Whenever the weather's beautiful, take your kids outside for fun and active games. Think about your children's activity preference and involve them in planning these family activities. Ask your kids to bring a couple of friends to add to the merriment. Just pack a couple of recess-style balls, a few bandannas and head outdoors for an afternoon or evening of fun.
Red Rover
Split your group into two teams. Each team should stand facing the other group while holding hands with approximately 30 feet between the two teams. One team will start and decide among themselves what player from the other team they want to call over. When they've decided, they grasp hands and call out together, "Red Rover, Red Rover, Let __________ come over!" filling in the blank with the name of the player from the other team. That player must release hands with his teammates and run as fast and as hard as he can toward the linked hands of the opposing team. If he's able to break the chain of hands, he can choose any player from that team to join his team. If he's unable to break the link of hands, he has to join the team that called him. The team to steal all the players from the other team wins the game.
Fruit Tag
Designate boundaries for this tag game and nominate a single player to start the game as the tagger. When the game starts, the tagger tries to tag the other players. If the tagger successfully tags another player, that player becomes the new tagger. To avoid being tagged, a player can kneel on the ground and call out the name of a fruit, but that fruit can only be called out once. If a player calls out a fruit that has already been called, she won't receive immunity and can become the next tagger if tagged.
Single-Man Kickball
Use bandannas to designate a home base, pitching mound and running base. Play on a space that's about a quarter of the size of a soccer field. Unlike normal kickball, rather than playing on teams, each player plays for himself. Only five positions are required: kicker, catcher, pitcher and two fielders. The pitcher rolls the ball to the kicker and the kicker kicks the ball, keeping it on the ground and within the designated boundaries. After kicking the ball, the player runs to the running base and runs back home. If the player makes it home without being tagged by the ball, he scores a point. The player is "safe" while on the running base, but must attempt to run back to home plate. After being tagged out or scoring, the runner rotates to the catching position, catcher to pitcher and pitcher to fielding. One of the fielders rotates to the kicking position. You may have to adjust the distance between bases and the size of the field to meet the needs of the kids involved. Each player keeps his own score, and the first one to reach five points wins the game.
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