Inside: Here are 7 super fun snow activities for grandkids & kids. Arts and crafts, kitchen activities, games, and more. Each activity helps your grandkids and kids develop fine and gross motor skills as well as heightening their creativity and imaginations!

Snow Activities for Grandkids & Kids

It’s January and snow is in the air. After living in a place of perpetual sunshine for 40 years, we now live in a state where we enjoy the 4 seasons. It’s winter and we’re surrounded by snow-capped mountains; piles of snow on the city sidewalks and bundled-up children taking advantage of snowy hills and sleigh rides.

It’s literally a white winter wonderland!

This week our theme with the grandkids is snow activities—snowmen, snow mittens, and snow art projects.

Do you live in a place where it snows? If not—you can still have your grandkids/kids enjoy the possibilities of snow by reading books about snow or even making quasi snow from cornstarch and water (recipes online).

Here are 7 snow activities we did with our grandkids. Most are snow art projects but we added a sprinkling of kitchen activities and games.

#1 Snow Activities: Mitten Doodle Art & Fun Creating Patterns

My daughter-in-law, Moé is an amazing knitter. She loves snow activities and enjoys making handknit mittens and hats for winter. Below is a sample of her work (Etsy shop: MeyersYarnCraft). Her 4 children wear beautiful hats, gloves, and sweaters she creates. (she has even knit & crocheted Halloween costumes).

Seeing her mittens with beautiful repetitive designs (Fairisle style) gave me the inspiration to do this activity.

I showed the grandkids the mittens their mom made and told them we were going to create something similar using cardboard.

This snow activity requires several steps and increases fine motor coordination:

• cutting out the mittens
• coloring the mittens
• doodling  & repeating patterns on the mittens
• lacing the mittens

Are you familiar with doodling and what it does for a child’s brain? It’s drawing random marks and shapes on paper that create a pattern. Doodling helps a child:

• relax
• stay focused
• grasp new concepts
• retain information & improves memory
• think creative thoughts.

Click here to read why kids and adults should doodle

Here’s how to create doodle winter mittens:

Supplies

• Cardboard (I used white cardboard)
• Colored markers (Crayola)
• Black sharpie pen (fine tip)
• Buttons
• Shoelaces—white or black—at least 48”
• Hole punch
• Glue

Directions

• Using white cardboard, draw and cut out a mitten
• Punch holes around the mitten about 1” apart
• Draw horizontal lines on the mitten—about 1 ½ -2” apart
• Using markers, color each section a different color
• Next, use a sharpie pen and doodle different repetitive designs in each section—circles, dots, squares, letters, squiggly lines, etc.
• Glue buttons on the mitten
• Last, lace-up around the mitten using a shoelace (about 48”)

#2 Cardboard Collage Snowmen Family

I’m sure you’ve brought nature into the snow activities you do with your grandkids/kids. Like making snowmen, snow forts, or igloos.  This winter art project dovetails perfectly for grandkids and grandparents who love nature.

First, take your grandkids/kids outside and have them look at the mountains. What winter colors do they see? What shapes do they see? If you live in an area with no mountains or mountains too far away to see, show them pictures of mountains in winter.

We wrote down all the colors and shapes we saw and then created this snow scene with mountains and a snowman family.

Mountains are anything but smooth, so we took pieces and scraps of cardboard and glued them to our mountains to make them look more realistic. Then we painted them and sprinkled glitter and artificial snow over everything.

Next, we cut out shapes of a snowman family and using a collage art technique, decorated our snowman family using scraps of colored paper.

Lessons learned: creativity, observing & seeing nature, fine motor skills

Here are the details:

Supplies

• Cardboard
• Glue
• Tempera paints
• Glitter
• Artificial snow
• Twigs
• Different colors of paper
• Black buttons

Directions

• Draw a mountain/hill on a piece of cardboard. Cut out
• Take different scraps of cardboard and glue them onto your mountain/hill
• Paint the mountain with colors your grandkids/kids see on the mountains in winter. We saw shades of blue, purple, green, and white. The grandkids also mixed the colors with white paint to create various shades of color
• While the paint is wet, sprinkle glitter and artificial snow overall. Let dry
• Next, draw a snowman family out of cardboard. Cut out each family member (we made 4—mother, father, 2 kids).
• Make collage snowmen by using scraps from colored paper. Glue the pieces in place
• Add an orange nose, different colored hats, black buttons for eyes, and twigs for arms
• Glue your snowmen to the mountain

I like art projects that require several steps to completion. It helps grandkids/kids to understand that most things we do in life are not done in an instant—they take time and steps to create something memorable and worthwhile.

#3 Snow Activities: Doodle Art Snowman

Here is another doodle art project and a unique way to make very colorful snowmen. It’s a fun way to teach creativity by looking at the traditional white snowman in a different way.

It’s super easy—just draw a snowman on white poster board, draw horizontal lines to create different sections, color and doodle away! If you want a free printable for a snowman and snowman accessories click here.

Supplies

Most of these supplies were also used for the mitten project.

• White poster board
• Colored markers
• Black sharpie marker
• Paper to make accessories for the snowman—hat, and arms
• Glue
• Dot markers

Directions

• Draw a snowman on a piece of poster board
• Using a sharpie pen, draw horizontal lines over the entire snowman, 1.5” apart
• Color with colored markers—coloring each section a different color
• With a black sharpie pen, create random doodle marks on each section—making each section different
• Glue on snowman accessories—hats & arms
• Make snow using dot markers

#4 Painting Ice, Pebble Snow & Snowmen

Do your grandkids/kids love the sensation of painting on ice? Ours do. When we were learning about dinosaurs, they painted over ice-encased dinosaurs.

This time, we’re painting ice as we create a snow scene.

If you don’t have much time to plan snow activities, this one is perfect—easy-peasy and fun!

Supplies

• Ice—pebble ice and cubed ice
• Tempera paints—blue, green, purple, white
• Paintbrushes
• Snowmen, snowflakes foam stickers (Michaels)
• 9×9 plastic container

Directions

• Pour pebble and cubed ice into a plastic container
• Paint over the ice creating a colorful winter wonderland
• Carefully attach the foam sticker snowflake and snowmen around the ice
• Watch throughout the day as the ice melts creating a collage of color!

#5 Snow Activities with Kids in the Kitchen: Making Pizzas

Making pizzas is not necessarily a winter activity, but there is something magical about making pizzas in the kitchen with grandma on a snowy winter day with the fireplace blazing and music playing.

Try it.

You can make it easy by purchasing pre-made pizza crusts so all you have to do is add the toppings.

Supplies

• Pre-made pizza crusts (Boboli party pack) or make your own
• Pizza sauce
• Mozzarella cheese, shredded
• Toppings: mushrooms, pepperoni, sweet peppers, olives, onions, etc.

Directions

• Put the pizza sauce on the pre-baked pizza crusts
• Add any toppings your grandkids like (see above)
• Top with mozzarella cheese
• Bake in the oven & eat!

#6 Balancing Board Game—Filler Activity

If you are doing several activities with your grandkids/kids—you may need what I call “filler activities.” They are easy activities your grandkids/kids can grab and do while you set up the next activity.

They include board games, books, short videos, wiggly rope, and musical instruments. I’m always adding things to this list—and this week, I added a game I found at IKEA ($15).

It’s a simple 2-sided dart game—using Velcro fish and Velcro background. You’ve all seen these—you stand back and try to throw the “dart’ onto the Velcro board.

However, I decided to make it a little more challenging each time they played:

• First, the grandkids/kids threw the fish at the board—any random space was great
• Second, they were challenged to hit the correct color fish on the correct color on the board
• Third, I had a balancing board that I purchased from Balametrics that they stood on to throw their fish. This was the most challenging because they had to balance and throw at the same time.

An inexpensive way to keep the kiddies happy and entertained while building gross motor and balancing skills!

#7 Books About Snow Activities

Here is a list of our favorite snow activities books. Purchase on Amazon or check them out at the library. Our grandkids particularly loved Over and Under and If Winter Comes, Tell It I’m Not Here. 

• The Mitten by Jan Brett
• The Snowy Nap by Jan Brett
• Wolf in the Snow by Matthew Cordell
• The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats
• Tracks in the Snow by Wong Herbert Yee
• The Snow Bear by Miriam Moss
• Over and Under the Snow by Kate Messner
• Snow by Cynthia Rylant
• Snowflake Bentley by Jacqueline Briggs Martin
• If Winter Comes, Tell It I’m Not Here by Simona Ciraolo

If you can’t find The Snow Bear check it here on YouTube

Check out these other blogs about activities to do with grandkids/kids:

The Most Fun Snowflake Activities for Grandkids & Kids

How to Have Fun on a Nature Study with Grandparents

9 Super Fun Ocean Activities for Grandkids

How to Discover Bugs & Insects with Grandparents

What fun snow activities have you done lately with your grandkids or kids? Please share in the comment section below.

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