10 Fun Outdoor Activities for Stay-at-Home Dads
Over the last decade the percentage of fathers opting to stay home with their children has more than doubled. In 2001, only 1.6% of dads were full time care providers. Today, it’s 3.4%.
What’s a dad to do? All that time at home with the little ones can get tedious if a guy isn’t prepared. But if you put a little effort into finding activities you and your kids can both enjoy, then your day will be much easier.
And if you can get them outside, away from the television, it’s even better.
Here are ten activities which I think you’ll enjoy.
10. Go Fishing
The one thing I could count on my dad wanting to do every weekend was grab some fishing poles and head for the nearest body of water. He loves fishing, and because of him, so do I.
His hobby is now my children’s hobby.
I loved watching each one catch a fish for the first time. It was exactly this cute:
If you don’t know anything about fishing, don’t worry about it. You can learn with your child. There are plenty of books on the basics of fresh-water fishing.
And the bonus is that even if you don’t catch a fish you still spent some time outside having fun with your kids. It’s a win-win.
Hooray for Geocaching!
Great ideas for any family! We’ve been doing a smaller-scale version of the giant bubbles–I have to admit that my husband and I can be found trying to improve on our best bubbles long after the kids have moved on to something else. We’ll definitely have to try the pool and hula hoop.
We took our four grandsons, aged 2 to 10, fishing last week. Plus two honorary grandkids. Six kids, with four adults helping. We caught a bucket full of blue gills, which grandpa spent an hour carefully cleaning. He wanted the kids to be able to eat what they caught. And they did, chowing down enthusiastically, which surprised the heck out of us.
My daughter and SIL and the boys moved to CA from MN last year, following a job for my SIL. We miss them terribly. When they came to MN for a visit last week, we drove the seven hours from the UP to spend a couple of days with them. We offered to take the boys fishing, and my daughter said that’s the one thing we do with them that nobody else does. We all had a blast, and we made a LOT of great memories. The high point for me was helping the two-year-old catch several fish, too. He didn’t quite understand the process, and wound up throwing the cane pole in the water instead of the tiny little fish! We got it back, though. Great times!
What sort of man could decide to be a Househusband and still look at himself each morning with any pride? Essentially, he is a mangina.
Bingo.
No, folks, women and men are NOT interchangeable. It DOES matter who does what.
If Dad can make a living working at home, great. Wish I could, wish more dads could.
But DAD should be the breadwinner, not mom, and I don’t care if the feminidiots don’t like it.
Regarding activity #5:
JESUS CHRIST, THEY’RE MINERALS!
We’ve seldom been able to launch stray cats more than 60 feet with our catapult.
This year the daughter and I are planning on doing the Willamette and Columbia rivers from Corvallis, Oregon to Astoria, Oregon in our Prijon Excursion tandem kayak. If that goes well I expect we will do a week or two in the San Juan Islands and/or the BC Gulf Island in September.
The plan for next year is to do the inside passage, While I would like to do Portland, Oregon to Glacier Bay, that may be a bit over eager and we may need to leave from Olympia, Washington. We shall see.
Daughter is twelve; I think she should blog these adventures just to encourage others to indulge. If not, I probably will just to keep a record of the trips.
Thanks for the list of other things to do and I hope your ideas and ours lead others to their own adventures.
Mark Sherman