Family Fun Without the Cost

When my kids were little we invested in a plastic "rollercoaster" and I put it in the backyard on a slight incline. It was worth the investment. After they got tired of going down the ramp on the "car", I would let them roll balls down the ramp. A week later, I brought mini cars outside to roll down the ramp!

My kids would love to water the flowers in the yard. I let them pick out their own "kid" watering cans.

Also, I would give them buckets of water and regular-sized adult paint brushes. They would "paint" the walkway, the driveway, the plastic picnic table, etc...

We would feed the ducks at a local pond.

On rainy days, we would makes faces on toast w/ raisins, celery, etc...

You are really doing what works with a four year old! Here are some ideas though.

Find a playgroup and meet other Mom's. Or take turns at each others homes.

Build a tent inside. Put a blanket over the table or a card table.

Feed the ducks. Take old bread and feed ducks at a pond.

Playdoh!

Go to garage sales. Give child $2. You can buy a lot at garage sales for $2. Especially if you are a cute 4 year old that can bargain.

Learn to cook. Learn to read. Make crafts, cards or gifts. There are organizations that just want children to make cards to cheer up their clientele.

Visit an Home for the Elderly.

Some stores offer free activities. Your local library probably has a lot of different activities.

http://www.spencerlibrary.com/services.shtml The calendar for the library lists story time at 10:30 AM on Tuesday and other activities.

http://www.parkermuseum.org/#nogo All the searches for your area recommend Parker Museum, and admission is free. Another fun museum activity is to go to a local art museum, and put a few postcards in the gift shop. Have your son try to find the pictures in the museum.

As others have said, play areas in the mall are good, especially when the weather is too hot or too wet or too cold.

If you have an iphone or some other smart phone with gps, you can try geo-caching. Here is a link to some sites in Spencer:
http://www.geocaching.com/seek/nearest.aspx?lat=43.14581&...

Lowes, Home Depot and Barnes and Noble all have free kids activities, but I don't know if you have one in your community.

We go to Whole Foods and Central Market and try all the samples. My kids will eat anything if you put it into a paper cup with a toothpick in it.

We go to different parks to try out their playground equipment.

At home, try bubbles, sidewalk chalk (you can also crush it, add a little water and let him paint with it), playdough and other cheap things like that.

Make your own playdough or salt dough and bake and paint it.

We take our book of discount coupons (the entertainment passbook) and take $10 and go through various drive thrus and see how much value we can get for our money.
We have also taken a $20 gift card we had to Kohls just to see how much we could get for the money. You know how it always shows how much you saved..we tried to see how high we could get that number. We bought things on super clearance and used them as gifts if it was not something we needed.

Good luck and have fun!

My kids LOVE history places. While they are not always free, a lot of times they can be. It becomes a big adventure and is so fun. We love to pack our lunches and head out for the day. That's my favorite thing about their summer vacation. I have every other Friday off of work and since they are off too, we go do things.

I preplan them, so we have a list and just do what works best. Some are inside if it's bad weather or too hot, some are close and won't take all day, others are only outside and a long drive.

But history places are ALWAYS a hit.

Our Easter plans may fall through, and if they do, the kids are I are going to take a ferry to Mount Vernon and then check out the Cherry Blossoms - hoping they are still in bloom!

Story time at the library.
One of our malls had an indoor playground so we went there sometimes, too.
Do you have any lakes, rivers, ponds or streams nearby? It's fun to get wet and hunt for bugs :)
And of course we went to lots of DIFFERENT parks, change of scene breaks the monotony! One of our parks has an educational farm program on site, we loved taking celery and lettuce to feed the goats and cows.
Do you have friends with kids to hang out with? If not, look for a playgroup or other local mom's club (google MOPS, mothers of preschoolers.) I would have gone bananas if I didn't have other mothers to do these things with and talk to.

You can do lots of stuff. Tie die a shirt with him. Use bubbles, add a little bit of tempra paint and let him blow them on to the paper. This makes an awsome art project. Have him use chalk. Go to an outdoor movie in the park. Go to the library for reading hour. Have him help you cook. Teach him to rollor skate. Invite a friend over for a play date. Go out for ice cream or make your own ice cream, shakes or what ever.

Our local library has a number of passes to local museums, aquariums (sp? aquaria?) & special places. With a library card, you can borrow one & have a ball for free or at least a very big discount. In the summer, it helps to call in advance & reserve 'em.

We go to our local environmental center toddler/preschooler program (free) on mondays. Music and movement at the library and sometimes Storytime as well. We take tricycles/scooters to the local skatepark when the big kids are in school. We go to the farmers market in the summer (both of those things we meet up with friends which makes it more fun). We have a family center in town that has free kid stuff going on constantly - such as craft time and lego time. They have a little indoor play area, parenting classes, a parenting book library, and a toy library...maybe your town has something like this? We invite over a friend one morning a week (or we go to her house) and she and I take turns running. Then we hang out afterwards. We hike on local trails. You can take newspaper and roll it up and make structures with it. My son used to love to do this when he was 4. We'd make giant structures all over the livingroom. http://innerchildfun.com/2011/10/newspaper-play-structure.... He used to love to go ride his scooter at that age...and hike with training wheels. Is your local pool expensive? That is always a GOOD time for both our kids. Again, I usually meet a friend to have someone to talk to.

arts and crafts, science project, bike ride, learning to skate will take up a lot of time! Try that, you will burn off a whole day.

Is there a local museum that is free or have a free day? Or you can always go to the library. Maybe your library has events on certain days.

We take or four year old to the library, the municipal art gallery, music and movement group and to the public pool.

Does your local library offer a story time, craft time, or anything like that? That is what I do with my four year old and she loves it! I will even just take her and look at books and do the activities that they offer there. We can usually spend at least two hours there!

we took rides around the countryside to look for "signs of Spring". On these trips, we counted cows/horses/barns/etc.

If we were in the city, then we looked for flowers/trees blooming/etc.... anything to encourage observation of our surroundings.

We would take pizza out to the park for a picnic dinner. We're fortunate to have an awesome park with overlooks at the top of the park... beautiful year-round! In the winter, we would eat inside the truck. :)

We used our local library & our sons both attended preschool. We also were blessed with a "village-minded" neighborhood. We were all in/out of each others' homes. A very good thing!

We always did craft projects at home. We used cardboard appliance boxes many, many times....sometimes we'd make a fort - a McDonalds - a yard sale...the ideas were limitless! We made gifts for every holiday, & cookies for the neighbors.

We really enjoyed reading....& would tie learning activities to our book. We celebrated most holidays, learned about each season, &....as my sons' KG teacher said, "your sons have a lot of prior knowledge, a well-rounded childhood to fall back upon. There are very few subjects they haven't experienced, & that makes my job much easier". Some of the best words I've ever received! :)

& please....this is not bragging....simply sharing how my sons' childhoods went!

In our area memberships are very worth the investment (or make great gifts at the holidays). We have memberships (by gift) to the local zoo and childrens museum, as well as the local arboretum. We use them all the time.

Often, the cost of one admission gets you half way to a membership.