Tag Archives: airplanes

Airplane Activities for a Four Year Old

Airplane Activities for a Four Year Old

My family flies a lot because my husband works for an airline. And he was working abroad last summer, so Buddy and I flew together a couple times to see him. It was our first experience flying just the two of us, and overall, we both had a good time.

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Before our first flight, I had purchased this Wildkin rolling suitcase for Buddy. Since we were traveling by ourselves, I needed him to pull his own toys. Buddy loved this suitcase and was happy to pull it. It fit underneath the seat, and it holds a lot! I highly recommend it.

Because our trip consisted of two long flights followed by a week in a hotel room, I wanted to bring a variety of activities. I put together a few busy bags, some games, some books, and some small toys for Buddy. Some of these were things we had, and I got some new things for the trip too. Here are the things we brought with us.

Toys

Books

Other Items

  • Kindle and headphones
  • Empty waterbottle – we always fill after we go through security and before we get on the plane
  • Snacks – fruit snacks, Ritz bits, and animal crackers are Buddy’s current favorites. I usually throw in a couple suckers too.
  • Bag of clothespin, popsicle sticks, and pipecleaners- This kept Buddy busy for awhile. See picture below.
  • Post it notes and pen – I’m not sure why Buddy is more interested in writing with a pen than a marker or crayon, but he is.

I found all of these items to be very helpful in entertaining Buddy on the flight and at the hotel. Although Buddy was content to watch his Kindle for long periods of time, it was nice to have other things to keep him busy when we were ready for a screen time break.

Airplanes and Clouds Sensory Play

This has been a crazy and stressful school year for me, and as a result, I haven’t been blogging much. I’ve missed it, and I’m going to try to do more blog posts in 2020.

This activity is one Buddy and I did last summer, but I haven’t gotten around to blogging about it yet. I first saw the idea for an airplane sensory tub on Fun with Mama’s blog. Buddy loves airplanes, so I knew this would be a good activity for him.

I got the activity ready by getting a travel sized can of shaving cream and the lid to our sensory bin for the clouds. I also used a silver Sharpie, a ruler, and a black piece of construction paper to make a runway. Buddy has a bunch of planes, but we chose to use the metal ones from the dollar store for this activity. That way, if they got wrecked, they would be easy to replace. (They didn’t get wrecked though, which is a great thing.)

I showed Buddy how to make some shaving cream clouds on the lid. Then I let him have a try. Buddy isn’t always a kid that enjoys messy activities, so he was a little nervous about the shaving cream. But he quickly decided the foam was really fun.

Buddy and I flew the planes off the runway and into the shaving cream clouds. They quickly got very messy, but it was a lot of fun.

After a few runs, I got a tub of water and a sponge to wash the planes down. Buddy loved playing with the planes in the water as much as the foam.

Once the big piles of foam had been smashed down a bit, it was easier for the planes to fly “through the clouds” without it being such a mess. Then Buddy happily made them fly back and forth in the foam with the occasional trip to either the plane wash or the runway.

This activity was a huge hit with Buddy. He asked to keep the runway, and he still uses it from time to time when he plays with planes.