Now I have to start with a disclaimer. I’m not one of those mum’s that’s good at thinking up creative activities. Basically when it comes to keeping my 3yo entertained I am looking for things that require minimum set-up and almost zero creative skills. I also have a baby daughter, so I like (need!) to do things that make it easy to look after her at the same time too. 

As much as I love spending time with my children, at times the days are long and sometimes, no matter how hard I try, I struggle to come up with new things to fill the days and to keep my son entertained. I also find that getting out of the house is the best option for us.

This is an article for those mums like me who are looking for fun things to keep their young children occupied but who struggle to come up with ideas each and every day.

Here’s my go-to list of free activities and ideas for entertaining toddlers:

Park

Ok, this one is a given. However, rather than go back to the same old parks each day, I make quite an effort to make sure we are exploring new ones. Sometimes I purposely go to ones in a totally different suburb, as this way not only does it keep my son entertained for longer, I can also guarantee both kids nap on the way home.

Library

We recently discovered our local library and it’s now made it on the weekly activity schedule. My son loves books, and we can fill in a good hour with him looking at all the kids books and the two of us sitting on the floor reading together. I highly recommend the library as a great activity. We only started going after COVID hit so ours isn’t running story-time anymore, but if it starts up again we will definitely add that to the list.

Picking Mulberries

We are lucky to have a mulberry tree near our house, and the branches overhang into our driveway. Whilst it can be quite messy, during spring this is a really fun and delicious way to spend some time. If you don’t have a mulberry tree nearby, although not nearly as tasty, we also love sitting in the grass and looking for 4-leaf clovers.

Watch Trains (or Busses or Ferries)

This is something my son LOVES to do. We live about a 15 minute walk from a train overpass and a train station. When I’m really struggling to think of things to do we go for a walk to the overpass or the station and watch the trains go by. Sometimes we’re able to catch the train drivers eye and he gives us a wave – which really makes my son happy. Don’t worry if you’re not near a train-line, you could do the same by sitting at a bus station or ferry terminal.

Local Gardens

Near our house we have a public garden which has some beautiful walking tracks. It’s a nice alternative to walking around the streets. My son normally finds a stick along the way and I’m often amazed at how his imagination races off as he plays with his stick while we walk around. Depending on what we find we often chat about the bees or the different coloured flowers and types of plants. He is often fascinated and it’s always a nice reminder to me too about paying attention to the small details in our surroundings. Check your local council website for public gardens in your area if you’re not sure where to go.

Picnic

For this one you actually don’t even need to leave your yard. Instead of eating lunch at the table, sometimes I just set lunch up on a blanket outside (but you could do a balcony, or even on the lounge room floor if necessary). The change of normal routine really makes a difference and we pretend we are eating ice-creams and cakes and all sorts of treats.

Treasure Hunt

Again, this one doesn’t require you to leave your yard (or your house), but it can actually be done anywhere. As I said, I’m not good at setting things up, so rather than hiding ‘treasure’ I just use things in nature – such as ‘find an ant’, ‘find a brown leaf’, ‘find a feather’. Sometimes (especially if I’m running out of things for him to find and I want a break) I’ve been known to throw in some random ones like find a purple rock, or find a grasshopper haha

Count the Houses

This was an activity we started doing during lock-down when the parks were closed. To get out of the house and to give my husband a chance to get some work done (at that stage his desk was set up in the lounge room – and I think that iso showed us all that working at home with children was almost impossible) we would go for walks around the street and ‘count the houses’. My son was going through a stage where he was fascinated by numbers, so we would just go for a walk around the block and he would stop out the front of EVERY. SINGLE letterbox and we would read the numbers out together. Apart from being a way to fill in time, it was actually very educational for him. His number recognition picked up so quickly and even now, this is still something he enjoys doing.

Make Pancakes

I’ve learnt that you can make ‘pancakes’ out of almost any ingredients you can scrape together – whilst lots of pancake recipes call on flour as the base ingredient, you can substitute this for oats, bananas, or almond meal. I’m pretty sure that I’ve never used the same ingredient mix twice… Basically I look at what I have in the fridge and the cupboard, mix it together and just focus on trying to get the consistency right. They almost always turn out ok! But, if you prefer to follow a recipe here’s one for Blueberry Pancakes from the Healthy Mummy

Water Play

An easy one that can be done in so many ways. Depending on the time of day, I ask him to ‘help’ me to water the plants, my son loves using the hose. Or if it’s a cold day, just get a few plastic containers out of the cupboard, and some utensils, add a bowl of water and voila – you’ve got a fun activity that will keep them occupied for awhile. Use food colouring or lego people to change it up a bit.

Another great water-play activity is to give a bowl of water and a paintbrush and ask them to paint the fence, or paint the rocks. Or, if it’s been raining, throw on some gumboots and go searching for puddles

Make sure you check for any water restrictions before doing this one, and always be there to supervise.