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Fall is here again!
It’s one of my favorite seasons (tied with spring!), so in honor of the season here are some fall-inspired ways you can keep your kids busy while you write a blog post.
These activities are perfect for Family Writing Time or for any other time when you need to focus on work for a little while. They’re fun, mostly non-messy, and a great way to bring the colors and feel of fall inside.
1. Leaf Rubbings
Before you sit down to write, take the kids on a quick “field trip” outside. Look around for fallen leaves, and have everyone gather a handful. Try to get a variety of shapes and sizes.
When you come back in, get your kids set up with crayons (paper removed), and paper. Show them how to make a leaf rubbing, and then sit nearby and work on your post while they make more.
While they can stick to traditional fall colors, don’t constrain them. Let them make blue leaves if they want. (My kiddos enjoyed using a variety of colors, as you can tell! 😀 )
If they make a single rubbing and declare themselves done, consider giving them one or more of the following challenges:
- Make a leaf border using small leaves. Draw a picture in the middle.
- Have leaves arranged from smallest to largest.
- Glue paper together to make a longer picture and draw a tree with leaves on it.
- Experiment with which colors are best to use on top of other colors.
- Estimate how many rubbings you can get on one piece of paper.
You can hang up their beautiful pictures around the house to help welcome the new season.
2. Make Logs
We heat our house with wood, so firewood gathering plays an important role for our family each fall. We love spending time together in the woods, listening to the chainsaws and tossing wood into the truck.
This activity is a fun reminder of our time in the woods.
Give your kids some toilet paper or paper towel tubes. Then, have them color each one like bark on a tree. They can be as detailed as they’d like!
After the tubes are all colored, your kids can turn their logs into a “campfire” in the living room. My kids enjoy building their “fire” in the middle of the room. Then, they bring down sleeping bags and books and camp out by their fire. It’s a fun way to extend this time a bit, and a couple of the younger ones have even fallen asleep while playing!
3. Draw Apples or Pumpkins
Set out some of your fall produce, like apples and pumpkins, and encourage your kids to pick a couple. Have them arrange them on the counter, table, or in a nice bowl. Then have them draw their arrangement. They can create a fall inspired still life drawing.
You can have all your kids work on the same arrangement, or let them make unique ones.
Once they’re done drawing, encourage them to add additional details or a background to their picture. This way you get a little extra time to work! They can also take time to color their pictures.
4. Build a Maze
Corn mazes are tons of fun! Your children can recreate some of the fun by creating mazes of their own. For each maze, they’ll need a cardboard box, file folders, scissors, and glue or tape.
First, they’ll need to use a pencil to draw a maze on the inside bottom of the box. Then, they’ll cut strips of file folder out. Folding down an edge of the file folder will provide a glueable surface.
They can glue these down along the maze to make a 3D replica.
Younger children can stick to just drawing mazes. If you have more than one child, have them each create one and then trade.
5. Create Fall Decorations
My eight-year-old daughter loves making fall decorations. Set out some construction paper
- Hand print turkeys
- A “Happy Thanksgiving” banner
- A basket of paper pumpkins and apples
- Place mats with leaves
- A tree with falling leaves for the wall
The picture below shows a basket full of pumpkins and apples my daughter created last year. This year she made a pumpkin patch. I love how just setting out basic supplies encourages their creativity – no Pinterest searching allowed!
6. Make a Paper Scarecrow
Challenge your kids to make a scarecrow to hang up. Older kids can craft their own using materials around the house. This will provide more of a challenge for them, and will give you really unique scarecrows!
Younger kids can use a printable craft. You can let them cut out the pieces independently, or have them pre-cut so all they have to do is color and glue. I really like using projects like this to teach scissor skills, so I typically let my kids cut their own.
Yes, occasionally they cut off an arm or something. But then we just bring out the tape and patch it up.
7. Create a Fall Themed Matching Game
With a stack of index cards and some colored pencils, your child can create a fall themed matching game.
They’ll need to create several pairs of cards that go together. They can make:
- Matching pictures
- A picture that matches a written word
- A picture that matches an initial letter
- Matching fall words
Once you get your post written, have your child set up the cards upside down, and then play a round or two together. If you have more than one child, encourage them each to make a game. Then have them set them up and play them together before you join in. Tell them they are testing the game to make sure everything has a match. (While you get a little extra time to work!)
8. Create a Mosaic
Depending on the age/development of your kids, this one might get messy. I’d recommend doing this on a tablecloth so the extra seeds can easily be tossed.
Set out bowls of fall seeds (sunflower, pumpkin, etc.) and some beans. Whatever you have in your house that is shelf-stable and little.
Then give your child some white glue and paper, and have them create a mosaic.
They can make a fall scene, a single pumpkin, or anything else they’d like. Show them how to put glue on just a small portion of their picture at once, so it doesn’t dry before they’re ready.
When they’re done, take pictures of what they made.
9. Make a Fall Inspired “Hidden Pictures”
Do your kids enjoy reading Highlights as much as mine do? The Hidden Pictures are their favorite puzzle each month.
Let your child create a Hidden Pictures drawing of their own for you to solve when you’re finished working. To get them started, make a list of fall items they can “hide” in the picture. Here are some ideas:
- Pumpkin
- Apple
- Football
- Sunflower
- A piece of firewood
Need More Ideas for Fall Activities for Your Kids?
If you want some additional ideas, here’s a post of 10 Fall Activities for Family Writing Time.
What are you going to have your child do first?
Lisa Tanner is a former teacher turned homeschooling mom with 11 kids. She's also a successful freelance writer. Lisa enjoys helping other busy moms find time to start and grow a side hustle of their own.
Great idea! I love the build a maze idea! I think I’ll try that with my little guy! Thank you!
Thanks Jeannie! I hope he enjoys maze making as much as my crew did.
Hi Lisa,
I have a toddler and an infant, so I’m always looking for great activities to keep them busy. My son loves leaves, so that one we will definitely try. The arts and crafts activities are still hard because he can’t stay still, but I keep trying. Thanks for the great suggestions!
Amber
You’re welcome Amber. For the toddler, you could also try creating a simple color match game with leaves in a file folder. Create several leaves with two different fall colored paper, and color the inside of one side of the file folder one of the colors and the other side the other color. It’s a simple way to practice sorting and buy you a couple of minutes!
These are such creative yet simple ideas that I think I can easily do! Thanks for the tips- I need all the help I can get to get more posts done!
Brandi @chickenscratchdiaries.com recently posted…An Honest Review of Monat Hair Care – for Postpartum Hair Loss
You’re welcome Brandi. I’ve learned simple is best!