Entertaining the kids during “Lockdown” in the Seychelles.

The Seychelles is joint 17th of countries in the world with the lowest cases of Seychelles with only 11 so far. (https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/).

Nevertheless, unlike Sweden or a range of other countries, the Seychelles' fairly draconian “Lockdown” policy, which forces residents to remain indoors (We’re not even allowed to go out and exercise), means that entertaining the kids has become somewhat more difficult. Especially since a lot of our time is spent at the beach or in the jungle, etc. You can read more about these measures in our blog “Living in Lockdown in the Seychelles during Covid-19”.

However, we’ve come up with a range of great activities to ensure that the kids are getting fresh air and exercise, so here’s a number of our favourites so far:

1. Tyre Swing

I know it sounds simple, and it was. But this has provided us with an abundance of entertainment. Just make sure it’s secure.

2. Den Making

I mean this is mainly for the Dads. Den Making is great fun and gives the kids a challenge to come up with their own designs. You can also play a range of games once the dens are up.

3. Rope Climbing Frame

We had some old rope fencing laying around so we knocked this climbing frame up, which also serves as a child’s hammock or sorts so we can lounge around in the shade reading when we’re finished climbing.

4. Tyre Balance Beams / Log Balance Beams

Having all this time meant that we’ve been doing a lot of trimming and pruning, so logs are in abundance. We also came across a few old tyres whilst digging around so we dug these down into the garden and made the kids a set of balance apparatus. They’re great for coordination.

5. Gardening

We had the kids set up their won garden with some seeds we had and they organise a routine for taking care of it. Who knows, if Lockdown continues we may need these tomatoes.

6. Assault Course.

Using allot of the above we set up an assault course and had competitions to see who could do it the quickest. We keep adding more inventive tasks to it as the days go on.

7. Fairy Garden.

We cut up a couple of logs and tidied up an area under a tree and created a “Fairy Garden”, where the kids can sit and relax or have their snack. They’ve been slowly decorating it with old knickknacks.

8. Recycled Stuff Crafting

Not as energetic as some of the others, but environmentally friendly fun. It also helps us talk to the kids about sustainability. Here we made some old tin can wind chimes with a bit of beach glass added.

9. Mandala Making

We all collected a range of leaves, sticks, or anything of interest from around the garden and made some mandalas.

10. Dress Up/Theme Day

We used items from the garden to create costumes (Our theme here was Hawaii). Banana Leaves for the dress, flowers and leaves for the Leis and natural colourings for the body art. We kept the theme all day and made Hawaiian dishes and did some Hula.