50 Things to Do With Kids While You’re Stuck at Home

Let me guess — you are stuck home with your kids for a while aren’t you? How did I know? Well, we are all in this together, friends. Many of us are struggling to work from home while tending to our children and trying to maintain patience and a calm attitude. How does one do that while trying to keep our kiddos busy for hours upon hours upon hours, all without leaving the confines of home sweet home? You are in luck, because I have 50 things for you and/or the kids to do when sheltering in place. Take what you like and leave the rest. 

1. Make your very own escape room.
2. Have a staring contest tournament!
3. Learn origami.
4. Have a blindfolded taste-test challenge: Is it Coca-a-Cola or Pepsi?
5. Make paper airplanes and race them or see whose plane can fly the farthest.
6. Turn your kitchen into a fine-dining restaurant. “Hire” your family members to be the chef, the waitress, and the busser. 
7. Write a letter to your future self. 
8. Write a letter to your younger self. 
9. Play MASH. 
10. Make paper fortune tellers.
11. Make cards (and send them by snail mail) for residents at nursing homes, patients at hospitals, and your neighbors. 
12. Have a fashion show.
13. If you are brave, have a shaving cream fight. Outside, of course! 
14. Turn your bedroom or bathroom into a spa: give manicures, massages, and face masks! 
15. Have a lip-synch battle. 
16. Host a family talent show in your living room! 
17. Make a things to do jar, when you’re bored pick one idea out of the jar and go!
18. Play Mad Libs — if you don’t have them, make your own! 
19. Marie Kondo your home. 
20. Make an obstacle course and have someone lead you through it while blindfolded.
21. Make a vision board with pictures or images from old magazines or the internet. 
22. Paint kindness rocks and leave them outside for others to find. 
23. Thumb wrestle. 
24. Play “Burn,” when one person tries to gently slap the other’s hands before they pull them away. 
25. Make a fort — and sleep in it! 
26. Make up your own words, or better yet, your own language! 
27. Play Pictionary — but the person drawing must wear a blindfold! 
28. Start a family journal. Ask each other questions (in writing) and pass the journal from family member to family member so everyone can take turns writing their answers.  
29. Take a virtual field trip to a zoo or other location. 
30. Make a gratitude list. 
31. Challenge yourself to write five thanks you notes/emails/texts each day. Trust me, you will find people to thank. 
32. Challenge yourselves to remove one word from your vocabulary and then “catch” each other saying the word. Start with something easy like today and work up to a more challenging word like the. 
33. Put on a play. 
34. Watch the movie Clue.
35. Put on a movie or TV show and mute the sound. Then improvise and create your own dialogue.
36.  Redecorate your bedroom. 
37. Play make believe. Pretend Mom is the CEO and she is hiring a new assistant, have each child participate in mock interview! 
38. Draw a self-portrait while looking in the mirror. 
39. Make a slide show of all your favorite photos. Add some music! 
40. Create a scavenger hunt for your family members. 
41. Gather all the mismatched socks in your home and try to match them with their partners or turn them into puppets for a puppet show!
42. Play cards. 
43. Have contests to see who can perform certain tasks (writing or stacking cups) with their non-dominant hand. 
44. Make a prank phone call to someone you love, and who won’t be mad.
45. Call the radio station and request they play your favorite song. Then tune in to see if they do! 
46. Play 20 questions or I spy. 
47. Create a family gameshow and find out who knows mom best! 
48. Learn a dance with the help of a YouTube tutorial. 
49. Arm wrestle.
50. Write a list of 50 things to do when you are bored!