The January doldrums have arrived. All the fun fellowship of celebrating Christmas and ringing in the New Year with family and friends is now archived in photo albums, cell phones and refrigerator doors.

The kids are whining about being stuck indoors and Mom and Dad are getting cranky, too.

For those in the northern climes, you’ve had it with parkas, boots, lost mittens and errands on icy roads. And the kids aren’t doing so well keeping the outdoor animals’ water from freezing. Everyone wants sunshine!

For those in the southern climes, you’re tired of the rainy season and would really enjoy a good old-fashioned snowball fight. You mourn the fact that the kids have never seen snow, gone sledding or sculpted a snowman!

Grandparents, it’s time to inject some FUN into the gloomier school days of winter. You can do it in person, or if distance is an impediment you can mail a customized “kit” to your families and enjoy the experience together via Skype.

All you need to do is gather the ingredients for one of the kits below and you’ll have a fun and exciting educational experience to beat the winter blahs. You will be the HERO — whether you bring sand castles to Minnesota or snowmen to Florida.

For northerners in need of sunshine — bring your grandchildren and their parents a Beach Adventure in a Box.

For southerners who yearn for a “real” winter — your grandchildren and their parents will love an Arctic Afternoon in a Box.

Here’s what you’ll need for your kit. You can choose any number of these ingredients or come up with creative ideas of your own, tailored to your unique family. Don’t get overwhelmed. Keep it simple and choose two or three ideas. Save the rest for another special day with your grandchildren.

Beach Adventure in a Box

• Summer clothes (the required attire for everyone).
• Flip-flops (to hand out as gifts to each family member)
• Beach blanket (to spread on the floor for a picnic)
• Picnic lunch (or get some take-out chicken and potato salad).
• Watermelon (to carve for dessert).
  • After dessert, have a watermelon-spitting contest in a hallway or hard-surface area. Then, save the seeds to plant in the spring and you and the grandchildren can do a study of how a watermelon grows. Lots of science ahead!
• Plastic wading pool (to fill with sand)
• Sand (to create sand castles). Lumber stores are a good place to find bags of sand.
• Seashells (to mix into the sand for the grandchildren to find). Available at craft stores.
• Toy marine creatures (to bury in the sand for the grandchildren to find).
  • Have each child look up information about the sea creature he or she finds. Then, together, compose a creative story about that sea creature. They’ll have a blast hearing your ideas and combining it with theirs.
• Prizes! (fun items your grandchildren will like). Hold a sand-castle-building contest and award prizes for the best castle, most creative castle, biggest castle, castle with the most turrets, flattest castle, tallest castle — you can think up categories so each child will end up with a prize to enjoy.
• Space heater (to make it really hot in the room). Or, turn up the heat as high as your budget will allow.
• Flashlights and lamps (to shine as simulated sunlight for the beach adventure).
• Camera (to record the Beach Adventure activities). These fun photos will double as an academic record,
• Scriptures about the wind, waves and sand (to focus on God, who has created all of these things, to marvel at His majesty, and to thank Him for all the beauty of nature He has set around us).
  • Discussion question: Read about Peter walking on water (Matt. 14:22-23). Discuss how that would feel. Would each family member have had the faith to stay on top? What is faith? How do we know we have faith? Who do we have faith in? How is our faith in the abilities of the pilot flying our airplane different from our faith in Jesus Christ? What is a saving faith?
• Paper, pencils, pens, markers (to draw and/or write a journal entry of their Beach Adventure).

Arctic Afternoon in a Box

• Winter clothes, coats, mittens and boots (the required attire for everyone). And no, our dear Texas friends — cowboy boots don’t qualify.)
• Turn on the air conditioner to as cold a setting as your budget will allow.
• Purchase some miniature stuffed Alaskan Husky-type dogs and wrap them in gift bags for the grandchildren.
• Baked Alaska or Snow Cone recipes (for kitchen fun with the grandchildren).
• White paper and scissors (for creating old-fashioned, homemade snowflakes by folding and cutting the paper into unique designs).
• Compare everyone’s snowflakes. None are exactly the same. Relate it to God’s unique creation of each snowflake and each human life. Gen. 1:27 says God created us in His image. And he made us totally unique; even identical twins are different.
• Snow! (for a miniature snowman-making contest) There are various recipes on the internet for homemade artificial snow. Or, you can purchase containers of artificial snow. Provide sticks, pieces of fabric, scissors, buttons, ribbon … anything that would be fun for the kids to use in decorating their snowman.
• Ice cubes and frozen candy bars (for a race to see which child or adult can melt an ice cube the fastest).
  • Let everyone use their creativity in melting the ice. Anything is allowed (hair dryer, microwave, their hands) unless you specify otherwise. Award the winner a frozen candy bar.
  • If you’re more adventurous, you can go online and look up the freezing points of various liquids. Bring your list to the Arctic Adventure and have the grandchildren guess which liquids would freeze first. Or, you could put a sample of each liquid in a section of an ice cube tray and conduct a test yourself during the party. Award prizes to the winners.
• Bookmark the website for the Iditarod, an annual sled dog race across Alaska, which begins on March 1: http://iditarod.com
  • Study it together online: How the teams prepare for it, the hazards of the trail. Discuss the reasons people may risk their lives just to win a race in the snow. This link has all kinds of educational information about the Iditarod, including opportunities to follow the race daily via blogs, newsletter, forum and live chats.
  • Rent the animated film, “Balto” and cuddle up with blankets. Balto was the lead sled dog in the “Great Race of Mercy,” in which teams of sled dogs transported serum across the harsh Alaskan wilderness to Nome during the 1925 diphtheria outbreak, saving many children. The Iditarod commemorates that historic event.
  • When there is more time, read one of the Balto books together; several have been written.
• Camera (to record the Arctic Afternoon activities). These fun photos will double as an academic record, too!
• Scriptures about the snow (to focus on God, who has created all of these things, to marvel at His majesty, and to thank Him for all the beauty of nature He has set around us).
  • Discussion question: What does the Bible mean when it says, “…Though your sins are as scarlet, they will be white as snow….” (Is. 1:18)? How white is pure, unadulterated snow? What happens when snow is stained? Can we make it white again? No, only God can. And He is also the only One who can make our sinful lives clean. Discuss the futility of trying to make stained snow white. Compare that to people trying to get to Heaven by “good works.” Both are impossible. The Bible says our “good works” are like filthy rags (Is. 64:6). We can’t make ourselves clean by “good works.” So we must rely for our salvation on the only One Who can make us clean and bring us back into a relationship with God if we repent of our sins and put our faith in Him.
• Paper, pencils, pens, markers (to draw and/or write a journal entry of their Arctic Afternoon).

Grandparents, you are such an integral part of your grandchildren’s lives — a lifestyle of learning, of loving, of serving. May those cherished times together be multiplied for eternity.

— Rich & Barb Heki, for Grandparents of Homeschoolers™