Boredom Buster Pool Noodle Activities for Kids

During the summer, I am constantly wracking my brain for new games and activities to keep my kids occupied. The inevitable whine of “I’m booooored. I have nothing to do.” is one of my least favorite sounds of summer…. When I reply that there are toilets to be cleaned or floors to be scrubbed, no one happily jumps at those boredom killer opportunities. I wonder why…

Pool noodles are in abundance at our house so when I came across some of these Boredom Buster pool noodle activities for kids I figured we would give them a try. I have to say, I was pleasantly surprised at the excitement most of these created. These are definite “keepers” that will be repeated from year to year. Why don’t you give these a try:

Pool Noodle Light Saber

Of course, my boys love anything that involves a weapon. What is it about boys and guns and stuff? So, these light sabers were a HUGE hit (sometimes literally).  Here’s the pic:

Simply cut your saber to whatever length works for your little person and wrap the “handle” with duct tape or this shiny tape I found at Home Depot.  Let the light saber duels begin! The nice thing is, no matter how hard they hit, no one really gets hurt. They kept my little guys occupied for hours in and out of the pool. Just one rule: when your sister says stop hitting her then you STOP.  oh boys…

Pool Noodle Garland

This noodle project was geared towards my daughter and friends but I have to admit, the boys ended up liking this one, too. I cut a few different colored and shaped noodles into smaller pieces (you can choose the width).  Everyone was given a length of rope (we used clothesline rope).  Be sure to knot the end large enough or tie your end through the first noodle “bead”. Then let the kids string their noodle beads on the rope. I encouraged coming up with a pattern and everyone had to do something different. The fun part was that we could take them apart over and over and do it, again. Afterwards, we strung them up outside on our patio.

Pool Noodle Racetrack

The boys really liked this project! I used my husband’s help on cutting the pool noodles in half lengthwise. He used one of his handy dandy electric saws to do the job.  Again, we used a few different colors of noodles and connected them with duct tape on the underside of the “track”. The kids got pretty creative and made tracks that went all over the family room. We even constructed a Start and Finish line for our track and then the races began. We have tons of Matchbox cars and Hot Wheels so there was a good amount of time spent on choosing cars for your team and then testing to see which cars were the fastest. This occupied the kids for the best part of an afternoon. The next day we even moved our track out to the pool for more fun. Yup…this one’s a winner.

Pool Noodle Target Station

We put this together and then invited some neighborhood kids over to participate in the competition. The kids had a great time! We basically used noodles and duct tape to construct this. We used different colored noodles and each one counted for a different amount of points. We made the whole contraption stand up by driving some thin metal stakes, about 3 feet tall, (again, from Home Depot) into the ground and sliding the noodle opening over the stakes.  Great fun!!  The kids just used more pool noodles as their “arrows” but later on we also used our splash balls and pool disks that made it a little trickier, even for the older kids, to get through the hoop they were aiming for.

Pool Noodle Sculpture

Our last pool noodle project tapped into the kids’ creativity. I wanted the kids to utilize noodles of different colors and shapes to come up with their own personalized pool float. So, that meant whatever they created had to support their body and they should be able to fit in it or on it. It was fun to watch them think this through. I told them there would be prizes for the most creative, the most complicated and the most colorful.  I had some bendable wire for them to use to create shapes and of course, our good friend Duct Tape (now in so many great colors and designs) to hold things together. We had some amazing designs and everyone really enjoyed doing this. The winners received a Light Show Pool Noodle. Well, what else after all our noodle projects??

All our pool noodle projects really got the kids to use their……wait for it………Noodles!!   (sorry, couldn’t resist)