And so it's raining outside and the kids are inside driving you crazy. And there are plenty of fun, free activities for kids that can help you create rainy day fun so that you don't lose your marbles. When your kids are tired of watching cartoons and making messes, you'll have a few cool ideas and tricks up your sleeve to keep them entertained while maintaining your sanity.
When the kids are outside playing ball or jumping rope with their friends, they are able to burn off extra energy, get some exercise and stay out of our hair for a little while. When the weather becomes inclement, or it's raining out, the kids come inside to play. Sometimes they come in the house alone, sometimes they bring their friends with them. It's a good idea to have some rainy day activities available to keep the kids entertained and to help preserve your sanity. Rainy day fun can sometimes be more fun than playing outside, if you do it right. Keeping your kids happy and entertained in bad weather doesn't have to be such a challenge, nor does it have to require television or video games. There are plenty of fun indoor activities that require little preparation to execute but that produce lots of fun.
 Learn about rainfall accumulation!
1. Teach your kids a little bit about rainfall accumulation. It's hard to figure out how much rain accumulates by watching it fall on the pavement. However, when it falls into a container, the accumulation becomes much easier to understand. Use a small glass or empty food jar to teach rain accumulation. Simply place the jar outside in the open and allow it to remain there while it rains. You can check on the jar during the rain and let your children measure how much water has collected in the bottom of the jar. It can be placed back outside to collect more water. If you have older kids, you can bring the jar in periodically, measure the rainfall and chart or graph the results.
Bake The Cookies You've Been Meaning To Make!
2. You can let the kids help you bake a batch of cookies. There are many cookie recipes online that you can use to help you find a recipe that uses the ingredients that you already have in your home, to save you a trip to the store. While baking cookies is a simple activity, getting the kids involved makes it that much more fun and gives them something fun to do. Kids love to help cook, especially when they are allowed to eat their creations when the cooking is over. If your children are older, with supervision, you can allow them to use a recipe card or printable cookie recipe to help them with the cooking process. Younger children can help you measure ingredients into measuring cups and help mix the batter. To make things easier on you, before you begin baking, tell the kids that they will need to help clean up when the baking is over. It is surprising how quickly children can help clean up when there are fresh baked cookies waiting for them. ;)
 Get free printable coloring pages online!
3. If your children enjoy coloring, you can find some free printable coloring pages online and print out some pictures for them to color. Most kids are amazed that they can request almost any object or character that they desire, while Mom or Dad simply type in the request and the picture prints out like magic. Print out a few free coloring pages for your kids to keep them busy. If your kids can't decide what they would like to color, you can try doing a search for free dinosaur coloring pages or free puppy coloring pages to get them started. You might even want to print out a couple of the same pages, just in case the kids "mess up". Coloring is a great rainy day activity, because it allows kids to be creative, productive and entertained at the same time.
As you can tell, there are many free rainy day fun activities that you can use to keep your kids happy and entertained. The best part is, most of these free activities for kids require very little preparation or investment and can mean the difference between having a great rainy day with the little ones or a difficult stressful day due to too much pent up energy. If you have any rainy day fun suggestions to add, I'd love to hear them!
