4 Cheapish Things to Do With Young Kids

We've had our share of discombobulation, unexpected travel and required parent nights at school lately. You too? Running on fumes? Here are four tried and true ways to do something mildly amusing without too much outlay of energy, mental powers or moola.

1. Save the cardboard circle the frozen pizza came with.  Let your kids decorate it to make pretend pizza.  If you're lucky they won't ask for stickers, and if you're REALLY lucky this will morph into a game of "Pizza Delivery Guy" until bedtime.

2.  Get thee to the ride-thru carwash.  When I left town this past weekend I suggested to my husband that he let the kids wash the car.  Being a man, he decided to go to the Drive-Thru Carwash instead ("Alleluia" had been asking to do this for a while, but Mommy said that--at $7 a pop--it was too expensive.).  "Gandalf" took "Peel," "Chop," and "Alleluia" and reported that they were mesmerized!  Since they begged to go back, hubbie loaded them all up (plus one of the teenagers) into the second car the next day.  He even sprung for the extra buck to get the Super Dooper Deluxe Wash (this consisted of a spray of purple stuff all over the car).  Just waiting for someone to throw more ketchup at our car so that we can do it all over again.

3.  Corral a bunch of corks and see if they float in the kitchen sink.  Then, when you're done playing, take out the sink stopper and watch the corks circle the drain like spaceships into a Black Hole.

I lucked out recently when helping a friend put away her dishes.  Her silverware shared a drawer with these beauties.  You never can find corks when you need them, so here's me:  "Can I PU-LEEZ have all of your old corks?!?"

I wonder who had more fun:  the people who drank this Gallo or us playing with the corks?

I have some more ideas of things to do with these, so if you have any extra corks, SEND ME SOME, OK?!?

4.  Get the good old standby butterfly net.  Cheap and you can throw it in your car for random emergency entertainment.  "Alleluia" and I spend a lot of our time waiting:  for her older siblings to get out of school, for Daddy to come out of the car repair place, for piano lessons to be over, etc.  She is convinced that one day she will actually catch a butterfly, but I think it's all about the thrill of the chase.

These little moth guys love the statue of the child Jesus behind school!

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