Top 10 things to keep the grandchildren entertained
Make chocolate cornflake cakes
Nothing is as well received with grandchildren as this old classic, and few things are easier to make – you can do it together.
You’ll need: 100g dark or milk chocolate (depending on which they prefer), 2 tbsp golden syrup, 50g butter and 75g cornflakes (or Rice Crispies, if they prefer).
In a pan over a low heat, melt the chocolate, syrup and butter and stir together well. Stir in the cornflakes, making sure they’re well coated in the chocolate mixture.
Next, simply spoon the mixture into 12 cake cases in a 12-hole cake tin, and place them in the fridge to set. Easy! They’ll keep for 2-3 days in an airtight container.
Devise a treasure hunt
The great thing about a treasure hunt is that you don’t even need to leave the confines of your house – particularly if you have a large garden. And it beats sitting the grandkids down in front of a DVD.
First, decide on a theme – pirates is a favourite. With a little forward planning, you could even help them to make some simple costumes.
Create a series of clues on bits of card (have duplicates in case any get lost) and distribute them in different rooms in the house, and throughout the garden. Let the final clue allude to a prize you can give them – maybe a cake.
For more tips, see www.treasurehuntbook.com/content/articles/index.htm.
Take them on holiday
If you’re feeling generous, and your grandchildren’s parents would really appreciate you taking them off their hands for a few days, you could take them on a short UK holiday.
A holiday park is a good idea, as there are lots of activities and entertainment laid on for them on site. Haven has 35 holiday parks throughout the UK, and you can take a short three-night break at many of them.
At each park, up to 65 free activities are included in the holiday price, with kids’ clubs and excellent sporting facilities, including swimming pools and tennis courts.
Go foraging for fruit
The autumn is the time when the UK’s hedgerows are bursting with nature’s bounty – and much of it is free for the taking.
To make a healthy walk in the country with your grandchildren more interesting, give them a bucket and help them to collect blackberries.
The fruit of the bramble bush, blackberries are familiar to all of us, so there’ll be no misidentification problems. Be sure to pick the freshest-looking, shiniest fruit.
When you get home, you can use them to make a blackberry and apple crumble, keeping them entertained all afternoon – especially when they eat it.
For foraging information and recipes, visit www.wildmanwildfood.com.
Make piñatas
These colourful, prize-filled creations originated in Mexico and are now a children’s party staple over here. They’re surprisingly easy to make, so why not have a go?
The ideas is that these papier mâché creations, in shapes of your choosing, are stuffed full of sweets and other treats. They are hung up on some string between two trees in the garden.
Each child has to take it in turns to beat the piñata with a stick, while blindfolded, until the prizes spill out. Needless to say, kids love doing this.
For full instructions on making a world-class piñata, go to www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Piñata.
Fly a kite
Getting your grandchildren out into the healthy open air is always a good idea, and it’s a lot easier with an incentive such as kite-flying.
Find a big open space, in your local park, away from kite-eating trees. You’ll need some wind, too, obviously.
Hold the ball of string and get your grandchild to hold the kite, which should face you and the wind. Unwind about 25 metres of string, then get your grandchild to let go. Pull on the string and launch the kite into the air, paying attention to the wind direction. If it changes, you need to move so it’s still directly behind you. Happy kite-flying!
Take them to a soft play centre
Commercial play centres are all over the place these days. They normally have soft, indoor and/or outdoor play areas for the little ones, with carefully designed games and toys that are safe and fun.
The good thing about these places is that you can watch and wave from the sidelines as they (hopefully) wear themselves out with bouncy rides, chunky building blocks, pens full of squishy balls and the like.
For a full online UK directory of soft play areas, indoors and out, visit www.softplayareas.co.uk.
Teach them some manners!
The learning of manners can, believe it or not, be made into a fun activity for younger kids.
Table-laying is a good way to begin a foray into the world of etiquette. Announce in the afternoon that you are going to have a formal dinner together in the evening. Tell them you’ll prepare it, but it's their job to lay the table: the tablecloth, plates, glasses, cutlery, cruets etc.
You could all dress up, too, if you really want to go to town. If you’re a bit shaky on the finer details of table-laying, visit http://yourdinnerparty.co.uk/tablelayout.aspx for the low-down on what goes where.
Play Pooh sticks
If there’s a bridge over a river or stream near your house, or one in a local park, little children will love a game of Pooh sticks, as practised by Winnie-the-Pooh.
The rules, of course, couldn’t be simpler: everyone takes an equally sized twig or stick, and drops them off the bridge when you shout “Now!”
Then, you simply go to the other side of the bridge and wait to see whose stick emerges first. Then they’ll want to have another go. And another go. And another go… Hours of fun, and of course it’s completely free.
Learn origami together
The ancient Chinese art of paper-folding is cheap, absorbing and can hold kids’ rapt attention for quite a while.
If you’re dealing with an arty kind of grandchild, go for creative paper sculptures such as swans, trees, hats and the like. If, however, your charge is more of a physical sort, paper planes are essential. Challenge them to make the greatest one ever, then have competitions to see whose can fly the furthest.
For hundreds of origami ideas with clear diagrams, visit www.origami-club.com/en/.
