How does your child relax after school/nursery in the winter?

[lechatnoir]

When the weather's good my boys will happily stay outside playing in the park/on bikes (supervised - they are only 2 & 5!) or in garden but in winter I struggle to keep them occupied without my constant attention which isn't always practical as I have dinner to cook mumsnetting & chores to do and I try & avoid having the TV on too much . They'll both play with toys either together or on their own for a bit but certainly not for the entire 3-4 hours. So what does your typical after school day look like?

My DD is 4 years old and goes to nursery in the morning. She has activities on two afternoons and the other afternoons if the weather is bad we will either go to the library, soft play or stay at home where she will play with her toys, colour in, paint, play with play dough, do jigsaws etc. Some of these she can do on her own and others she needs my help. DD can/will play for short periods on her own but does prefer my attention.

I?m quite lucky as I?m a SAHM so I will do most of the housework, chores etc while DD is at nursery. When I?m about to start dinner I will usually let DD watch some telly or if she does not want to, she will come and help me in the kitchen.

swimming - they are then knackered and zombied in front of DVD while I cook tea...

Plus mine will choose to play out for a bit in fairly miserable weather as long as kitted up. Unless it's really chucking it down.

Or what about drawing/painting? This depends a bit on the child - my DS1 (4.5) hated that kind of thing until very recently but now enjoys. DS2 (2.5) is more in to it and can go with minimum supervision on a good day.

I tend to get them "helping out". Even a two year old get get items from cupboard and fridge and put it in pans. The older child could carefully help with stirring and setting table. After dinner is washing up together ( usually followed by mopping floor due to spillages!)
I try to keep menus quick n easy to cook. Ur then free to do colouring/ jigsaws etc tho for some reason my oldest two insist on playing school, even when they've been there all day