Our world is in a strange place right now due to COVID-19. Many are quarantined and forced to be separated from relatives. We are practicing social distancing and homeschooling our children. It is a stressful time for many; especially our kids.
Children may not be the first group that comes to mind when we think about the stress of self-isolation, but they are feeling it more than many. Depending on their ages, many children don’t understand why they have to remain at home. They don’t understand why they can’t see their friends, go to the park, have a birthday party, or visit their grandparents. It’s tough!
My children are young (all 4 and under) and this Pandemic has been particularly hard to explain to them. They grasp the concept that people are sick, but they don’t understand why that means that they have to stay home. They want to see their cousins, have their birthday parties and go back to school.
What Do We Do?
Knowing that this probably won’t get easier anytime soon, I wanted to come up with a way for them to interact with the people they miss. We’ve definitely enlisted technology to help, but I wanted to take it one step further. Remember when you were a kid and you wrote notes to your friends during class or got a secret note in your locker? I mean, I totally never did that…wink wink. It was so much fun to receive a secret message! It always brightened my day.
Although my kiddos are still young, I thought it could be fun to do something similar for them. So, in an effort to help them remain connected to some of their favorite people, I came up with this Secret Message Activity for them to do. Let’s break it down:
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Materials
- White card stock
- White crayon
- Water colors paint (kid paint) – if uncovering the message
- Water cup
- Paint brush
How To
*I strongly recommend using card stock over regular paper. Kids can ‘over paint’ and that will make regular paper soggy and tear. You want these messages to last!
1. Grab all of your supplies and find a clean surface to write on.
2. Decide on your message and use the white crayon to write it. It helps if you are near a good light source (window, lamp) so you can actually see what your are writing in white crayon on white paper! *If your kids are old enough, let them write the message themselves!
3. Prep your card to be sent, or grab the water colors for your kiddos to uncover the message!
Related: Looking for another fun craft to do together? Check this simple activity out for endless fun!
*If you are sending a card to a relative to paint, make sure you write out an instruction sheet to send with. I wrote our instructions with white crayon then had my son paint over them so his cousin co
Get Creative
My kids had a blast with this activity! They loved getting to create secret messages to send to their cousins AND uncovering their own secret messages!
This is an activity that you can really get creative with. Try some of these ideas:
- Use it for math by writing question answers in white and letting your kiddos ‘uncover’ them.
- Create a special message for your kids to uncover at breakfast to let them know what will be happening that day.
- Decorate a card with white crayon and then let your little paint over it to reveal the design!
- Write out a joke in black permanent marker, then write the answer in white crayon. Let your kiddos paint over to reveal the answer!
- Have everyone write down something that they want to do when life gets ‘more normal’. Then, pass them around and paint to see all of the fun activities you have to look forward to!
We created Easter cards to send to the Grandparents and Birthday cards for the cousins using this method. There really are endless opportunities with this activity! Although we can’t be with some of our favorite people right now, we can still help them feel special and stay connected using this fun activity.
If you are looking for some ways to educate and engage those littles during this time at home, check out these fabulous activities!
