My name is Caroline, and I used to hate when school closed, because I had nothing fun to do apart from helping my mother – which gets boring! Luckily, this holiday my favourite cousin Maria came to visit. She is full of energy, and she showed me how I can use my creativity to find ways to entertain myself and my family.

Create a book of your family history

The first thing we did was create a book with all our favourite family stories. Our grandmother passed away 6 months ago, and Maria felt like this would be a good way to make sure that we do not forget all the stories that she told us. So, we used paper from some of our school exercise books, and blue and black pens we found in the house. When we were done with the stories, we made holes on the borders of the papers and put thread through to bind the pages together. You see, it’s so easy to do! Why don’t you also make one?

Play the alphabet game

Maria also taught me the alphabet game; you have to name something that starts with each letter of the alphabet, from start to finish. But here’s the trick; everything you name has to be part of the same theme – so different foods, singers, historical figures, etc. We played this game over and over again with different themes and even got my mother to try the game!

Lend a helping hand

There are few things more rewarding than helping someone in need. So, Maria and I spent a couple of hours each week volunteering at the local community centre to help adults learn to read. I felt really good about being useful to the people in my neighbourhood, and helping them learn to read and write.

Now, I definitely like the school holidays as they give me time to do new activities that I’m usually too tired and busy to do. And it's all thanks to my cousin Maria, who encouraged me to use my creativity and the resources around me!