How are you entertaining your grandchildren?

Endlessly – but I love it and them.

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PollyDolly what a great success our matchbox collection was!!! It took us a good hour and a half to find an amazing collection of feathers, seeds, stones, leaves etc on our campsite. ?. A water pistol was purchased for little brother as a present but of course we had to try it out before we brought it home for him!!

Mollygo

My DGD has asked me to help sort her bedroom out tomorrow. She said she has too much stuff to fit on her shelves. Evidently I have to be hard-hearted and encourage her to give up things she really doesn’t need. Oh and could we have Bao buns for lunch.

Whenever we go to visit, my five year old granddaughter "casually" asks, "Would anybody like to come and see my bedroom?"
This results in an hour or more of me admiring her toys, and tidying, folding and putting away her clothes, though I'm no longer allowed to make her bed as that's now one of her pocket money jobs!
Last month she wanted me to go through the clothes she'd got out ready to pack for our holiday to Greece ?
Precious times ?

I had my two great grandsons today, helped by their aunt DGD3
We went to the local leisure centre and DGD3 took the older boy who is 7 to ten pin bowling while I took the younger one who is 6 into the soft play area.He turned into a monkey swinging from ropes and climbing everywhere I was worn out just seeing an eye on him.
We then took them to where their mother , my DGD2 was working,(this is allowed in school holidays if they keep quiet),until she finished work.
A very happy and enjoyable day.

What a lot of nice ideas here!

On their last visit, my 2 Gc, 8 and 7 were delighted when I handed them scissors and said they could cut the dead flowers from my pots! They spent a quiet hour deadheading, while I had a glass of cider and supervised.

When it is hot, a small wading pool, or even just buckets and cups, colanders, small plastic figurines will keep them occupied and cool. Grampa saves bits of wood from his workshop, and I let them paint and make things (no nailing though!) GS 8 likes to make ramps with bits of wood and race his cars down them, GD 7 makes houses for her little figurines.

My DGD has asked me to help sort her bedroom out tomorrow. She said she has too much stuff to fit on her shelves. Evidently I have to be hard-hearted and encourage her to give up things she really doesn’t need. Oh and could we have Bao buns for lunch.

PollyDolly love the matchbox idea for camping ?

One year I had planted a pot of peas and my GC happened to visit. They spent over an hour sitting (in the shade) picking the peas, podding them and eating them raw.

Camping in the back garden is also well loved.

Ohmother

WOW there’s some brilliant ideas here. As an update I’m taking my ‘never sits still’ 5 year old granddaughter camping for two nights to a place where they have a few animals, a steam train over the road, a castle and a model village in the nearby village. I hope she likes it ?

That sounds lovely Ohmother, have the best time! When my two were little we would often go camping, I would take empty matchboxes and challenge them to fill them with was many small items as possible. Also took bars of cheap soap for them to decorate with stuff.

Making orange juice is a regular activity that my grandson loves.
It takes longer than you'd think! He often asked to do it.

We made "fry bread" as my 4 year old granddaughter had read a book about indigenous American families making fry bread and what it meant to them.

Lots of easy recipes online. Cooked it in coconut oil. Very successful and not difficult.

pinkjj27

I invested in a padding pool in lockdown which I filled and covered before the hose pipe ban, I even got in myself last week. I play games with them like, I am a food, what food am I, am I healthy or unhealthy food , I teach them about nature and growing things. We made bird food cakes last week and a bug hotel. We have been crafting and having fun in the kitchen, We have made jellies, ice lollies and no cook healthy goodies . I look for things in charity shops before the holidays like bundles of comics and crafty things, so there is quite a supply of things to do. We made these plant pot people a few weeks ago. This one is me

Those plant pot people are a great idea ?????? You look beautiful x ?

WOW there’s some brilliant ideas here. As an update I’m taking my ‘never sits still’ 5 year old granddaughter camping for two nights to a place where they have a few animals, a steam train over the road, a castle and a model village in the nearby village. I hope she likes it ?

I live in Australia where 6 months of the year we have hellish heat and humidity so I know what you all are going through, when the temp is high my great grandson (age 4) spends all his time at mine playing with water, we water plants, we have a pool we put a tarp on the grass in semi shade and he makes a water slide, he literally spends his whole day with us in his swimmers.

Paddling pool ,they play happily for ages in it.?

I invested in a padding pool in lockdown which I filled and covered before the hose pipe ban, I even got in myself last week. I play games with them like, I am a food, what food am I, am I healthy or unhealthy food , I teach them about nature and growing things. We made bird food cakes last week and a bug hotel. We have been crafting and having fun in the kitchen, We have made jellies, ice lollies and no cook healthy goodies . I look for things in charity shops before the holidays like bundles of comics and crafty things, so there is quite a supply of things to do. We made these plant pot people a few weeks ago. This one is me

I had my 9 year old granddaughter for one week and I took her swimming, to GoApe and to a theme park where I had to go on scary rides with her. She loves them, I just closed my eyes tight and prayed! I then had my 7 year old grandson for a week and did the same with him but not GoApe. Again I had to go on scary rides! Again I closed my eyes and prayed! Granddaughter is Autistic/ADHD and grandson has ADHD. They don’t sleep well at night, want snacks all the time and can’t sit still for long periods.

I have two of mine today and overnight until tomorrow evening. The eldest is 15 and does his own thing, his brother is 6 and never sits still. We picked some apples first thing and are hoping to go and pick some blackberries to make a crumble later (although it’s still a bit warm here to have the oven on) I didn’t sleep last night and had to be up at 6am to go and pick them up so feeling a bit jaded. I have some pebbles and paints for the youngest to do and he also loves helping in the garden so I will get him to water the containers. We will take the dog out later when it’s cooler, we are forecast thunderstorms here today, quite looking forward to sitting watching that. I might run out and just cool off in the rain!!

I had considered taking two of my younger GC to see the Railway Children Witzend what a shame you had to leave, not what I expected, what I saw of the trailer led me to believe it would be quite a gentle, feel good film much like the original. Will probably give that a miss.

How old are your Gdcs, Chris3?

I took my two elder (6 and 7) to see the new Railway Children film, since they’d been asking to see it, but it was nothing like I expected. They found it scary and upsetting and we left before the halfway point.

When the British Board of Film Censors thing came up at the beginning I was startled to see ‘violence,, racism’ etc. mentioned - should have checked first, I know, but to me ‘Railway Children’ in the title suggested a gentle sort of film, like the original. Dd said she’d expected the same.

I had four of my grandchildren staying for the whole week in all the heat. (Went home yesterday) we had such a lovely time. They played in the Brook at the end of our garden most days and we took a picnic to another river a couple of times. All meals in the garden. Today its raining so I guess we had the best of the weather.

Takes a bit of time to freeze solid but I put a big container of water in the freezer for a couple of days.

When it's really frozen then it's fun to sprinkle a little bit of salt on top and hear it crackle, dribble food colouring and see where it goes inside the ice, try to melt it using just your hands.

Sometimes I freeze little objects - a penny, a flower - in it and we have to 'release' them.

Georgesgran

I’m going to tie mine up while I lie down in a dark room!!
Only joking.
We have a farm nearby with lots of animals and play equipment. They do a child’s picnic in a box - so we’re off there with plenty of factor 50.

Cable ties, bungee cords or good old-fashioned rope?