Keeping Children Occupied

The Christmas toys have been played with, the festive day trips are all ticked off and crucially, the money is all spent! So how do we keep the children occupied now?! January can feel approximately 478 days long! For many of us, the weather is pretty miserable too and us parents could do with some inspiration for filling the weekends with fun and giggles. Well, look no further! We’ve asked the parents in the office what they do with their families. Here are our favourite ideas that don’t cost much (if anything), don’t need a huge amount of preparation and are (nearly) guaranteed to make the little ones in your family smile.

If you are parenting with a disability, all of our ideas can be supported or enhanced with a few handy tools or adaptions. We know how important it is to have fun together and play alongside your children easily. We have a wide range of gripping aids and gadgets that aim to ease tasks in all areas of life. This leaves you free to focus on good quality family time (and mediate the sibling bickering!).

Keeping Occupied Outdoors

Despite the chilly weather, getting the kids outdoors is a great way to keep their bodies moving. It can be a useful mood-booster too! Get everyone wrapped up warm quickly and easily with a little help from our dressing supports. Zip Grips added to coat zips and Zubits added to shoe laces and you’re all set.

Once you’re out, we’ve found we tend to need a few tricks up our sleeves for keeping the youngest members of the family walking once their legs get tired. One of our favourite ways is to take a bag with us and challenge them to collect things as they walk along. Pretty leaves, interesting shaped sticks or shiny pebbles. Or challenge them to find something from every color on the rainbow! Once home, they can make leaf rubbings or turn their sticks into magic wands. And we get to sit down with a cup of tea!

If you’re a wheelchair user, we have lots of ways to help family walks feel a little easier for you. Coffee is pretty crucial to our ability to keep up with the kids. We rarely leave home without one! Our Wheelchair Drinks Holder keeps your drink handy, even on a long walk. Our HandiPouches stick onto your wheelchair frame, keeping car keys, mobile phone and other ‘bits and bobs’ easily accessible. You could always pop a few plasters or tissues in there for the inevitable grazed knees or runny noses! If you don’t travel light and need a few more things, our Wheelchair Under-seat Bag or Pocket is perfect for keeping just about everything tucked away under your chair, easy to reach whenever you need it.

Keeping Occupied at Home

If you prefer to stay cosy at home, there are lots of things to keep everyone busy. Rob, our CEO, tells us his children love to raid the recycling bins for boxes, bottles and cartons. They then junk model all sorts of things! Costumes, robots, boats… they have even junk modeled gripping aids, inspired by daddy’s job! Add a few paints, some sticky tape and colourful paper.You can easily spend an afternoon making… well, just about anything!

If you want to get involved too, we have a range of scissor options to suit everyone. From scissors with longer loops to Table-Top Scissors that spring open and don’t need lifting… we’ve got you covered. Or you could use the Nimble to slice through tape and craft paper with the use of just one finger! Once you reach the decorating stage, pop an EazyHold Strap around paintbrushes and glue sticks. You can get messy with the children, without the need for strong grip.

Keeping Occupied in the Kitchen

Baking or cooking together can be a lovely way to spend a winter weekend. Clare, our marketing and technical manager, often baked with her children when they were small and encouraged her older children to take turns cooking for the family. If you fancy something a little more silly, why not raid your kitchen cupboards and play ‘blind taste testing’ with the children? Pop a little bit of a few different foods into pots and blindfold the children. They take turns to taste and guess what they are eating!

Our range of kitchen gadgets can support you to cook, bake or play in the kitchen with ease. From cutlery options to cutting, preparing and serving. Avoid the frustration, reduce the stress and get playful with the children.

…And Relax!

If you’ve spent some time outside, got creative with the recycling or made a mess in the kitchen… it’s time to relax! There are few better ways to spend a rainy weekend than with a film, a cosy blanket and some hot chocolate. If you’re lucky, you might even find a few leftover Christmas chocolates to go with it! Dim the lights, pop on your comfiest lounge wear and the kids might even let you close your eyes for 5 minutes!

Our Hot Drinks Bundle is designed to make those cosy winter evenings straight forward to deliver. The Easy-Pour Kettle delivers boiling water without the need to lift to pour, which can be both tricky and potentially dangerous. The SpillNot is one of our favourite gadgets. Slip your fingers through the fabric loop and carry any drink from kitchen to sofa without the worry of spills. It doesn’t matter how much you sway as you walk or move, the SpillNot will not spill your drink (we’re told it’s physics, but we’re pretty convinced there’s magic involved!)

However you choose to spend your family time, we are here to support you. Parenting is hard enough without the added frustrations that disabilities can bring! Why not take a browse through our shop and find out for yourself the many ways in which we can support you to play and relax with less stress and more joy?

Jo Smith