Do kids still play Hide & Seek? You know, where some kids go hide and one person tries to find them? Well, what happens when there aren’t enough kids around to play? Or maybe the “big kids” have gone off to school and only the youngest is left at home? You can try this new twist on the Hide & Seek game! You don’t need anything but a few toys that are already in your house. All you do is collect up a few favorite toys and hide them for your child to find. I know…too simple? But it can be lots of fun!
Here’s Clifford the Big Red Dog hiding under the covers.
Here’s a little shoulder buddy hiding among the boxes of cereal.
Depending on the age of the kids playing how hard you make the hiding places. If younger kids are playing, make sure to leave a little of the toy visible.
Matchbox Jeeps love to drive on books!
Sock monkeys go bananas for bananas!
You can give little hints if the hunt goes on for too long. Maybe Tommy Turtle got too hot and decided to find a place to cool down. (Yes, he’s in the refrigerator.) 😉
This gorilla must be wanting to help make supper!
The older the kids are that are playing, the smaller the toys might be.
Or just for fun, ask your child to set the table for supper and hide a fun toy in the silverware drawer.
You can make a whole game out of this idea or just randomly make things disappear to places the kids will come across them and be surprised. Or start with a new toy that you hide and whoever finds it, tells everyone where they found it and they get to be the next person to hide it. This can be an ongoing game that keeps everyone grinning. Hope you’ll have fun playing Hide & Seek a new way! 🙂
Do you ever wish you had something NEW the kids could do without going out and spending a ton of money? What if there was a game that takes some really simple supplies that you likely have on hand already? This game can be played with just some simple pom poms, drinking straws and either some painters tape or strips of paper and scotch tape. And a table or floor to play on. 😉
The basic idea of this game is to use a straw to blow the pom poms to a certain place. This game can easily be adapted for young kids to adults. I suggest each person has their own straw and 4 differently colored pom poms but the number of pom poms can vary. Let’s start out with the simplest way to play and then move on to harder ways.
To set up the game, begin by placing a strip of painters tape across the table, close to one end but allowing 6″ or so of the table open on the very end. I suggest painter’s tape because it should come back up easily and not hurt the table. If you don’t have painters tape, you can use a strip of paper and tape it down with scotch tape.
Next place another strip further down the table…maybe 12″-15″ away.
Now you are ready to play the easiest version of the game. Player #1 takes his/her pom poms and puts them on the end of the table by the first piece of tape.
Using their straw, player #1 blows through the straw while aiming the straw at a pom pom.
See how the pom pom has moved past the first line?
Keep blowing each pom pom until all 4 pom poms have crossed the line further down the table. NO HANDS ALLOWED!! 😉
If you want, two players can go at the same time.
You can decide on what rules of the game you want to use. For instance, can the players help each others pom poms across the line or must each player do their own? If the pom pom is blown off the table, does it go back to the starting point or can it be placed back on the table close to where it fell off? The ages of the players can determine how hard you want this game to be.
Now, let’s make it a little bit harder. Put a piece of painter’s tape down the center of the 2 strips already on the table. When each person takes their turn, they must keep all of their pom poms on their side of the tape. Add a third piece of tape even farther down the table for the finish line.
Now I added a piece of tape on the outside edges on both ends. (This is a side view.) At this level the players also cannot blow their pom poms outside the side edge or that pom pom must be placed back at the beginning. Players can race against each other or each player can be timed and the player with the fastest time is the winner. You can make this level be that all 4 pom poms must be together in the first “box” before they are blown on across the table past the finish line.
Ok, it’s getting harder now! Place more tape on the table so that each side has 4 small boxes. I drew a line down the center for a reminder to stay on your side. (Another side view)
This level can be that each player must have 1 pom pom in each of their 4 squares at the same time before they can move on toward the finish line. (Side view)
Or you can choose which squares the pom poms must be in to be able to move on. Like in this picture, 2 pom poms in the 2 squares that were picked.
Here is another version where one player plays at a time and you time each player. One pom pom must be inside each square in the first row.
Then each pom pom must be blown into a separate square on the second row.
Next, all 4 pom poms must be in the space in front of the finish line before…
…all pom poms are blown past the finish line. An extra rule would be that pom poms cannot be left sitting ON the tape…they must be inside the appropriate area. Again, decide what happens if a pom pom is blown off the table…start over or put it back where it fell off? 😉
Here’s another angle to decide before you play…where do the balls start from? Do they all have to be together in a line?
Or can they be placed more strategically across the starting area?
One more idea for you…give each player 4 pom poms of 3 colors. And make them follow the last game I described but 1 pom pom of each color must be blown into each square before moving on to the next step!
I’m sure you can come up with even more ways to play this game! Start out easy and gradually increase the difficulty. You can also give players a set amount of time to finish. For example, they have 30 seconds to blow the pom poms across the finish line. I hope these ideas will spark some ideas of your own and you will have a ton of fun with just some pom poms and drinking straws! 🙂
Hello and welcome to a new week at The Kids Niche! Today we’ll talk about a super easy and simple matching game. The first way we played it was using buttons we had around the house. (If you don’t have buttons, its ok…keep reading please.) Pick out several button pairs so you have 2 that match. Lay them out on the table or counter and mix them up.
The age or ability of the children playing can determine how many sets of two you use. Let the children match the button pairs up. If there is more than one child playing at a time, they can take turns finding matches. There isn’t really a winning person in this activity, but everyone wins when all the matches have been made!
Also depending on the age of the kids playing, how hard you make the matches. For instance, these two sets of buttons look very similar. But one set is white and the other is shiny.
These two sets of buttons look the same except they are different sizes. Be careful of using too small of sizes for the younger kids because we don’t want anyone putting things in their mouth and choking on them!
Maybe you don’t have buttons at your house? Lego pieces work great for this activity too. Follow the same instructions that we used for buttons.
All matched up!! Good job!
You can use whatever items you might have around the house. Maybe crayons or blocks or hair barrettes. The idea is just to have things that you have two of for the kids to sort out the pairs. I hope you and the kids have fun trying out this game! 🙂
The Kids Niche 