Restaurant Activity Books - and DIY Dinner Table Activity

Without a pen and paper, you might 

1Make a hand puppet.

2 Turn a paper napkin into origami fortune teller. 

Use Pen and Paper (Napkin) To Entertain

Draw two horizontal lines and two vertical lines across them to make a grid for noughts and crosses.  If you have an Ipad with a pen, draw a grid and play noughts and crosses, draw in the noughts and crosses. 

Play dots and boxes.

Instead of snakes and ladders, play spaghetti and tomatoes. 

Finger Puppets

Failing that, draw on your finger tips, a smiley face. If you have a water colour pencil with non toxic paint.

Or draw the people at dinner, eg father with moustache or glasses, or hat, or tie, mother with dress or saree, child with dress from Disney, baby large head, high chair, with big eyes, vertical oblong drink and straw. Stick figures. 

Play - here's the church / barn

When I was a child, at school I learned to play with fingers - Here's the church, here's the steeple, open the gates and here are the people. 

Other version say doors instead of gates. Another version ends with another rhyming couplet, here is the parson going upstairs, here is the parson saying his prayers. If parson is an unfamiliar word, try person.

For those who are another religion or not religious, use the barn version.

Teach the child how to link both hands with fingers pointing downwards, raise the little fingers, then rotate wrists towards you so the fingers stick up to be people.

If you can't get a drawing and activity pad, here are some games to play.

1MAKE A KIDDIE FAVOURITS MENU

Create a menu of a list of your favourite food.

(In advance copy the children's menu from the restaurant you are visiting or any other one visited previously. Crop to get pictures in the left hand column and print the list or pictures. If necessary, draw lines in pencil, and/or copy the words for the child / children to copy.

Or ask the child their favourite food. 

Eg Fish fingers, with chips. Ice cream.

With or without tomato ketchup?

Which colours? Save photos from one meal to make pictures for your menu on the next visit.

Save pictures to show the waiters and waitresses in restaurants overseas!

If you are creating your own menu from scratch, you can make a border of your child's favourite characters, Princess, Unicorn, teddy bear's picnic, doll, dolls house. 

How about a dolly at the restaurant. Of your child's name and the restaurant. 

Suggested food

Nibbles

Olives

Crisps

Nuts

Starter

Soup - tomato

Soup - vegetable

Soup - chicken

Main Course

Child's Menu

Vegetables

Peas

Sweetcorn

Corn on the cob

Salad - green

Salad - green and tomato

Lentils

Dessert

Fruit -

apple

oranges

grapes

banana 

Pear

Peach

Plum

Fruit salad

Ice cream - vanilla

strawberry

chocolate

mixed

nut

Sorbet

Raspberry

lemon

Cake

chocolate

cream

Drinks

Water

Sparkling water

Fruit juice 

Strawberry

Mango

Mixed juice

Chocolate drink

Ice cream sundae

String & Cat's Cradle

At one family reunion in a pub with children of all ages, we gave each child a book, whose title they had given us in advance. However, on the day, before lunch, instead of reading the books, the childeen all played games with the string we had been in a hurry to wrap the gifts, because we were in a hurry and couldn't find ribbon. The oldest girl, around 11 years old, showed the younger ones what to do with the string.

Useful Websites

https://www.wikihow.com/Create-a-Church-With-Your-Fingers (Includes barn words in comments.)

 https://www.amazon.co.uk/Kids-Restaurant-Activity-Book-Screen-Free/dp/B0DZNTHYVY/ref

https://www.farmhouseinns.co.uk/kids-menu

https://www.brewersfayre.co.uk/en-gb/kids-menu/brewers_fayre_kids_menu_priceless.pdf

https://www.etsy.com/uk/listing/1870682905/kids-restaurant-menu-template-activity

Has a list of food and grid for noughts and crosses.

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