Walking in a Winter Wonderland
While the weather outside may be frightful, a magical world awaits those willing to don warm gloves, gear and good boots. Hit the road for a wintery walk with the grandchildren using the following ideas for outdoor adventure.
Penny walk. As you venture off, use a penny toss to determine your route by declaring a toss for heads being a left turn and a toss for tails being right. At each street corner, toss the coin again to decide which way to go. Once you’ve tossed and turned time and again, you may need to toss once more (or off and on throughout the walk) to decide whether to head back home or to continue on.
I spy with my little eye. The classic game is a no-brainer for winter walks. Take turns choosing something ahead of you (nixing what’s behind helps keep one and all going in the right direction), then recite the requisite “I spy with my little eye something _____” mantra. Depending on the degree of difficulty, it may take just a few rounds of seeking and finding before you’re all back home.
Alphabet walk. Print the alphabet, A to Z, down a piece of paper, then cross off each letter as you see things starting with that letter. A is for airplane, animal. B is for blue sky, buildings. C is for car, cat. And so forth. With 26 letters to mark off the list, this walk requires plenty of time—and creative thinking for a handful of letters, such as Z, X, K and Q. One note: Be sure to use a pencil not a pen for the marking, especially if the weather’s so cold the pen ink might freeze.
Picture-taking walk. Budding photographers of all ages will enjoy heading out with camera in hand to capture pics befitting a designated category—as long as they have gloves on and can maneuver the camera buttons. Ideal themes for winter are frozen things (icicles, roads, windows), animals, signs of weather (clouds, snowflakes, etc.), and more. Don’t forget there is a whole photo album’s worth of holiday décor for picture-taking, too.
Do you hear what I hear? Going for a walk typically means looking about and taking in the sights. Add a twist to your outing by keeping track of all the sounds you hear while out and about, too. With big sounds like trucks, sirens, dogs barking and motorcycles, down to lower volume sounds, including wind chimes, snow being shoveled, and leaves rustling, there’s no shortage of audible delights as you walk about your neighborhood winter wonderland.
Lisa Carpenter is a writer and blogger specializing in topics related to grandparenting and parenting adult children. She publishes the Grandma’s Briefs website and can be followed on Twitter and Facebook.
