For those with younger kids, What are some group activities that you take them to to socialize and learn? Gymnastics, Library Events, etc...
For those with younger kids, What are some group activities that you take them to to socialize and learn? Gymnastics, Library Events, etc...
We are older parents without a lot of friends that have kids.... We have done a few below but what are some other ideas? She isn't in daycare or anything so her socialization with other kids is limited! We love giving her every experience we can.
We've done so far:
- Baby "swim" lessons
- Library Reading and Play Times
- Parent and Me style "Gymnastics" class.
What are some others one that are out there?
"Music Together" was fun. Sometimes libraries have a story hour.
We've had a lot of success in the neighborhood park. Every morning our toddler wants to go "look for friends." I think he gets more out of the unstructured play environment than he does at swim class or more proscribed play events.
Honestly, what I did was Google "city Name events" and have a browse about whatever came up. Me and event Brite are besties and I have curated a bunch of Facebook pages to follow. There's a bunch of local stuff to do for kids.
When my kid was very young she mostly liked looking at things, so we went to farmer's markets, festivals, craft fairs. Anything where there was a lot to look at. Picking strategic times to go ro the park is also great. People take their young kids around 10am. School aged kids pop up around 4 or 5pm. In between that it's really random. If you can keep a schedule you'll run into the same parents over and over.
My kid is 4 and trustworthy out and about, so mostly we just try random things. I'm new to the area, so it gives me an excuse. Maybe we'll hit up a skatepark (she loves her scooter), maybe a new restaurant, maybe we'll just walk around an area or check out a festival. I think I realized when she was 3 that there were very few venues that are explicitly not for kids so eff it, let's check it out. How long can a toddler last on a museum? My kid, about an hour which is pretty good.
Along the way I teach her how to operate in adult spaces and how she can have fun even if it isn't specifically for kids. We're gotten to the point where she just tells me she's bored and wants to leave instead of screaming lol