As a father of five I like to think that I’m quite experienced when it comes to spending time with my children. My youngest, nine year old twin girls, love to play board games, sports and lots more different types of games. However, it can often lead to my wife and I planning almost every minute of every day for our children. That usually means planned activities and walks etc, but I think it’s important that we as parents ensure our children have plenty of time to become bored.
That’s why we’ve kind of taken a step back over the last year or so and let our children become bored. If we’re always entertaining them or coming up with things for them to do then how will they ever learn to use their imaginations and creativity to think of new, fun and engaging ways to entertain themselves?
Obviously my girls are lucky because they have one another to bounce ideas off. Quite often after school when they’ve changed out of their uniforms and their dinner is cooking they’ll head straight out into the garden to play. I think this is really important. It’s far too easy to let children come home from school and watch TV or play on their video games consoles so if you can instead encourage them outside every day then you’ll quickly start to see positive changes.
One thing that always gets my girls outdoors is their swing set. When I was growing up I had nothing like this in my own garden. I had to head to the park if I wanted to go on the swings so they’re very lucky in that respect. They love playing on their swings and quite often make up these games that are quite fun to watch!
The other day they were both sat on their swings as though they were horses and they were pretending to go on a long horse ride journey. I think they were cowgirls or something like that!
If you’re looking to invest in a swing set for your children, then Fatmoose is a great place to start looking. Fatmoose is an online retailer that makes really cool wooden products for the outdoors. From climbing frames to swings and sand pits.
My wife, who also happens to be a twin quite often reminisces about her own childhood spent in the garden. She too had a swing set and recalls spending hours in the garden on the swings with her twin sister making games up, climbing trees and running around. I think this is why our children love being outdoors so much too. It’s because we’ve almost ingrained it in them! We’re not strict parents at all, in fact quite the opposite when one of our daughters told us the other day that we’re the softest parents going but we always encourage outdoor play. Technology is great, but it has a time and a place. You just can’t beat the great outdoors if you ask me!
