One of our favorite family activities is to play with a beach ball while we hang out in Buddy’s room. Over the years, we’ve played with the beach ball in a variety of ways. When he was little, we just rolled it around. Now, we often use it to play variations of basketball, volleyball, and soccer. We recently took Buddy to his first hockey game, and since then he’s wanted to play hockey with the beach ball.

I bought two fly swatters from the dollar store a long time ago, after reading about doing balloon tennis from Little Bins For Little Hands’s blog. However, we never got around to doing that activity. When Buddy asked for a hockey stick, I realized that the fly swatters would work perfectly.

Fly swatter hockey is simple. My husband and Buddy were the hockey team, and I was the goalie for the other hockey team. I stood in a narrow space between an ottoman and Buddy’s bed, and they had to knock the beach ball past me. A door opening would also make a good goal. We only had two fly swatters, so I just kicked the ball away instead of swatting it.

This was a fun and easy activity that provided a perfect way to get rid of some energy while stuck inside. We have played this several nights this week, and Buddy loves it! I’m sure this will be a frequent activity for the rest of the winter at least.

Do you have any other ideas for fly swatter activities? If so, please leave a suggestion in the comments section.

Buddy loves playing games, and it’s something our whole family loves to do together. Last year, I blogged about games that work for both toddlers and preschoolers. In the course of the year, we’ve discovered more games that are so much fun. These games are better suited for preschoolers rather than toddlers. Buddy is currently almost four, and some of them he wouldn’t have been able to play a year ago.

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Silly Street

Skills Needed: Counting, various physical skills

Skills Practiced: Character building, gross motor, creativity

This is my favorite of our new games. I had never heard of Silly Street before we received it as a gift. It is a board game where you pull a card for each turn, and then you have to do something before you can move. Some of the cards are mental tasks (name as many red foods as you can – move one space for each), some are social/emotional tasks (find a picture of something sad on the board), and some are gross motor tasks (stand like a flamingo). The first day we played it, we did three games in a row! It is so fun, and so silly! We have brought it to friend gatherings, and it was great as an adult and kid mixed group party game.

Cars and Trucks

Skills Needed: Counting

Skills Practiced: Counting past twenty, simple addition (adding 1, 2, or 3), comparing numbers, reading numbers

Cars and Trucks is a kid version of the card game war. Each person picks a card, and whoever’s vehicle has more animals wins the round. There are bonus cards that say +1, +2, or +3. Then you get an extra card and you get to add on the animals to the total amount. There are 45 cards in the deck, so once a two player game is done, at least one person has to count past twenty. (Last week, I lost by a lot, and Buddy counted his cards out to 30 by himself.) As a math teacher, I especially love this game. It’s so fun, and it’s such good math practice.

Disney Eye Found It

Skills Needed: Finding simple objects

Skills Practiced: Memory, perseverance

We call this one the Mickey game at our house. Buddy got it in his stocking last year, but he wasn’t quite up to playing this at age 2. However, by the time he turned 3, he was able to do it well. Basically, this is a look and find card game. Every player gets five cards, and you can get rid of your card by finding the target item. (In the picture above, the person who finds the anchor first can get rid of their card.) It quickly becomes a memory game, because you’ve seen the cards many times before, but they are so detailed it takes some skill to remember where objects are. We love this game for it’s portability, and because we love Disney too. There is a board game version of this that also looks fun.

Yeti in my Spaghetti

Skills Needed: Ability to grab a small rod

Skills Practiced: Fine motor, logical thinking

Yeti in my Spaghetti is a simple game. Once the game is set up, you take turns pulling out a piece of spaghetti. When the Yeti falls in, the last person to successfully take spaghetti without knocking in the Yeti wins. It is a little like Jenga, but easier for younger kids.

Let’s Go Fishing

Skills Needed: The ability to get the end of a pole in a fish mouth

Skills Practiced: Fine motor skills, patience, counting, addition, comparing numbers

Let’s Go Fishing is so much fun, but is definitely a challenge for Buddy. The fish chomp their mouths open and closed, and the fish rotate around. It took some practice for Buddy to be able to do it, but now it’s not too difficult for him. Once we get our fish, we count them to see who has the most. Sometimes we count how much we’ve caught together as we play (I have 4 and you have 4 – how many fish have we caught?)

Have you heard of other great preschool games that I didn’t include? Please mention them in the comments.