Holidays are lots of fun but not all of us want to be sitting on a beach sunbathing or putting the kids into kids clubs so we can lounge around – as nice as it sounds, for us its about spending time together as a family, doing things together and often trying something new.
We’ve recently spent a lot of time carefully thinking about family holidays we want to take together and part of that discussion was about new things we could try while on our holidays.
Holiday activities which get you moving: Here are things the kids wanted to try:
Water Activities
They are never happier than when they are in the water, I’m sure in a previous life they were fish!
Snorkelling Our local swimming pool had snorkelling lessons however children have to be at stage 8 to partake in these. Both my children have now given up their swimming lessons so they will never be able to do those, so to make up for it we did get them snorkels for our big paddling pool over the summer. Of course, they really want to learn to do it properly then so they can swim with the fish in the sea.
Parasailing The really want to do a skydive after watching me do mine a few years ago. They won’t be old enough to do that though for many many years so this is something they could do in tandem on a holiday and are even keener after Emmy had a friend show her pictures of her doing it over the summer.
Swimming/Aqua aerobics This is a great exercise for getting up your heart rate up. My children and I love swimming and we do go as often as possible. They don’t care how deep the water is just as long as they are having fun – both can swim really well. They also love water slides.
Swimming with Dolphins This has been something I have wanted to do ever since I was a child, I love dolphins as does Emmy. I think it would be an amazing experience for them to do at least once in their lives.
White Water Rafting/Canoeing We actually live right by the Olympic White Water Rafting centre in Essex, however, it’s not something they have tried yet but we do often go down to watch others having a go.
Body Boarding Emmy started to pick up the basics while on our last holiday to Cornwall and she loved it so much but would like to try again when it isn’t freezing so she could spend more time in the water. She was purple with cold by the time she got out, sadly, one of the joys of living in the UK.
Surfing Another one Emmy wants to try, I think she would actually be rather good at it but would need a few lessons.
Snow-based activities
It goes without saying these would have to be activities for when we go abroad unless they are done in the snowdomes dotted around the country, but the children would far prefer holidays to Switzerland over a snowdome any day.
Skiing They’ve never tried this before, in fact, nor have Paul and I. I am so accident prone that I do fear it would end rather badly and lessons would certainly be needed.
Snowboarding Again not something they have tried before but Paul used to mountain board before we got married and I’ve had a few goes too.
Building snowmen I do feel like I need to break out into song whenever I write that.
Snowball fights Who doesn’t enjoy a good snowball fight?
Sledging Something we do here whenever it actually does snow but that’s only about 2/3 days a year tops – but of course, we have 3 sledges in the cupboard just in case.
Dog Sledding Ever since they saw a video of this when their Auntie and Uncle got a Husky dog they’ve been talking about trying it out.
Ice-skating I actually used to have ice-skating lessons for PE classes back in secondary school, I loved it. I’ve not been for years but we are all going this weekend which will be Harry’s first time.
Other Activities
There are so many other activities you could do while on holidays that I couldn’t possibly name them all, here are just a few:
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Clare
Hi, I'm Clare (Emmy's Mummy). A former Nanny and Mother of 2 - Emmy (born February 2010) and Harry (born October 2012). We are Essex based and share our adventures and misadventures of a busy crazy life.
