It’s not easy with the newest round of lock downs and restrictions as some parts of the world continue to struggle with COVID. As we grow weary of doing more remotely here is the list of some great ideas for any scout troop, team, or group to help them get through the latest rounds of restrictions.

Hopefully this list helps you all keep active and stay positive.

1. Cookie Mix Mason Jars

Pick your favorite cookie recipe and add all of the dry ingredients to the mason jar. Note, it’s best not to use one with brown sugar as that can get hard if the jar is not 100% sealed.

2. Design your own cookie cutter!

We paired this activity up with the previous one to make a holiday cookie cutter and cookie mix gift set. We are fortunate to have a few 3D printers at our disposal, however if you don’t don’t despair. Contact your local “Maker Space” or get it printed with a commercial service like ShapeWays.

3. Cyanotype DIY Blue Prints

We ordered pretreated cyanotype fabric from Amazon. Be sure to read the instructions and don’t expose the fabric to UV light until you are ready! The kids really enjoyed making there own blue print art.

4. Origami

Origami by itself may not seem like such a great idea, but we made traditional Japanese origami cranes. And then with Google Earth, we toured Japan! not only was it hands on and kept little hands busy but it was culturally interesting. One additional challenge was if anyone wanted to join the “walk Mount Fuji” Conquer challenge. Basically if you sign up for this organization and track your kilometers walked you earn metals for a small nominal fee. They happen to have one for Mount Fuji!

5. Make your own cheese.

I own a book called “One Hour Cheese” and highly recommend it for some tasty recipes. the key here is having the dense 90 grade cheese cloth to drain your cheese. With just whole milk and lemon juice you can make delicious cheeses.

6. Make your own geocache

Geocaching is great since this can be done with a group or independently. Basically here everyone made a cache from a recycled container. A few pointers, don’t use glass and be sure to connect a wire or some sort of tether so you can secure it to a location. Other then that get creative and make your own cache!

7. Hide and find the team’s geocaches

After everyone makes and hides there caches, spend a day going around and seeing what your friends were able to put together. Be sure to sign the logs and bring swag to trade.

8. Mechanical Robot Arm

We did this one in honor of the “Canada Arm” on the international space station. This one is a fun introduction to mechanical systems for kids.

9. Battery bugs

I can not tell you what a HUGE hit this activity was! Not only did we get to make the bugs remote we were actually all0wed to race them in person a week later!

10. Alkaseltzer rockets

We did this one with plastic Easter eggs, however I’ve seen videos of folks using MM mini containers and other small plastic tube like containers.

11. Bird feeders

This one is basically 2 packets of gelatins mixed with 2/3 cup of water and 2 cups of bird seed. Makes a huge mess which the kids love and gets all packed in to a greased mold or cookie cutter to creat edible bird feeders. We added a local birds bi go card for the kids to track who visits there feeder to help extend this activity.

12. Make your own fairy house

Well, I love fairy houses. Don’t know why but I do! Check out my earlier post about making a few different ones from tree stumps. Alternatively, you can use oven back clay to cover a glass jar and make your own tea-light fairy house.

13. Water beads

We did a camp put song one evening with the group while we allowed the water beads to absorb the water. Then everyone just played with the beads. Such simple fun.

14. Homemade lip balm

Melt together 1 table spoon bees wax, 1 table spoon of coco butter and mix with a 1/2 teaspoon of rose hips essential oil and 1/2 teaspoon of orange oil. Add a tea spoon of grape oil to the mix and pour it to a small jar. Let it cool and you have lip balm! We bought small tins for this one but if you happen to have let over tiny jars from honey or jelly those are the perfect size.

15. Macrame succulent planter

We have a lot of glass yogurt jars. So here we turned the. Into small hanging succulent planters with the help of just a few beads for decorations and some string.

https://www.eatingwell.com/article/7828083/hanging-planter-yogurt-cup/

16. Make your own wax food wraps

You know those wax food wraps that are all the rage right now to replace plastic wrap? Well you can make your own from some scrap cotton fabric, bees wax and grape seed oil! Basically place the fabric on a sheet of wax paper. Sprinkle some wax around on it and a little grape seed oil. Then place a sheet of wax paper on top and iron it.

17. No sew flannel pillow

Cut two pieces of flames fabric into a square of a desired size. Then cut large 2 inch long fringe along the edges. Tie the two pieces together to “sew” the pillow. Stuff it full of cotton and that’s it.

18. Grow alum crystals

Cover a pipe cleaner with Elmers glue. This will act as a catalyst for the crystals to grow. Then melt alum powder in hot water. Place the pipe cleaner in the saturated alum mixture and let it cool. As the mixture cools the crystals will grow. If you want to make larger crystals, take out the piped;earner, reheat your alum mixture (add more alum when reheating) and place the pipe cleaner back in the saturated mixture again.

19. Make your own slime

This one is so common and popular so just search for “Elmers Glue Slime”. We used glow in the dark glue and it was lots of gooey fun!

20. Solar oven pizza box

Last but not least we attempted to make a pizza box solar over. It worked but outside was too windy in our area so we had to move the operation indoors. Our marshmallows didn’t get too gooey but I think that had more to do with our lack of patience then anything.

Here we have, foil, plastic wrap, a skewer, tape and a pizza box. that’s it.