Playing through Winter

For me, January, February, and March are the toughest months of the year. The holidays are over. Sunshine is scarce; the days are short. It’s cold.  Stinkin’ cold. So stinkin’ cold that a two-year-old might walk outside and promptly say, “It really cold. My teef (teeth) hurt.”

On top of all that, it’s flu season. We really don’t want to risk getting sick again, which means this mama is about to go stir crazy!

It’s time to get back into fun, creative, at-home play. Here’s what we’ve done so far:

Cotton Ball Snowman

Inspired by an online tutorial (here), we made a snowman.

I drew three circles. The toddler helped me squeeze out glue. She added the cotton balls.

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I drew a little hat. She cut it out. (Yes! By herself!)

I drew one arm. She drew the other.

We added buttons (pom poms).

We added eyes.

The toddler saw no reason to stop with just two eyes, so our snowman has five eyes. None of them actually made it on his face.

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Colored Snow

We’ve had one notable snow storm so far, and it melted so fast we hardly got to enjoy it. Oh well, I’m sure there will be more. Probably in April or something. This is Indiana, after all.

One day we had a few minutes to kill while we were waiting for Daddy to get home for lunch. Inspired by this article, we grabbed the condiment bottles we use in our water table, filled them with water, and added a few drops of food coloring.

Then we went outside to “color the snow pink.”

It didn’t take long for her to empty the bottles and ask for a refill.

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At one point she said, “Look, Mommy! I make heart!” What do you know? That does look like a heart.

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Are you collecting ideas for toddler play on pinterest? If so, send me the link to your board! I collect most of my ideas on my “Baby Play” and “Toddler Play” boards.

Any other winter activities you think we should try?

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3 thoughts on “Playing through Winter”

  1. Very sweet, Rachael! If you are looking for more wintery fun, maybe you could try blowing bubbles outside! I hear the bubbles should freeze in really cold weather and shatter when they land. I don’t know if it really works, but it may be fun to try

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