How to Entertain your "Dragons"

A few facts:

1) Kids can be frightening.
2) Kids can be a handful.
3) Having two 2 year olds and 2 five year olds for 5 hours can be a NIGHTMARE!

.... if you are not prepared. 

Here are some things to consider when preparing to entertain young children:

*Get someone to help you watch the munchkins.
*Ask the parents for permission on any planned events.
*Watch your language. 
*Don't talk about anything that you don't want repeated... kids have goo-ood memories.
*Make a Plan. 
*Prepare activities to keep the dragons (I mean kids) busy.
*Have a few "impromtu" ideas in your back pocket in case of emergencies.

So, while Vaughn and Tasha went and saw Harry Potter, my husband and I watched Elina and Meaghan.  Add in Alexis and Lily and that's four altogether. 

Here's how the evening panned out...
To start, we did sparklers in the snow!

Elina and Lily Sparkle

Lexi in the warm indoors.

Our next activity is pretty straight forward.  We were cold...  We needed hot chocolate!!  And by adding left over cupcakes from the night before, hot chocolate turned into a Hot Chocolate Party of course!

 



By now an hour had gone by...  Everything was great, but things like this can turn in an instant, so stick to the plan.

Next up was swimming... in the Jacuzzi tub.

**We used a few too many bubbles.  I wouldn't recommend bubbles in a jacuzzi.  They can turn out like this: 

After the girls got out of the "pool" and into their dry clothes again, it was time for a breather.  I decided that we needed to do something that used a little more of the girl's energy... and a little less of mine.  So we played...

TROLL!! ( Dun Dun Dun...)

This actually went on for sometime, until girls started running into each other, so we had to stop before someone got hurt.

After running around, we (I) got up the courage to make cookies.  Who doesn't love to make cookies?  And I have a fool proof cookie recipe from Taylor's mom, so that's what we did.

There was no fighting because we had a good talk about how we would all take turns pouring and stirring the ingredients.  The girls were pretty pleased with themselves.

BUT!

Even with all the planning and supervision...  things still can happen. 

Well, these two happened... in the pantry... with a whole bottle of anise seed.  Atleast it smelled good.

(Even now I get a random anise seed stuck to my foot).

While the cookies were baking, we did this...

And after all that...  the night STILL wasn't over. 

But, since it was about an hour and a half after bedtime, I decided it was "quiet" time.

I put on "A Christmas Story" and we all settled down.

These are just a few examples of what you can do to entertain kids for an extended period of time.  There are countless more, especially during the summer.

Here are a few:

-painting nails

-coloring

-making a surprise video for Grandma and Grandpa

-help them to write a story , which they can illustrate

-play dress up.

The possibilities are endless.  It is up to your imagination.  What did you like to do when you were a kid?

A few facts:

1) Kids can be really funny.

2) Kids can melt your heart.

3) A night with the "girls" can end up being better then you had planned.  :)