10 Winter Boredom Busters for the Dead Week After Christmas
There is a stretch between Christmas and New Year with no name and no shape. School is not on. The presents are open. It is dark at four and wet outside, and by the twenty seventh somebody says they are bored while standing in a room full of new things.
That is not ingratitude. Three days of high stimulation flattens a child the same way it flattens you, and a pile of unfamiliar toys is a decision, not a rescue.
What works in that week is not more stuff. It is a small number of things that hold attention for longer than eleven minutes, and knowing which hour to bring each one out.
Ten things in three groups, arranged by the hour of the day they actually help. Ratings are live Amazon numbers at the time of writing.
- 1
A big screw together building kitBest if you only buy one thing - 2
A 195 piece build anything setBest for two children sharing - 3
Chunky building blocksBest for a younger sibling in the room - 4
Take apart dinosaurs with a drillBest for a child who breaks things anyway - 5
Walkie talkiesBest for turning the house into the game - 6
A dress up and craft bundleBest for long pretend play - 7
Montessori busy toys for toddlersBest for one and two year olds - 8
A book box set to read togetherBest for the hour before bed - 9
Magnetic balls for restless handsBest for an older child on the sofa - 10
A feelings wheel bookBest for the day it all goes flat
Group one
The ones that eat a whole afternoon
There is a simple test for a holiday toy. Can a child start it without you, and is there no correct way to finish it. Almost everything that fails on the twenty seventh fails one of those two.
Building sets pass both. The screw together kind are the strongest version, because the drill turns building into a job with a sound, and the finished thing comes apart again so tomorrow is not ruined by yesterday’s success.
Start with a big set rather than a themed one. Themed kits get built once and then live on a shelf looking like a decision you regret.
Huaker STEM Building Toys for 3 4 5 6 7 8 Year Old Boys Girls
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If two children are going to share the floor, a set with more pieces is the difference between building and negotiating. The extra parts are cheaper than the argument. Our guide for eight to ten year olds goes further into which sets keep older children busy.
When there is a two year old in the room, the small pieces end the game for everybody. Chunky blocks let the youngest build next to the oldest instead of being carried out of the room. It is the least exciting purchase here and it buys the most peace.
And for the child whose instinct is to take things apart, a toy designed to be taken apart is an obvious kindness. It ends the week with the dinosaurs in pieces, which was going to happen anyway.
Group two
The ones for when they will not sit down
Some boredom is not boredom. It is a body that has not moved since breakfast, in a house where going outside means twenty minutes of clothing for forty minutes of drizzle.
Walkie talkies are the best value item on this list for that state. They turn the stairs, the hall and the back bedroom into a map. One child hides, one child directs, and the game runs itself without a parent inventing the next round. There is more on movement that fits indoors in our indoor movement piece.
Paw Patrol Walkie Talkies for Kids Static Free Indoor and Outdoor Toys (Chase Marshall)
Pretend play does the same job more quietly. A bundle with costumes and craft bits in it gives a child a role instead of an activity, and a role lasts longer. Expect the living room to be a shop by lunchtime.
For the toddler who is simply following everybody else around, a set of busy toys at their height keeps them in the room and out of the building set. Ours went through a fortnight of posting objects into a box and calling it work.
Group three
The quiet end of the day
By four o’clock the light has gone and so has everybody’s patience. This is the part of the day the dead week is actually about, and it is the part most lists ignore.
Reading together is the cheapest reset in the house, and a box set removes the nightly choice. A child who cannot decide what to read will often read whatever is nearest. If you want proper recommendations rather than a box, our book guide has them.
Older children rarely want to be read to and still need something to do with their hands. Magnetic balls are quiet, they go in a pocket, and they occupy the exact fidget that otherwise becomes kicking the sofa. Keep them away from younger siblings, and read the age warning on the box.
Then there is the day it all goes flat for no reason anyone can name. A feelings book gives a young child a word to point at, which is a lot easier than being asked what is wrong at half past four in December.
What we would skip in that week
A big new toy bought on the twenty seventh.It arrives into a house that is already saturated and it gets the same eleven minutes as everything else. Wait for the middle of January, when it will actually land.
A craft kit with forty small components.They photograph well and they need an adult for the whole session, which is the one resource that is gone by then. A plain box of blocks outlasts them every time.
Planning an outing every day.Two days out of six is enough. The flat days are where children get bored enough to invent something, and that is the part you actually want.
The honest caveat:none of this beats a friend coming over. If you can arrange one afternoon with another family, do that first and treat this list as the other five days.
More for the indoor months
Questions parents ask
What do you do with kids the week between Christmas and New Year?
Give the week a rough shape rather than a schedule. One thing out of the house every second day, one long open ended activity each morning, and a genuinely quiet hour before dinner. Children cope badly with six days that all look the same and equally badly with six days that are all outings.
Why are kids bored right after Christmas with new toys?
Because choosing is hard when everything is unfamiliar, and because they are coming down from several days of noise, sugar and late nights. Put half the new toys away for a fortnight. Fewer options in front of them usually produces more play, not less.
How much screen time is too much over the holidays?
Watch what happens after rather than counting hours. If they come off a screen and can start something else without a fight, the amount is working. If every ending is a battle, the problem is usually that screens are filling the empty hour by default rather than by decision.
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I'm for the parent doing it largely alone. I've done the single-dad decade - two homes, one income, the handovers, the very quiet Tuesdays - and I write from the far side of most of those days, with humour and hard-won calm. Not advice from above; a hand back from a few steps up the road.
More from DiegoWhat's the one thing that actually calmed the chaos in your house?
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