How to deal with "I'm bored mummy"?

Every parent's worst nightmare is to hear "I'm bored Mummy!" Despite you arranging play dates, having millions of toys, organising fun days out, etc, kids always want more. There was time when I arranged days out every weekend to avoid those dreaded words but now I've cut all that down (I was spoiling them too much by taking them out every week). So now those words make an appearance very weekend without fail. Hence, I had to come up with a plan and quick.

I made a "I'm bored" jar. The jar includes things to do when they run out of ideas such as arts and crafts,  build a den, perform a story, etc. It does keep the kids entertained... sometimes. I also subscribed them to subscription boxes which they loved and made great family time.  I wrote a blogspot here: https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=4124083420943040106#editor/target=post;postID=6166131026687296463;onPublishedMenu=allposts;onClosedMenu=allposts;postNum=1;src=postname.  However, they could become quite expensive.

We do lots of arts and crafts too at home. Here are some of our favourite ones, which can be messy too:
1. Homemade play dough - all you need is oil, 1 cup of flour, 0.5 cup of salt, 1 cup of water, 2 tbsp of cream of tartar. You need to put all these ingredients in a pan and stir on the hob. It will get harder and harder to stir so you need to use a lot of muscle power. Once you got a nice lump, take it out and let it cool. Once cool, separate the dough into how many colour doughs you want and make a hole in the middle. Fill the hole with the colouring of your choice and knead it until the colour has covered the dough. No mess and the kids will love it.
2. Volcano - this never gets old. What we do is create a prehistoric land and build a volcano. The volcano include bicarbonate of soda and vinegar. And what you get is an exploding volcano.
3. Shaving foam fun - do you know how fun shaving form is? When the kids used to take bath together, to keep them entertained and busy, while I clean the house, i came across the foam art. It literally involved shaving foam coloured with food colouring and a paintbrush. The kids would paint themselves with this and the walls of the bath. It's so simple but it kept the kids busy and happy! Shaving foam can be used as finger paint too. Puffy dough with foam and cornstarch.
4.  Fake snow - again easy but so much fun. Cornstarch and conditioner.


We also do the standard things such as board games, cooking, baking, watching movies, going to park, cycling and so on. But I also love teaching them childhood games such as the lava game, elastic game, skipping rope games.

And yet, kids always need more! We can never win! But I hope this helps you!