14 Old-Fashioned Games to Play on a Rainy Day

Written by Rachel Barkowski Published on January 22, 2022

14 Old-Fashioned Games to Play on a Rainy Day

Rainy days can be disheartening, and the kids may get antsy or bored. Here are some good, old-fashioned games to play on a rainy day that most of us grew up playing! Ditch the technology for a while and play some of these classic games.

A lot of these Old-Fashioned Games to Play on a Rainy Day are great in the fact that they teach kids how to find something to do without a lot of supplies! Great for creativity!

(Pssttt….we also have another REALLY fun collection of indoor game ideas that are not old-fashioned but are sooo fun!)

14 Old-Fashioned Games to Play on a Rainy Day

Making Chatterboxes

Chatterboxes, Fortune Tellers, Cootie Catchers…..this paper toy has a lot of names, but it’s all the same idea.

Do you remember playing this when you were a kid? This tutorial from eHow explains exactly how to play.

You need a playmate to make choices that determine how many times you open the chatterbox in alternating directions until you get to the center where there are cute sayings (or fortunes, hence the name “Fortune Tellers”).

You could also put a series of phrases to go through to make a funny, random sentence!

If you want to start with a printable template, head HERE. Otherwise, just start with a squared off paper and follow the instructions for folding and creasing found in this tutorial.

This is a fun activity for a rainy day!

Hot Potato

This is a fun game for a group of kids! Traditionally, you play music while the “potato” is being passed around a group of kids sitting in a circle, and whoever has the “potato” when the music stops is out.

You can get creative if you don’t have music — everyone can recite a verse together as the potato is being passed, or you can just toss the potato to anyone in the circle and if they drop it, they are out.

Checkers

If you don’t have this board game, you can get a free checkers game for the iPad!

I love that even younger kids can learn how to play checkers, so young and old can all play this fun, old-fashioned game!

Cat’s Cradle

Cat’s Cradle is a game you play on your hands with yarn. You pass loops of string back and forth between your hands to make string creations, and it becomes even more tricky when you go back and forth between two players!

I think you definitely need a video tutorial to learn how to do this, so head here to see how fun it is! 😊

Simon Says

I love doing this one to help kids find something fun to do on a rainy day!

When they get bored, they can get irritated with each other, and this one gets them all tuned in, focusing on the instructions and forgetting about anything else.

It’s a nice reset game for kids on a rainy day!

This printable from The Best Ideas for Kids has fun ideas for Simon Says!

:: PIN FOR LATER ::

Telephone Game

You don’t need any special materials to play this game! Form a line or circle of people, then have the first person whisper a long, difficult sentence to the person next to them. The sentence continues to get whispered from person to person, until the last person recites it out loud. See how different it may have become by the end!

I Spy

This classic game is a guessing game. One player silently chooses an object that is in everyone’s sight, then says “I spy with my little eye, something that starts with __ (naming the first letter of the object).”

The players try to guess the object. Whoever guesses correctly becomes the “spy” for the next round, and the game continues as long as you like.

I love all the variations of this game over at the Teaching Every Day blog! They spy things that are certain colors, shapes, things that rhyme with a word, etc. This is a way to take it up a notch and make it more of a fun learning experience for younger kids!

Dominoes

When I say “playing Dominoes” as a rainy day activity, I’m actually referring to setting up a path of them up to watch them topple. 😊

There are true Dominoes games (Straight Dominoes is a classic, read how to play that here) that older kids can play.

But it’s really really fun to make a whole setup with curves and turns and then see if pushing just the first one will knock all of them down!

Check out this Domino Setup that set a world record!!

Paper Airplane Races

Have fun watching YouTube videos on how to make fast paper airplanes (or get a book – this one is AWESOME because it comes with tons of paper and instructions!)

Then have paper airplane races, seeing whose plane can go the farthest!

Hide and Seek

A game that never gets old is hide and seek. 😊 Just be sure to set boundaries as far as which rooms, if any, are off-limits when you’re playing indoors.

In our house, bathrooms are off-limits for hide and seek, and no doors are allowed to be locked. Otherwise, anywhere else goes!

Pick Up Sticks

Grab a bundle of pick up sticks off Amazon, or use wooden skewers from the kitchen like we do!

This is such a simple game – you just hold the sticks in a bundle vertically, then drop them and let them scatter.

Players take turns picking up one stick at a time, making sure not to let any other sticks move.

This can just be played simply (see who collects the most sticks by the end), or it can be more complicated with different points for the different color sticks.

Chinese Checkers

Chinese Checkers is a board game (if you count a wooden circle as a “board” 😆) that we probably all played growing up!

2-6 players can enjoy this simple game when you’re stuck indoors on a rainy day!

(As always when dealing with small objects such as marbles, remember to keep out of reach of small children since the marbles are such a choking hazard!)

Arm Wrestling

Arm wrestling is for two players at a time. Each player places one arm on a table with their elbows bent, forearm upward, and they grip each other’s hand. The goal is to push your opponent’s arm down to the table.

You don’t need any special materials to play this game, so this is a fun one to suggest if the kids are bored!