecleaning]

My DC doesn't have many friends and spends the holidays just with us. They are a young teenager now and get embarrassed if we go for a walk and they see groups of classmates. I completely understand why they would.
What can we do to help, make them less bored? They won't do organised activities at this age.

Sports camps or courses so they're doing an actual activity. Could be golf, tennis, football, taekwondo, sailing, windsurfing, canoeing. Don't need friends for these. Just turn up and follow the programme.

Or Coding or gaming groups if he's in to such things

Sorry @Ilovehatecleaning just noticed you said he won't do organised activities so those suggestions probably aren't much good

Feeling the same, mine do have friends but don't seem to meet up in the holidays. They get too old for those organised clubs.

Mine like gaming and sometimes talk to others online e.g. from school. e.g Minecraft etc

Few friends because they are an introvert who preffers their own company or few friends because they've found it challenging to find their own tribe?

One of the big things with my three has been giving them the choice.

Stay home or come on the walk, come to the shops but maybe do the ones that interest them first then let them do their own thing for a bit - we live near shops so they can go home or get a milkshake and make their way home.

I found with my middle son, with low self esteem, I needed to plant seeds for activities to do with friends - like this film is on at the cinema on x date at y time I could drop you and suggest a person if you fancy it. Or I'm going to the shopping centre do you want me to drop you off with a friend for 2 hours. He's got better as he's got older and has started aranging things more for himself and is less worried when people sometimes say no.

Cooking meals or cakes/ biscuits (without parent intervention) can be interesting, as can sending them out with the money to buy food for lunch.

Setting up a little money making scheme can be good for self esteem or trading in old games and tech at CEX and buying new stuff with the vouchers. Similarly lisiting on selling sites (with a little support) to generate funds (which teen doesn't need a bit of cash) - again its good life skills and great for self esteem. Things that give them an expereince/ something to talk about back at school.

The gym or play tennis with them.
If it would make them more comfortable travel a few miles so you don't bump into anyone they know.
Ask them to shop and cook a meal.
Pay them to clean the car/do some gardening.
Have a clear out and sell old toys etc on ebay.

Do you have a friend with a younger child that she could do some babysitting type time with - not real babysitting at this age now, but playing with them for an hour or so while the parent gets on with some work or similar?

Is there a biggish house or garden job they could help with - painting their own room or a fence/shed? Planting vegetables orca windowbox?

Could they tag along on activity with other family member.

Friend of mine goes out cycling with her 14 yr old straight after she finishes work at 4 in the holidays to get him out the house.

Neighbour of mine who works from home often takes his 2 boys (1 teenager, 1 younger) to golf course straight after he finishes work

Thank you for all the suggestions. They are shy and haven't found their own tribe but will definitely look at these suggestions. The Easter holidays are dragging and the summer ones are soul destroying

Is there a board game cafe near you?

Board games are such a trend and a good structured way to socialise for shy teenagers. If your dd gets to know how to play a few modern classics like Carcassonne and Imhotep they will have a social skill up their sleeve.

Here's what my homebody introverts have done/currently are doing:

Learning a language on duolingo
Learning and playing online chess
Gaming
Anime drawing, drawing/painting in general.
Pottery
Learn guitar
Make hibachi at home (admittedly, mine are totally into all things Japanese... so if there's a particular culture yours is into, maybe learning to cook dishes from that region could be fun).
They have not done all of this over the Easter holidays! No way. We are a very lazy family. But those are things they have done before or are currently doing.
We just avoid walking the dog where DD might run into high school friends. She's very much like your DC. Just doesn't like having people around, isn't a social butterfly, dies a death if she sees even one child from school. She just is happiest at home, creating her stuff. She's a very creative soul and lives inside her head a lot.

We're making our own Easter eggs this year.
Going out for walks, but taking the bus or train to somewhere a bit further away so we're unlikely to meet class mates.
Going to places as soon as they open and leaving after lunch e.g. crazy golf it was empty at 9am but we saw a group fron school in the queue when we left at 230.
Bike rides, skateboarding - again we tend to drive or train to somewhere. After all the kids from school took the piss of him trying to learn to skateboard (he has dyspraxia) he refused to go on it until I promised we would drive somewhere 30 minutes away so it was unlikely he's see anyone we knew.
Meet up with non school friends, although those are starting to drop us now as the children are all getting older.
DS doesn't have any friends at all though, so is usually happy to do stuff with us as a family.