Playing hangman can be a really great family activity, especially as kids start learning to spell. You can take turns deciding who picks the words and who guesses the letters. Both are good for young spellers.

According to Wikipedia, those who don’t like the concept of drawing a hanging man sometimes switch to drawing apples on a tree, then erasing them as guesses are missed.

There are online versions of hangman as well, but I really prefer the interactive side of playing it in person.

Do you have a box of dominoes? Pulled it out lately? It might be time to build a dominoes course and let one of the kids knock it over.

Building a course without knocking it down is pretty challenging itself. Kids love to help build them, but of course aren’t always careful enough. Be ready to just laugh off the frustration if things fall down at the wrong time.

Make sure you aren’t building it someplace where someone is going to knock a domino over just accidentally, and that the surface is pretty stable. Accidents happen but you probably want to minimize the frustration when you’re trying to just have fun.

Get creative in your building process.  You can make the dominoes course go over steps, drop from a height onto a lower track, and of course go all over the place.

Building a card tower is challenging, but it can also be a good way for kids to work with their fine motor skills and just plain have fun. One deck of cards is plenty for most purposes, but if you really get into it all you need is more decks!

Building a card tower takes a lot of patience, especially if a family pet or sibling comes and accidentally knocks the whole thing down just as you’re getting things going or are almost done. You want to pick the place you start working very carefully.

If you’ve never built a card tower, there are plenty of tips online. Just do a search and you’ll soon have a pretty good idea for how to get started.

While cooking isn’t strictly a free activity, odds are it’s money you would have spent otherwise, so this one at least doesn’t cost anything extra.

Pick out a new recipe that is age appropriate for you to make with your children. You can get a kids’ cookbook from the library if you want, or buy one if this is something you’ll do regularly enough. And of course there are plenty of kid friendly recipes to make online.

Make it fun or make it part of  a regular meal, whatever you want.

Cooking is a great way to teach kids about fractions and other bits of math, in a way that isn’t so intimidating. It can also teach them about responsibility, especially if your child is old enough to start cooking on the stove with you.

No, don’t catch a cold. That’s the wrong kind of bug to catch no matter how easy cold bugs are to find this time of year.

Depending on where you live you may find a variety of bugs that are really fun for kids to catch. It might be fireflies, ladybugs, pill bugs… whatever’s available.

Of course you may have to wait for appropriate weather if things aren’t looking good for bug hunting in your area. But I’d still suggest dodging those cold bugs.