Indoor Games and Activities for kids

Finding activities to keep children entertained can create a successful babysitting job.  Have plenty of activities and crafts in mind, and you will provide entertainment and fun for the children you are watching.  From indoor and outdoor play to games or crafts, you can create an entertaining evening for yourself and the children.

Active and Board Games

• Games aren't just for kids; they can be great for the babysitter.  Board games offer structured play, with rules and strategies.  Be mindful to take the age of the children you babysit into account when choosing a board game.

Fun Crafts

• Kids love crafts, this is a creative way to pass time while you are babysitting.  From the simple craft ideas for the youngest children to more complex for the older children, you will find that the time passes quickly and the children are content and happy while creating.  Be sure to assist the younger children while making sure that it stays their creation- (in other words- be sure not to make them color it a certain color- or put this sticker here, and not there... ) allow them to be creative.

Outdoor Activities and Trips

• When you are babysitting think about taking the children outdoors for nature walks or to an open field to fly a kite.  Be sure to get permission from parents' first before venturing out.  Playing with the family dog or cat can be another fun activity.  On a sunshiny day, a picnic with playtime activities just in the back yard will be a fun change for the children.

Creative Snacks

• Crafts aren't the only way for kids to be creative.  They can do so in the kitchen as well.  With permission from the parents, and after making sure no one has food allergies, head to the kitchen and start mixing things.  There are many simple, delicious and nutritious snacking options.  A well-known creative snack is "ants on a log." Cut pieces of celery and spread peanut butter on them to create the "logs."  And the "ants" 

Baby-Sitting Games and Activity Ideas

Baby Sitting First Aid Basics -(simple)

As members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, we recognize that both our temporal well-being and our spiritual well-being are important.  By learning how to avoid accidents and how to take care of some common accidents, we become better prepared to protect and take good care of our temporal bodies.  It is also important that we have some basic first aid skills.  When we are prepared, we are better able to serve and bless others as well as ourselves.

Just like the Parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke10:29–37) we need to know that caring for others is not only important it is a responsibility.

Most babysitting jobs go smoothly and the worst thing that happens is a fight over the last Popsicle.  But for the rare times when an emergency does happen, you need to be ready to handle it.  That means thinking ahead and planning for anything that could happen.

Be Prepared!

It may seem scary to think about this stuff — it certainly reminds you of this big responsibility that babysitting is.  Its not likely you'll ever need to react to a serious emergency, just knowing what to do can help you feel more in control and confident.  Plus, knowing things like CPR or the proper way to do the Heimlich maneuver could give you an edge over other babysitters: Parents feel much safer when their sitters know these lifesaving techniques.

Some emergencies — such as choking or seizures — require that you know the what to do.  Before you even begin babysitting, it's a good idea to learn basic first aid, the Heimlich maneuver (for choking), and infant and child CPR.  These allow you to begin providing emergency care to a child while you are waiting for the ambulance to arrive.

I found the a lot of the following information at : http://kidshealth.org/  I have-however, changed a few things to better suit what I wanted to talk about.  

Baby Sitting

Baby Sitting Part 1

I found an article written by V. JEANE WOOLFENDEN entitled "Tending" in the July issue of the New Era back in 1972, I took most of it from there and revised it to better fit our needs today.

 I plan to share this with my own kids and also share it with my Activity day girls.  

*Reminder- this blog is written for fun and is in NO WAY responsible for a babysitting job gone bad!  I am simply putting ideas out there to help with learning, and becoming a better and more effective babysitter.  Listed here are only a few ideas to help with babysitting and in no way want to suggest that this is all you need to know about babysitting.  If you are planning to babysit- talk to your own parents, or leaders on what to do to be better, and if possible inquire at your local 4-H Extension Service to see if a class is provided to better educate yourself, your child, or others to become a more competent sitter or caregiver.

Serving Others

Have I Done any Good in the World Today?

I am an Activity Day's leader in my ward and we (my companion, the girls and I) thought for one of our "Serving Others" activities, we would do a scavenger hunt.  Really this activity could be modified to the Young Women or Young Men, or even your Family Home Evenings (FHE). 

There are a lot of ideas out there that consist of splitting up into groups and going house to house finding service projects to do, and maybe even racing to see who could accomplish more faster- but we don't have that kind of time or didn't want to rush this activity- so when I found this idea online here at a cute site called Emily's LDS Activity Day ideas.  I thought it would really work well for us.

Primary Talk-

My Little girl was asked to give a talk in Primary.  The subject this year 2013 is "I am a Child of God."  And each month has an outline to help target a different subject- this site is specifically designed for those who help teach and organize lessons, talks, and activities that pertain to Sharing time, and Primary.

Primary Sharing Time and here is the PDF file for the actual 2013 outline. 

I went to page 4, week 2 outline to learn what they would be teaching during this week of Sharing time.  This was great- because then I had a subject that I could follow... because honestly- sometimes it is harder to find a subject for a talk then writing the talk.  So knowing that it was about the Fall of Adam, was a great place to start.

We All Have Different Talents and Abilities

Singing and Sharing
Developing Talents

I am Serving in my Ward as the Activity Day Leader, but this as well as other post I have can certainly be used for FHE, YW, YM, and just plain for fun.  I just hope that this will help someone else to magnify your callings too.

I found a lesson in Gospel Principles Manual that was going to be perfect for us to help teach the idea about how developing our talents will serve our Heavenly Father.

Valentine's Day Scripture Chase

Learning and Living the Gospel

So we wanted to come up with a fun way to do a scripture chase.  We found scriptures that fit with a Valentines theme... So we thought conversational hearts was super cute-- the girls worked together to match up the hearts to the scriptures and find the answers.




We divided up the girls into 2 groups to race with each other   They received the scripture reference  then they had to read it out loud, run to the candy bowl, pick out the conversational heart that it best matched with, run back to the group and read the next scripture.

The first team to complete this game won a sticker- I am sure we could have found something better- but stickers are fun!

Afterwards we went into the kitchen to decorate cupcakes with hearts and candy sprinkles.

These girls are super fun!!