Four Fun Fall Activities for Kids

#1.  Play in the leaves.  (I had to start with a time-honored fall tradition.)  When I was in college my friends sent me a box full of leaves in the mail because they knew I loved throwing leaves in the air and jumping in them.  Now, I consider it an unpleasant chore to rake up the knee-deep sea of leaves that drop from the huge, generous trees in our yard.  Our boys, on the other hand, love to throw the leaves and jump in the piles.  If the leaves are not soggy and wet from a recent rainfall you can bet they'll be out in the yard raking up leaf forts, pyramids, and tunnels.  Now doesn't this look like fun?

2.  Paint some fall prints.  On one of our walks I gave each boy a bag to collect natural items that were signs of fall.  They collected leaves, rose hips, apples, corn, fuzzy seed pods, and pine cones.  There were also a few stowaway lady bugs and spiders in the mix.  I covered our table with paper, poured some paint in styrofoam plates and let them print and paint to their hearts' content.

The Free One is printing an apple.  He thought they looked like hoof prints from the Angry Birds pigs.

The Anchor decided to use a paint brush to paint a "Fall Monster" instead.

Leaf Outlines

Leaf Prints

#3.  Make a fall wreath.  The boys collected lots of things they thought would look pretty on a wreath like sticks, rocks, long fuzzy things, seed pods, pine cones, rose hips, and flowers.  I bought the wreath frame from the dollar tree and let the boys dip their treasures into Elmer's glue and stick them on the wreath wherever they wanted.  It was completely random, but I think they turned out beautiful.  This one is hanging on my door and another one is leaning on my shelf next to some pictures.  This was a fun craft project for my boys that doubled as a very frugal fall decoration.  Cha Ching!

#4.  Make apple cider.  At first, I had planned on taking my boys out to our farm co-op to use their cider press.  I envisioned the boys laughing with delight as they turned the old fashioned hand crank.  I could hear their "oohs" and "aahs" as they watched the clear, amber juice flow out from the pressed apple mulch.  I could see their happy smiles as they diligently helped me clean each sticky part of the heavy antique machine *record scratch*  Then I abruptly woke up from my day dream and decided to use our easy to clean Jack LaLane power juicer in the comfort of our own kitchen instead.  Yum!  There's nothing like fresh pressed, I mean juiced apple cider!

Leave a comment:  What are your favorite Fall Activities?