Bored 7-year old

[judetheobscure]

It's the start of the Easter holidays and I know what the recurring theme will be - "what can I do now" and "I'm bored". We get this most days during term times and it multiplies exponentially during the holidays. Not helped by the fact that baby brother is not very well so won't be able to go out for a few days.

Dd is 7 years old, likes reading, drawing, playing on PC, has piano lessons and horse riding lessons. Thought of maybe cross-stitch type things - are there any kits suitable for 7 year olds? Any other ideas? Would be very grateful for any responses.

Jude - somewhere on here someone suggested a "busy box", which has worked fantastically for us. Basically you write on little bits of card activities/toys/games that they have and enjoy, and then when they say "what can I do" they get to choose soemthing from the box. We have 3 different colours according to who the activity is for (ds1 on own, ds1&ds2, or with adult supervision). Works really well for us.

Another hint - Post Office have some great fun stamps - 10 first class stamps (normal price £2.60) of fruits or veg. But then with them you get loads of stickers - eyes, hats, moustaches, legs, etc., etc. So you get to 'decorate' your stamp as a fruity face. I used this bribe to motivate my two to make and write Easter cards for all their friends and relatives - when they'd done a card they got to do the stamp too!

Re sewing - yes a 7 yr old with good co-ordination should be able to tackle a child's cross stitch - ELC certainly do some.

At the moment my 8 year old step DD finds us boreing.
I know she would rather park her bum down on the sofa and play with her gameboy or watch TV, but as we only all get together on weekends, then we try to organise some "family" activities.
As taking 3 kids out is usually quite expensive, we try to mix the expensive trips to cinema/bowling/indoor play centres, with some cheap ones like bike rides/rambling etc, usually involving a picnic.
We are also very lucky,as we live in Wales, all the Museums/heritage sites are FREE !!
In the house I usually do baking with them,and I buy packs of collarge materials from bargin book shops for 99p a pack, things like coloured feathers/sequins/pompoms/coloured pipe cleaners, this usually keeps them quiet for ages.
Proberbly, alot of these you already do, but they tend to keep my DS's 4.5yo and my step DD 7yo, amused.

My DS expressed an interest in learning to sew last summer (yessss, even though he's a boy!), when he was 7, and I just bought some of that material we used to do cross stitch with (I think it's called Binca), some yarns of thread of a few different colours and a tapestry needle, and he managed fine with that. I cut a bookmark size bit and he sewed his name and a border. I think it may have been a bit more satisfying than a kit, but then he wasn't very keen on owning any of the end results of any kits we saw, as they tend towards the girly end of the spectrum! There's also a good website called Homecrafts Direct I think (I'll find the proper URL if you're interested) that have loads of arty crafty type ideas, like masks for children to paint. She might like to try Fimo modelling clay, as it's more permanent than Playdoh and can be used for making jewellery and so on. The stamps sound great, KMG!

Cross-stitch should be fine - dd has done some 'samplers' at school.

A trip to PC World yesterday resulted in DD getting Harry Potter computer game (Philosophers Stone - was about 7 quid, I think), Junior Monopoly on CD=Rom and a 30 Games for Kids CD for children aged 7 and up. The last two were about a fiver each I think).

We've already had two weeks of holidays - only another 8 days to go - and have filled the time with trips out mainly. I bought National Trust membership (there are flyers around at the moment with three months free if you join now). We've also planted some hanging baskets thanks to Asda's cheap components.

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Origami is big here too - great for planes an trains and hospital waiting rooms and entertaining other waiting children who love the creations DD makes.

Best value origami paper I have found is available in two sizes from Muji.

Origami - tha t sounds good - I used to love doing that; will also try the busy box idea; and must get out her hama beads (iron-on things) - she did start doing them a while back. As you can see I'm keen on the ideas which don't involve going out and which don't make mess (I'm not really mean/stingy it's just with four children it's hard work!). They do have a big art and craft box which we get out when the youngest is asleep. Ditto baking, although we don't do a lot of it. Like the Homecrafts Direct website. Will save me the trek to the nearest HobbyCraft store.

Does anyone have any ideas for educational CDRoms or on-line learning. She loves playing the games but also enjoys those Letts Study books and I was hoping to steer her PC use to more educational purposes.

Although they're not educational in the same way as the Letts books, the CD-Roms that have held my childrens' attention the longest (and which I think are pretty good too) are the Thinkin' Things series (not so easy to get hold of now though) and the Zoombinis. There are 3 Cd-Roms of Zoombinis now, and we've got the first two, both of which are fab. They're basically teaching maths concepts without the children noticing. Everyone I know who has tried them (children ranging from 4 with parental help to 9 or 10) has loved them.
And finally, the URL I promised (though you've probably worked it out by now!)
www.homecrafts.co.uk/

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Thanks again; will give all the suggestions a try - she'll be keen to do anything with a PC!