Nature activity for kids: outdoor rubbings

This is day two of celebrating National Wildlife Week with my son by doing a different nature activity every day. And I have to admit things didn't go as planned today. But stick with me . . . .

Today, we tried to do nature rubbings.



This isn't a wildlife activity, but it did get us outside. And it led to an impromptu wildlife activity.

We used the back side of unwanted office paper to get a second use out of it. We also grabbed some crayons and chalk, and took everything outside.

The Man-cub has done nature rubbings before -- putting paper over a natural object like a flat stone, leaf, tree bark or flower -- but today he just wasn't interested.

I showed him how a fern appeared on the paper when I rubbed blue crayon over it. See, my son, it's magic!



And look at this pretty red leaf Mama made!



But my son wasn't buying it. Two-year-olds can be fickle that way.

I think he was just so distracted by other things outside that he wanted to do, not sit and color. He wandered all over the yard, smelling flowers and picking up leaves.

Then he asked to rescue a ladybug.

Yesterday, I took two beetles out of our pool. Today, he wanted to check to make sure there weren't any "ladybugs" in the water that needed a rescue.

So I packed up our nature rubbing items, in search of bugs.

And then he moved on to lizards.

So in the end, my son turned aside my not-exciting-not-wildlife-related nature activity in favor of an exciting bug and lizard search and rescue mission.

And that's really the whole point of doing nature activities and having a Green Hour: get kids interested in nature.

So my tip for the day is to not get discouraged if your child doesn't like a nature activity. Together, you'll find things you enjoy doing outside. Depending on your child, it might take some trial and error, but I think it will happen.

If you're looking for an alternate activity, try how to make a bug vacuum. You'll find more ideas here.