Fifty ways to have fun with your kids

Play. It's the way your children learn. It's the way they work out the complexities of their world. It's the way they discover how to relate to others. It's the way they understand how things are put together—or pulled apart.

So why don't we adults take the time to play and have fun with our kids? Issues and responsibilities and schedules often crowd out our free time with our kids. We have let the play factor die within us. But take heart. There's hope. You can resurrect recreation with 50 easy ideas for free family fun:

1. Select videos from the library.

2. Check out art prints from the library. Hang them at home and research information about the artists.

3. Plan a family bike trip to a park or historic site.

4. Organize a neighborhood basketball tournament.

5. Take a factory tour.

6. Pick something found in the wild, such as asparagus, flowers or blueberries.

7. Tour a printing plant.

8. Visit a candy factory.

9. Collect bugs and identify them.

10. Build a dam across a small stream.

11. Go sledding or innertubing.

12. Attend a taping at a TV or radio station.

13. Play an old-fashioned game with your kids, such as kick the can or hide-and-seek.

14. Record a radio drama. Play it back at a complete-with-popcorn family night.

15. Sleep out in a tent overnight.

16. Read stories together in the dark by flashlight.

17. Check for free workshops at museums.

18. Start a neighborhood story time.

19. Go to a fish or salmon hatchery.

20. Teach your child a craft, such as knitting or gardening.

21. Mix up a batch of salt dough and keep it in the refrigerator for impromptu sculpture projects: 2 cups white flour, 1/2 cup salt and 1/2 cup water. Knead for five minutes. When ready to use, shape the dough and bake at 250 degrees for 15 to 30 minutes. Paint with acrylic paints and finish with lacquer.

22. Use Styrofoam meat trays for picture frames or let the kids weave colorful scrap yarn back and forth across the tray to form designs. They can use a large dull-pointed tapestry needle to punch through the edges of the tray.

23. Make fun hats out of paper plates and cups. Decorate using felt-tip markers. Glue on stickers, pompoms, stars or buttons.

24. Make a pincushion. Use pinking shears to cut two layers of fabric or felt in a variety of shapes. Let the kids sew the two layers together, joining the edges while leaving a small opening. Stuff with an old nylon stocking or polyester filling. Sew the opening shut and attach a loop of ribbon or yarn for a hanger.

25. Make pictures by gluing various shapes of macaroni to cardboard. Touch them up with acrylic paints.

26. Get an out-of-date wallpaper book from a store. With pinking shears, let the kids make their own greeting cards or book covers. Old wallpaper is also good for wrapping small gifts.

27. Go on a rock hunt. Classify them with the help of a good rock book from the library.

28. Let little kids play in the kitchen sink with soapy bubbles, an eggbeater and other cooking implements. When they've finished, wipe up.

29. Cut pictures from old greeting cards to use as toppers on packages or use the pictures to make new greeting cards.

30. Set up an ant farm in a large glass jar.

31. Plant grapefruit, lemon, orange or apple seeds. Suspend avocado seeds in water by inserting toothpicks in the sides to hold them in place. Do the same with various kinds of potatoes.

32. Make a calendar for Grandma and Grandpa by drawing 12 pictures and gluing them on another calendar. Or on a copy machine, run 12 pages with a grid at the bottom for the dates and blank at the top for the children's pictures. Help your kids fill in the dates.

33. Make your own wrapping paper by block-printing it with fruits and vegetables cut in half. Potatoes can be carved to shape; lemons and oranges make an interesting print.

34. Have a rhythm band using pot lids and wax paper fastened around combs that the children can hum to make interesting sounds. Put beans in a milk jug for a shaker.

35. Take funnels, empty tin cans, sieves, shovels, trowels and other implements to a sandy area. Build a castle or a tower.

36. Collect leaves, rocks, flowers, bugs or buttons.

37. Let the children play store by getting out all the canned goods and lining them up in a display. Give them a handful of change or play money. Let them use a muffin tin for a cash drawer.

38. Have your children help you plan a vacation by sending for travel brochures and maps. Enlist their ideas for making your money stretch.

39. Sponsor a play. Collect costume materials. Watch behind appliance stores for big boxes to use as props.

40. Skip rocks on a placid stream. Turn over rocks and see what's under them. Watch for certain birds, such as kingfishers or herons.

41. Plant a garden. Start the seeds indoors in early spring. Watch the seedlings sprout and grow. Transplant outdoors later.

42. Spend time together looking at old family photos and describing what was happening when the photos were taken.

43. Begin a family history through interviews. Use a cassette recorder and get family members to tell stories. For those who might be intimidated by a tape recorder, interview them in a group. As one begins to talk, others can add their viewpoints.

44. Save funny articles, cartoons and photos, then laugh as you share them.

45. Read books together.

46. Have a family walkathon. Each person should select a walking distance goal according to his age. Have each family member record his or her daily walking record. See who can come closest to or surpass his goal.

47. Take turns planning and cooking meals.

48. Set goals for family cleanup chores. Give prizes for the fastest and most thorough worker.

49. Go on a scavenger hunt. When they return with their treasures, have a special meal waiting for them.

50. Host a garage sale. Let the kids plan the day, do the advertising, collect the goods, mark the items, discard the surplus and keep the money they earn.

Talk to them. Play with them. Walk with them. Work with them. Learn with them. Take it from a mother whose children have grown and flown: The time you have them in your home is brief. Will your teen remember the dust on the furniture or the afternoon you spent at a ball game when a favorite player hit a home run? Will your little one recall the cut grass or that you took time to play catch with him? Will your teen care more when he's grown and gone about the advances you got at your job by working late or that you had time to talk with him in the middle of the night when he was struggling with a problem?

Parenting is not for sissies. It's a time-consuming, expensive investment, and if you do it right, it's an investment you will lose. They will walk out the door on their own and carry with them the memories you made together. They will treasure those memories, and when they are grown, the groundwork will be laid for their own families and children.

Have fun with your kids! You'll never regret it.