I used to love rainy days. They were a great excuse to sit on the couch and read all day. But with two children under the age of five those days are but a distant memory. Now rainy days mean no outdoor play. I sometimes use these days to run my errands. If we can't play outside then the kids won't miss playing outside because I have to go to the store or the bank. But sometimes it's easier to stay home than to venture out into the world of slick roads and wet shoes.

Yesterday was beautiful. A perfect low 80s, sunny, no humidity day and today dawned dreary, gray and rainy. What do you do when you can't play outside? You could wait for The Cat in the Hat to drop in, which I think would be kind of fun, or you could build a rainy day fort. You know the kind you used to build with blankets and couch pillows in the family room when you were a kid? Do kids even do that kind of stuff these days? Well mine do now.

When I first told my son we were going to build a rainy day fort he said, "I don't tink dat's a berry good idea Mommy." I think what he really wanted me to do was put a movie on and let him lay on the couch in his jammies all morning. However, when I started pulling blankets out and stacking pillows on the couch he quickly changed his tune. Suddenly we were pirates building a ship.

The tunnel between the ottoman and couch was the entrance into the galley of the ship where we ate our snack of goldfish and animal crackers. I draped the blanket over two kitchen chairs to have a higher space for us to sit down below the ship. The top of the couch and ottoman was the deck of the ship where my son threw the anchors (pillows) overboard. Then he decided to block the tunnel entrance with pillows so that we were trapped in our makeshift tent. I said that the pillows looked like rocks blocking the entrance to a cave and suddenly we were explorers trying to find out way out of an underground cave. Our rainy day fort didn't look like anything super special or fancy, but it sure was fun to imagine it was something else. So the next time it's rainy and you're stuck at home let your imagination take you on an adventure.