15 Rainy-Day Activities for Families with Tweens

For those of us in the Pacific Northwest, 2022 started with lots of snow, then rain and all-around cold temperatures. The snow is always fun for the first couple of days but even that quickly gets old. When it starts to melt off, it’s not much fun spending anytime outside in the cold and slush.

We have fully approached that season of what to do with the kids that doesn’t involve a screen. On top of that, we have the Omicron variant. Luckily we are not in another lockdown, but this has led to additional time at home.

I’ll be honest, my kids have quite a bit of screen time. Maybe more than they should. My 11-year old son would be happy if I left him alone all day while he played Xbox talking to his friends on his headset. Maybe it’s to make me feel better, but I tell myself the fact that he can be talking to his friends this way makes it somewhat of a social activity and not just more screen time.

My eight-year-old daughter is easier to find activities for. She still enjoys art projects, baking and playing barbies. But even those are short lived sometimes and she tries to be “cool” by wanting to do things her brother is interested in. Or maybe it’s that my endurance is not long on many days for things like playing dolls.

As I look to the months ahead of gloomy weather, I am already thinking what things can we do as a family that my kids will actually enjoy and don’t involve me forcing my pre-teen to make paper flowers or a complete a scavenger hunt.

Here are 15 ideas to keep your tween entertained while also maybe even getting some fun family time in:

1. Kids Against Maturity: This is by far the most fun game we have played in awhile as a family. My son absolutely rolls laughing, particularly at the cards that leave my daughter asking, “what is that?” It’s for ages 10 and up but we simply let our daughter swap out any cards that confuse her. We got this for Christmas and I already bought the expansion pack because we have been playing so often.

2. Minute to Win It Games: You can find a huge variety on sites like this. My kids enjoy picking a few for us to do throughout rainy weekends

3. Family Workout: We are lucky to have a treadmill, a peloton bike and a variety of weights. My kids and I will actually take turns between “stations” and the rule is they get to pick what we do. It often means mom has to run further or hold a plank until I scream but, hey, that’s good for me too. You could easily do this without any actual equipment. You can also get two free months on the Peloton app which has a variety of family workouts with no equipment needed!

4. Hang in the Kids Rooms: This one is straight from my tween son. I am certain by the time he is a teenager he won’t want us stepping foot in his room. But I thought it was nice that when I asked him for non-screen ideas for our family he suggested we just “chill” in his room. We did this the other day for about 45 minutes just chatting, checking out new Lego sets he had built etc.

5. Would you Rather: This one might involve a screen to get ideas for the questions but I don’t really consider it screen time. My kids love making up their own and you can make it last longer by making each person have some sort of explanation as to why they would rather eat a spider versus a roach, for example. We have even turned it into mini debates which is ridiculous and really fun.

6. Truth or Dare: We started this one during the pandemic lockdown and the kids loved it. You have to set rules with the dares of course. With teenagers, you might have to be careful with the questions but my tween son so far has not asked anything too awkward or inappropriate!

7. Design an Escape Room: Use puzzles, riddles or other clues to crack the code to “escape”.

8. Pick an Idea: We each write an idea of a non-screen activity and put it into a bowl to draw from. Mom, you are not allowed to put things like “everyone does chores for 30 minutes”.

9. Pick a Movie: For future screen time. We also each write a few movies down and then when we decide on a family movie night, we make a random pick from that.

10. Teach the Dog a Trick: We have only gotten as far as “sit” and “shake” but the kids got really into it.

11. Obstacle course for parents: My daughter loves playing things like floor is lava but my son seems to be hit or miss these days. However, what they do like doing is setting up ridiculous courses for my husband and I. It typically turns into them also then trying the course so it’s a sneaky way to get my tween to participate.

12: Make a Tik Tok Video: Ok this one is a screen but the general idea is the making of it that gives some family fun. I finally gave in several months ago and downloaded the Tik Tok app. There are some really funny kid appropriate videos you can replicate. My kids really bond over making videos together and you can have all the settings private. But definitely parent awareness for this is encouraged!

13: Learn a Copy Cat Fast Food Recipe: My son loves Taco Bell but it’s not something we get him a lot. We recreated a crunch wrap supreme at home and he loved the whole process. It was fun getting him in the kitchen helping, even if it was for a fast food type item.

14: Solo Cup Fun: We use those red plastic solo cups for two things that our kids love. First, is to simply stack and see who can get the highest stack. I always lose this one.
Second, we line them up at each end of our kitchen table and then in teams of two, we bounce a ping pong ball to the other end to see who can get it into the opponent’s cups. Once a ball lands in the cup, the opponent must remove that cup. First team who gets them into all the cups, wins!

15: Learn How to Juggle, Card/Magic Trick or Tie Knots: These are on our list to do at some point. Yes, they might involve finding tutorials on YouTube but I think using a screen to learn a skill is different than screens just being the “main event.”

Hang in there during these winter months! Continue checking out AllMomDoes for tips, tricks and daily inspiration!