Colleen's Family Activities

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Welcome to Our Geocaching Experience👟

‘I have found that if you love life, life will love you back.’
— Arthur Rubenstein.

Welcome to my first Activity Blog 😊

Hi there 👋

Well hello, it’s good to meet you through my blog!

How’s your day going?

Let me do a quick introduction… my name is Colleen Brownlee. I am English, 42 years of age. I am married to a Northern Irish guy. We have a son who is five years old.

It has almost taken us five years to get into the swing of parenthood 😂.

Our son is very active, sporty and is at a great age for doing a lot of activities. We do a lot, a lot, a lot of activities!

This blog is all about great activity ideas to do with children, both free activities and activities that may have some cost. I love bargains so don’t worry I will be looking out for those, as well as vouchers and offers to let you know about.

We live in Germany, but some of the activities you can do anywhere and create yourself. It doesn’t have to be limited to Germany.

I hope you come on the journey with me and try some of the activities out. 🎉

Let’s get started!

Geocaching:

Geocaching is a mobile, tech based modern day treasure hunt, which originated in Seattle USA. Think of orienteering without the maps and running (and not so far off the beaten track). The great thing about Geocaching is you can do it anywhere!!

It is great for families but can be used for any age, even the grandparents and the dog would love Geocaching.

It’s a great way to explore your area or areas you are visiting. It is great for getting the kids out in the fresh air, walking, skating or biking round. It’s good to involve the kids, show them how to look at the map and how to work out the clues. Set realistic distances if your children are under five years old you may want to look at some points that are less than a kilometre away. It is also good to take a pen to sign that you have found the clue.

We started Geocaching last summer to explore our area and we absolutely love it! We had the goal of looking for the treasure and it was really exciting for our son. As a mum I enjoy looking around as we walk to see where landmarks are… oh wow there’s a shop we could use. 🛍

About the App:

There are a number of Apps to use – but the main one is simply called GeoCaching. It is easy to use – it will use the location services on your phone. Make sure your battery is well charged. The app is free and there are free caches to find. You can upgrade to see all the locations. Some of these are puzzles with clues, others bring you on a trail. There are different sizes of container as well as a guide to how hard it is to find and how difficult the terrain is. (Many of them are easy walking terrain, but may not be suitable for pushchairs. There are clues and a find log which can be marked on the app when found. We have found that all the caches are designed to be found and also not to disturb private property or the environment.

Some images from Geocaching day out.

Our Thoughts:

Our score for geocaching is definitely a ten out of ten even though my feet are hurting today from going out yesterday.

It’s free, keeps you fit, gets you interacting and talking as a family, and encourages the kids to learn and be outdoors! The only downside I can see is it may be harder to do in winter.

Try it for yourself. You can simply download the app on your phone. Or here’s the link to the website: https://www.geocaching.com/play

Thanks for reading!

Have a great week Colleen x

PS. It is helpful to take snacks and drinks or a packed lunch to make a day of it. You may end up being longer than you thought as the kids get into it.

Write any comments or suggestions below.

Tramming It!

Hi,

How’s your week been?

I have kind of lost track of the days this week… There always seems to be something to do to keep on top of life.

Yesterday (Sunday) we went along to a tram festival in Schwanheim, Frankfurt. This was at the Frankfurt am Main Transport Museum – at the end of Line 12.

http://www.verkehrsmuseum.info/

It’s a museum which is open all year – but they do a fun day where they open up, have festival and the older trams run on the lines on the day. It was really great.

There was different trams from the past and activities for the kids including a bouncy castle, face painting, balloon modelling, painting wheels etc.

Our son loves to get his face painted, as he has gotten older he always seems to choose SpiderMan. The lady that painted his face did an amazing job. As far as face painting goes we were really impressed. Thank you!

There were model train tracks with buttons to press to make the trams go round – we saw the Regional, the S-Bahn and the U-Bahn models. Our son kept going back to this and was fascinated by it.

There were stalls for drinks and food – our son was happy as they had a slushie machine. I tried a piece of Käsekuchen (cheese cake) – very yummy indeed.

The staff were all up beat and very friendly.

It was quite a small event, we didn’t stay too long as we were all very tired today. But with the old working trams out and about round Frankfurt – many people would have seen them. They made their way to Frankfurt-West as well as other locations.

If you are in Frankfurt it is worth a visit see link.
http://www.hsf-ffm.de/events-sonderfahrten/veranstaltungen/sommerfest.html#c1586 – keep it bookmarked for next time.

It is 20 mins tram ride but nice to travel out of the city, There is also a farm, quite a sizeable forested area and play park just behind it and plenty to do in Schwanheim with nice cafes and eating places and it’s just beside the river as well. It’s a great place to visit.

What activities have you been up too?
Would love to here what you get up to in the holidays and on the weekends.
Thanks for reading!

Play in the City – “OpernSpiele”

Playing in the City

Hi and Welcome….

If this is your first time on the blog or you are returning – welcome. Thanks for popping in and having a read.

On Sunday we were in Frankfurt at a free play event run by Abenteuerspielplatz Riederwald e.V. This is the organisation which does adventure playgrounds and mobile ‘spiele’ / play round the region. They do the free play along the river at the start of holidays the which we attended and will also do a post on at a later stage.

The unique thing about this free play activity is that it is right in front of the historic opera house. https://oper-frankfurt.de/en/

The location was directly outside the Opera house and in a surrounding park. A beautiful location for children and families to experience with fountains for the children to play in.

It has many different activities for all ages – from bouncy castles, climbing nets, crafts, games, T-shirt making, bungee bouncing, bricks and activities in the water.

Some of the highlights of this one is the playing in the fountain in front of the Opera House, the go carts, the train tracks and the climbing wall.

There was a lot going on in Frankfurt today, the city triathlon, a street food festival and a summer Fest by the river with fairground activities and this….

I was thinking about activities and what makes a good one. I think the easiest give away is your child’s face when it lights up. This was the case today so a good activity then.

Our son loved the rock-climbing wall, he found it a little difficult but the staff were really helpful with him and patient.

There were mini go carts which was my sons first time on one.

They have table games out to play along with as well as swing ball and other games. Some activities have a cost (the bungee trampoline and the T-shirt printing for example, but most of it is free!)

My son didn’t want to do it but they had painting all set up for children to paint large pictures and take home.

The organisation of it is really well done. There is a real sense of community.

I think I preferred this location to the one by the river, it was more spread out and then each section was less busy.

As a mum I felt I could see my son easier.

I will definitely book this event in my diary for next summer.

For information on the OpernSpiele and the other activities by the organisation visit their website http://abenteuerspielplatz.de/

What activities have you been up to this summer? Let me know by commenting.

12 Classic Family Activities – Part 2

Please click here to see the first 6 Classic Activities I have listed – here is Part 2

Thanks for checking back in – here are numbers 7 – 12 of my Classic Activities.

7 Head to the Park

Parks are great – they are free and are brilliant stimulation for the kids.

In Germany they encourage outdoor play a lot – in Kindergarten, school and beyond. Playing outdoors improves physical and mental health; encourages playing with peers and allows children to be adventurous.

We have some great parks in our village and we love to try out new parks.

The variety of parks is great and there are sure to be ones with play equipment close by, but others may have climbing areas, wooden climbing frames, water play areas amongst other things.

Some ideas when it comes to parks:

Create an assault course – using the equipment, benches, trees and paths – set a course and time children. My son enjoyed watching the Ultimate Beastmaster show and he pretends he is competing whilst going around the climbing frames.
Water parks are great for the hot weather.
Bring a frisbee
Bring a kite
Bring a ball or two

In Germany a lot of parks have table tennis tables, basketball hoops and sometimes football nets nearby or part of them.

Another great activity for older kids and a family is to join a Park Run. These happen all over the world on a Saturday morning, are free to attend and you don’t even need to run – it can be a jog or walk. They are all over the UK and there is currently only one in Frankfurt at Nidda.

https://www.parkrun.com.de/nidda/ – or visit https://www.parkrun.com/countries/ to see if and where Park Run is in your country.

There are some brilliant activities and sights in the parks

8 Local Events

All year round, but especially over the summer – there are always events going on locally. We have started to search on Facebook, Eventbrite and google searches for events as well as looking out for posters and flyers – as too often we found out about them after the fact.

In Germany there are a lot of little local fairs, fundraising events focused round the local community – from football tournaments (with bouncy castles and activities), street festivals to the local fire station and everything in between.

Face Painting is normally on the agenda!

Recently we went to the MainSpiele – Kids Play event along the river in Frankfurt – more on that in the next post – but this was a great day – all free. When there’s free events on there’s no need to do a paid event that day.

We also recently enjoyed watching the end of the Ironman event in Frankfurt – many people were out to cheer and watch and there was a whole Ironman village to look at.

9 Games Day / Night

For a wetter day or a family evening – we love a good games night. Getting the board games out, the dominoes, the cards or the puzzles.

Basically pile the games up and start playing – it can be great fun, encourages playing together and also keeps the brain active.

Our son loves to know the rules and follow the, and we are trying to use it to learn he can’t always win…. Our favourites are cards games, dominoes, ludo, snakes and ladders and he has been learning how to play chess. One of his best Christmas presents was a box with 80 games in it….

10 Education Challenges

I know it’s the summertime and we don’t want to be pushy parents – but we have found if we make reading, writing and maths fun – our little man loves to get involved.

We do stories nearly every evening – now he is getting into a mini novels, rather than the shorter picture books. He wants to hear what happens next.
He has always loved storytime – so it’s now using that passion to start to read and write himself.

We try from time to time to sit and read a few books at a time curled up on the sofa or lying on the bed.

For older kids setting a challenge of reading a book in a week then coming back together and telling the best things about it is a good way for them to communicate and to learning confidence in presentation.

This can all be linked to rewards or prizes. Workbooks are a great way of learning from home.

11 Baking / Cooking

Baking or cooking is a classic activity to do with kids. Making or decorating cupcakes or cakes, making pancakes, make your own pizza – or even better the pizza base as well.

It doesn’t take a lot of organising except having the ingredients available.

There is so much on YouTube and Pinterest for ideas on what to cook and bake.

My son loves baking chocolate cupcakes and decorating them. We all hold a love for pancakes and we are whisking up a batter mix quite regularly.

12 Local Attractions

Science Museums, Museums, Castles and other local attractions

These places will have a lot of events – some of them free, others which need to be paid for.

Look out for offers though – in the UK there is the National Trust and Heritage England to join.

Many attractions which were reasonably local to us in England had offers – including the Eureka! Children’s Museum and The Magna Centre which both had an offer where once you bought a ticket – you had return access for the year.

In Frankfurt on the last Saturday of every month the museums are free – so we are planning that in for the next few months. See here for details.

And many museums are free for under 18s

What offers are on in your local area?

And these activities don’t include arts and crafts activities, den / fort building, tree climbing, summer clubs and camps, football camps, movie and popcorn nights or the many other options.

So let me know which are your favourites and if there are some which I could try I’d love to hear from you…

12 Classic Family Activities – Part 1

This is Part 1 – to see the next 6 – head over to Part 2

Summer hols are here! If you are like me, you are looking for ways to entertain and create memories over the holidays. Yes – trips away are great, day trips are brill and memories are definitely made. But that doesn’t always cover the whole time off – so what do you do?

Sometimes the classic ones are the best and here are some of mine:

1. Get Outdoors

Whether it’s on a bike, on a scooter or even just walking – getting out and exploring is great. Exploring new areas, exploring your town, village or the local countryside.

In Germany everyone seems to be out on their bike, much more than in England. There are many more cycle routes and paths.

Once kids know how to cycle, they generally love it!

As a family we are making biking more of the normal in our life. We bike around our village, take the bikes on the train (much easier in Germany as the local trains have space for many bicycles) and bike around cities using their cycle routes.

We did a great park cycle around our village. There are 4 parks in the village, so the challenge was to visit them all, cycling between them. The visiting of the parks was also lots of fun – and expended loads of energy!

In many cities they are now bike hire or rental schemes which are easy to use and a great way for touring round new cities while exercising!

Our Score: 9/10

Great for exercising, great for exploring and can be an adventure for the kids.

Did you know there are twice as many bicycles in the world than cars!

2. Swimming

We all have different experiences of swimming when we were kids. For some it was good and for other parents – it’s not so enjoyable. But no matter which it is – getting children into the water is fun and it is such an important life skill to swim – so getting them to have fun in the water is great no matter what!

Swimming is a good all-round activity. Especially as the temperature rises.

In Germany there are a lot of outdoor pools – with slides, kiddie pools and larger pools. Most of them have sports areas, table tennis tables and lots of space to lie out and make a day of it with the blanket and a picnic.

Check out your local pool and pools around your area.
Visit a water park when on holiday.
Go to the beach!
Take a trip to a lake which is allowed for swimming and has lifeguards on duty. (don’t be tempted to jump into just any lake – make sure it is safe for swimming)

When we go to the pool of the lake – it’s hard to get our son out of the water!

Our Score: 8/10

Great for exercising, brilliant on warmer days and many memories made playing in the water. On many of the pools though – there may be a cost.

Climbing out of the pool – another time down the slide

3. Fruit picking

We are so so fortunate to have some fruit trees in our garden.

Fruit picking is a fun few hours of entertainment and again encourages kids to be outdoors.

They are local farms that have fruit picking times for the kids to go and fill up a punnet or two for a small cost. Usually it’s strawberries at the start of the summer – but some do raspberries and blackcurrants. You will probably find that the kids will eat as many as they pick.

The fruit can be used for great summer deserts – or made into jam.

Our Score: 6/10

Great summer activity – limited if in a city – and very weather dependent.

4. Talent Show

One to do when the weather takes a turn for the bad….

Kids love to perform, sing, try magic tricks, tell jokes and lots more.
The box that has sat since Christmas maybe get it out and set the kids a challenge. They could learn a card or magic trick, learn a dance, a song or make up a play. They can get some ideas from YouTube.

What costume can they make, what props do they need – get the craft and the paints out.

Make a stage, invite the neighbours, practice for the next family get together. At the next BBQ or family get together it’s a great way of having a fun evening’s entertainment – especially if everyone has been told they have to have a party trick or a karaoke song ready to perform.

Make pretend buzzers – but you may just get surprised at the talent!

Our Score: 7/10

This is great fun and a must do – for when the weather isn’t great. But we all hope for the good weather where we can be outdoors!

5. Cinema Trips

When we say the word cinema to our son his face lights up and he nearly explodes with excitement. He loves going to the cinema and the experience of it. It has become a great prize for good behaviour.

We don’t go that often because of the cost but when we do go, we make it an experience and we do order drinks and popcorn.

Look out for offers at your local cinema. Saturday mornings are good in England as they have the £1 showings – many cinemas have family showings and family tickets. If looking for the showings in Germany we look for the OV ones (Original Version) as this means it’s in English – this is for us to enjoy, as generally the little man can understand them better than us in German.

Our Score: 8/10

For us this is a brilliant option – because he loves the big screen. We keep it as a treat day / a prize and try to get the family offers.

6. Mysterious Adventure Tours

Get on a train, a tram, a bus and just head somewhere…. You might know where you are going – but it can be a ‘mystery tour’ for the kids.

Trains and trams are magical to kids!!

If kids are used to going, around in a car going for a train or tram ride can be a real experience and feel like a treat. Look for family tickets and many times kids travel free.

We enjoy going on train trips.

Check out your local trains. We use a train app!

It is great for kids to see where they are going and work out which stop you are all getting off. If you are travelling in another country it is also helpful for you all as a family hearing the language.

Our Score: 9/10

We love our train rides – finding the station, the platform, how long to the train, translating the German and letting the little man sort the ticket.

This is the first 6 ideas – I will be posting the next 6 tomorrow! Please comment and give me your thoughts on these and any ideas you have for fun activities – to keep the kids entertained over the summer. We obviously love the ones where there is a lot of energy expended!