Simple Play Space Transformations

Trying to keep your toddler or infant occupied at home can be a full time job. With your busy schedule filled with errands, work, extra-curricular activities and taking care of your family, you might feel overwhelmed trying to keep playtime exciting!

So, what can you do at home to keep your kids active and stimulate their imaginations? Creating a play space in your home is easier than you might think, and you probably have the supplies for it sitting around, gathering dust.

Here are a few tips and suggestions below for creating a fun, natural play shelter space in your home or backyard:

1. Using a tent, blankets, or teepee like structures, creating a shelter or fort for your children is easy! Children will have fun decorating their spaces and making them their own. Pop-up shelters or half-tents (typically used outdoors) can be bought cheaply at garage sales. These are easy to move around indoors too, which is great for bad weather days.
2. For more natural play spaces, try using sticks, logs and branches, and drape an old sheet, blankets, or colorful fabric over the top. 
3. The best shelters and play spaces are the ones that your kids make by themselves. Provide them with the supplies, and see what their imaginations can come up with!
4. Filling a fort or tent with blankets and pillows will make it a comfortable space for your child to read, color, watch movies, and play with their friends. This shelter, indoors or outdoors, can also double as a place for naptime, and even a good spot for an impromptu picnic. 

Get creative! Almost anything you have in your home can be put together to make a fun playtime shelter for your kids. Add some toys, books and other items for them to play with, and let their imagination do the rest.

At Little Angels Preschool and Daycare, we believe in using natural play to encourage kids to use their imaginations and create their own fun. If you want more information on our natural play philosophy, schedule a tour of our center! We are the trusted and preferred daycare in Ann Arbor, and would love to welcome you to our family! Contact us today!