WebParenTips - The Online Parenting Newsletter vol.6 no.3, Mar 2005 

             CREATIVE SURPRISES

    
I once wrote that children need predictable routines
and creative surprises. This time of year everybody
is tired of winter, school, chores--yes, everybody is
tired of the same-old, same-old. With a little
imagination you can come up with surprises to break
up the routines and delight your kids.


For instance, have a picnic on the living room floor.
Spread out a sheet or plastic tablecloth, use paper
plates, serve picnic food. Bonus: no ants to worry
about.


My children loved a Mystery Trip. Pick a destination
reasonably close to home that the children either have
never been to or love to go to. We used to go to the zoo
in winter--the animals seemed different in the snow.
Once we went to the Ford factory (we lived in Michigan)
to see automobiles being built.


We sometimes played Game Pick. I wrote the names
of all our board games on slips of paper. Whatever
name was drawn was the game we played that night.
You can do the same thing with books to read or music
to listen to.


We invented our own games sometimes. One child
would pick a word and the other had to write down all
the words that rhymed with it. Each word counted as
one and the child with the highest score won. Once I
wrote a few nouns on slips of paper. The game was
that each of us had to make up a story about whatever
word we drew out of the hat. I had the last turn one night.
Did you ever try to make up a story about a potato-masher?


Children not only have fun with your creative surprises
but they are watching how a parent uses imagination.
You are modeling a wonderful behavior to be imitated.


Happy Parenting,
Marilyn Heins, M.D.


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Dr. Marilyn Heins is a Tucson pediatrician, parenting
columnist for the Arizona Daily Star, author of the book,
ParenTips, as well as a mother, stepmother and grandmother.

She is available for workshops and lectures to groups of
parents, teachers, and grandparents. See:

Dr. Heins' Lectures
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