Indoor Snowball Fight
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PSN Team 
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How to Create a Fun and Safe Indoor Snowball Fight
You don’t need cold weather and snow-covered ground to have a snowball fight. Discover the secret to creating a fun and safe indoor snowball fight the whole family can enjoy. Get creative and let the games ensue!
Snowball Fights: How Soldiers Turned Routine into Playful History
You don’t need cold weather and snow-covered ground to have a snowball fight. Discover the secret to creating a fun and safe indoor snowball fight the whole family can enjoy. Get creative and let the games ensue!I want to begin by telling you a story from the Journal-Courier on February 4, 2024: “Holy cow! History: When soldiers traded swords for snowballs” by J. Mark Powell, Contributor.
An interesting event happened more than 160 years ago. The soldiers fighting during the American Civil War briefly retrieved their weapons courtesy of Mother Nature. These soldiers were used to camping along green grass, soaking in the sun, and engaging in their daily routine: roll call, drills, and cleaning their equipment. After months of this humdrum kind of life, the lack of excitement got to them. Remember, they were young guys in their teens and 20s.
During the first week in February 1862, a welcoming surprise arrived. Northern Virginia was blanketed by more than a foot of snow. A sturdy young colonel took the soldiers out the next day to build snow forts. They were busy all morning, eager to participate in a snow fight affair. That afternoon, the group was divided into two parties. One party stood inside the fort while the other stood outside of the fort. Eight hundred of them participated in the biggest snowball fight of the century. Many received black eyes and bruises, but it was quite a spectacle.
As time passed, smaller and less dramatic snowball fights continued through the end of the war in 1865. “BOYS WILL BE BOYS!”
Is the inclement weather keeping you indoors? Do you live in a warmer climate that doesn’t get any snow? Either way – no worries! It’s time to learn how to create your own indoor snowball fight.
Items Needed:
- Soft homemade or purchased snowballs.
- A large room to include couches, chairs, tables, etc.
Description of activity – how to get started:
- Remove all valuable and breakable items from the play area.
- The furniture in the room will be used as forts.
- Arrange the furniture so that an individual can hide behind it. For example, you may want to position the end tables and chairs on their sides.
- Scatter the play snowballs around the room.
- On a signal, the players grab the snowballs and throw them at each other.
- Hide behind the furniture (forts) so as not to get hit by the snowball.
- I would tell your children that the snowballs they are playing with are quite soft and won’t injure anyone or damage anything in the house. Whereas real snowballs can seriously hurt someone.
Modifications:
- Play Christmas or Wintertime music
- Hold a strong paper plate with the dominant hand and use it as a shield to block the snowballs from hitting you.
- Create forts around the house using bed sheets, pillows, and other items. BE CREATIVE!
Adaptations:
- If you use a mobility device, make sure the area is safe, and you can move around the playing area efficiently.
- Make sure to position the furniture so that someone using a mobility device can hide behind them.
