Garden games are fun

While you are outside in your favourite garden working away what should you do with the kids? Well you can have them play a game while you dig, weed, snip and enjoy your fabulous backyard. Take a container outside with you and place it on the patio or the middle of your yard. While you are doing your "thing" ask your children if they would like to have a scavenger hunt? If they don't know what that is tell them it is a game where you call out an object and they have to hunt around the yard and find that particular item. They find the "treasure" and them bring it back and place it in the container. Here are some examples: Hey go find me a stone/pebble and bring it back, find me a feather (we have lots of those in our yard because of our bird feeders), find me a blade of grass (good vocabulary builder...what in the world is a blade?, fine me a tiny stick or twig, etc. after you have created your list according to the things available in your yard the last item can be...find me a surprise (maybe a wiggly worm, a lady bug,a snail). If the last one is perhaps a living item explain why you love their choice but why it cannot be included in the container because it is needs to be free because it probably has a family and needs food and air to live. If it is one of your favourite flowers that was plucked, now is the time to say why those particular flowers are not to be picked. Point out to them that a flower like a dandelion flower is fine to pick. You can use the garden game as a forum to teach valuable lessons of garden etiquette to your child. Take time to identify the items collected and talk about the finds. Be sure to take the container inside when you are finished to share all you joy in the garden with dad.