Check out this fun, social distancing family activity using objects from around your home. It’s the how-to that you figure out how-to yourselves, together!
ed. note: Chris is back as he continues to share some of his own tips and ideas for those of you looking for things to stay busy and use your time wisely while social distancing and working from home.
This fun, social distancing family activity is a different kind of “How To” for the different world we’re all living in right now. Usually, at The Creek Line House, our “How To’s” are detailed, meticulous, fool-proof and easy to follow. We’ll list the materials needed, where to get them, how much to buy and how to put it all together. Whether it’s installing floor tile, baking a banana bread or making your own pillows, we always bring all the information you’ll need. This time, things are a little different. You’re going to have to figure this one out by yourselves. But that’s what makes it fun.
The Social Distancing Family Activity Challenge
It started with an idea: let’s turn our kitchen table into a ping-pong table! With that, came a challenge to the kids: How do we turn our kitchen table into a ping-pong table? We don’t have a net, we don’t have paddles (Note: Courtenay, here, we actually do own paddles, but I didn’t tell anyone because the homemade ones are way more fun.) and we can’t just go to the sporting goods store to buy these things. They went straight to the recycling bin and started brainstorming. Here’s the plan they came up with:
There was some cardboard, some bubble wrap and pair of mini-sticks. The plan looked solid.
What You’ll Need
What do you need to build your own ping-pong table? I don’t know. You have to figure that out. Remember, in this “How to” you don’t follow our plan or use our ideas, you just have to be inspired by them. Look in your recycling bins, toy closets, basements, that box of sports equipment in the garage and find the things you can use to convert your dinner table into your own ping-pong table.
How To Make Your Ping-Pong Table
Making your own ping pong table requires these two easy steps. First, you take the things you came up with on your own and second, figure how to make them into a ping-pong table. On your own. You figure it out. Go do it. It’s that’s simple.
Success
Now that we’ve all come up with our own amazing plans and executed them to perfection, let the games begin! Look at how much fun we had with ours:
After the kids were tired out, I even came up with a few alternative plans to try out. What do you think of these ideas?
That’s literally all the paper products we have left in our house right now. We didn’t get in on the hoarding but we’re holding out hope, one of these days the grocery store will have toilet paper again.
Anyway, we’re going to try and come up with a few more of these ideas to share with you in the coming weeks. Even if the situation outside improves, things like this are still great bonding moments we should all look for more often. When I pitched this idea to Courtenay her facial expression almost shut it down immediately. She thought about the mess, the lack of real productivity, the noise, but about 10 minutes in she said, “this is actually fun”. It got us all away from our laptops, iPads and iPhones for a few minutes to laugh together. That’s a huge win right now.
Try out your own ping-pong family social distancing activity and let us know how it went.
More Like This!
- Making Celebrations Special During Social Distancing
- 9 Great Camping Activities You Don’t Have to Pack
- Home Inspiration From Our Little Town
- Potato Chip Fire Starter
- Ten Projects You Can Make With Things You Already Have in the House
- 10 Things to Organize When You’re Practicing Social Distancing
Courtenay Hartford is the author of creeklinehouse.com, a blog based on her adventures renovating a 120-year-old farmhouse in rural Ontario, Canada. On her blog, Courtenay shares interior design tips based on her own farmhouse and her work as founder and stylist of the interior photography firm Art & Spaces. She also writes about her farmhouse garden, plant-based recipes, family travel, and homekeeping best practices. Courtenay is the author of the book The Cleaning Ninja and has been featured in numerous magazines including Country Sampler Farmhouse Style, Better Homes and Gardens, Parents Magazine, Real Simple, and Our Homes.