Rainy day drawing activities for kids: 9 easy ideas for a stuck-indoors afternoon

The rain has been going since breakfast, the park is off, and someone has already asked "what can we do?" three times. Drawing is one of the easiest answers. It needs almost no setup, it works for a 4-year-old and a 10-year-old at the same table, and it fills time without a screen doing all the work.

Below are nine rainy day drawing activities for kids that we like, each with what you need and how to run it. Most use only paper and pencils. A couple use a phone as a tracing guide, if you have one handy. At the end there is a simple plan for stringing several together into one afternoon.

Before you start: set up a drawing corner

A little setup makes everything after it smoother.

1. Clear one table. Move cups and anything breakable away from elbows.
2. Put out a small kit. Plain paper, pencils, an eraser, a sharpener, and crayons or felt-tips. Printer paper is perfect; nobody needs a fancy sketchbook.
3. Pick a spot for finished drawings. A strip of tape on the wall or a clothes line with pegs turns the afternoon into a growing gallery.
4. Choose a light spot. Rainy days are dim. Sit near the window or switch on a lamp so the pencil lines are easy to see.

Nine drawing activities for a wet afternoon

Pick the ones that fit your child's age and mood. Each takes between five and twenty minutes.

1. Draw what you see out of the window

Sit by the window and draw the view: rooftops, a tree, a parked car, the puddle by the gate. Then add the weather. Short slanted lines make drizzle, long lines make a downpour, and little circles make splashes in puddles. It is a nice way to start because the subject is right there.

2. The umbrella parade

Draw a row of umbrellas and give each one a pattern: stripes, spots, zigzags, stars. Then add who is underneath. A cat? A dinosaur? A slice of pizza? Silly owners are half the fun.

3. One-minute drawing races

Set a kitchen timer for 60 seconds and call out a subject: a cupcake, a rocket, a whale. Everyone draws as fast as they can and stops when the timer rings. Quick drawings take the pressure off, because nobody expects a masterpiece in a minute. Do five rounds, then vote on the funniest.

4. Raindrop characters

Draw a big raindrop shape, then turn it into a character with eyes, a smile and little boots. Make a whole family: a tiny baby drop, a grumpy storm cloud, a shy rainbow. Kids who say "I can't draw people" usually love this one, because a raindrop is an easy shape to begin with.

5. Your name in big letters

Write your name in big bubble letters, then decorate it. Fill the letters with patterns, add a shadow on one side, or draw tiny raindrops falling around them. A decorated name makes a good bedroom door sign or notebook cover.

6. Trace a sketch with a phone

If you have a phone and a steady stand, AR tracing is a nice change of pace. The phone stands above the paper, a sketch appears over it on the screen, and your child follows the lines with a real pencil. Our guide to setting up your phone for AR tracing covers the stand, height and light, and our parent's guide to AR drawing covers safety and camera privacy.

In Sketchglass, our AR drawing app, there is a new sketch each day, and every sketch is split into easy steps that Pip the pencil guides one at a time. Simple ones for a first try include the Sleepy Cat, the Baby Whale and the Little Ghost.

7. A four-box rain comic

Fold a sheet of paper into four boxes. Box one: someone goes outside. Box two: it starts to rain. Box three: something goes wrong (a puddle, a gust of wind, a lost hat). Box four: how it ends. Speech bubbles are optional, but kids usually add them anyway.

8. Trace your name in a cool font

This one joins activity 5 with tracing. In Sketchglass, the "Your name" tool lets you type a name and pick from 8 lettering styles, from graffiti to cursive, then trace it on paper with the camera. Once the outline is on the paper, your child can colour it in by hand.

9. Make the drawing move

To finish, pick the drawing your child is proudest of and give it a second life. Without a phone, cut it out, tape it to a straw and put on a little puppet show. With Sketchglass, a traced drawing can be snapped and brought to life on screen, where it can dance, bounce, wiggle or walk across the desk; our guide on making your drawing come alive shows how.

A ready-made rainy afternoon plan

If you want a structure, this one runs for about an hour and a half, with breaks built in.

1. Warm up (10 minutes). Draw circles, squares and wavy lines across a page to loosen up. Rain drawn as wavy lines counts.
2. Window drawing (15 minutes). Activity 1. Talk about what you can see while you draw.
3. Snack and stretch (10 minutes). Step away from the table.
4. One-minute races (10 minutes). Activity 3, five rounds, loud laughing allowed.
5. Big project (20 to 30 minutes). Choose the comic, the umbrella parade or a traced sketch, whichever your child picks.
6. Gallery show (10 minutes). Hang everything up. Each artist tells everyone about one drawing.

Tips that keep it fun for everyone

Mix ages at one table. Give younger kids the big shapes and older kids the details. A 5-year-old draws the umbrella, an older sibling adds the pattern.

Praise one specific thing. "I love how round that whale is" lands better than "that's amazing", and it gives the next drawing something to build on.

Keep the eraser optional. Some kids get stuck rubbing out the same line. Try one round where erasing is banned and every wobble stays.

Do it with them. Grown-ups drawing badly next to a child is one of the best ways to show that drawing is for fun, not for being perfect.

If the rain lasts all week and the drawing habit sticks, our 7-day drawing practice plan gives one short lesson a day, from warm-up shapes to a full little drawing.