Fun Winter Activities for Teens

Play in the Snow

• Teenagers aren't too old to enjoy a good snowball fight or a giant snowman. Gather a bunch of friends and host a snowball war or a game of capture the flag. Try building a family of snow people, or make snow sculptures with nontraditional shapes, like snow turtles, snow dragons or snow flowers. If you're feeling industrious, build yourself an ice-fort or an igloo by cutting blocks of snow and piling them in a dome. Leave a hole in the top and build a fire inside to toast marshmallows. For a little less exertion, take a walk in the country or the park and admire the pristine, glistening fields of white, keeping your eyes open for wildlife. If you're looking for something romantic to do, take a horse-drawn sleigh ride through the snow.

Winter Sports

• Despite the chill in the air, winter hosts a variety of sports, both indoors and out. If you are looking for adventure, take a ride on a snowmobile, or hit the slopes on a snowboard or skis. Even if you don't live near mountains, some towns have small slopes open for the winter season. If you and your father like to fish, don't let the ice stop you--cut a hole in it and lower your lines. For a romantic outing, teenage couples often enjoy taking a sled ride together down a plunging hill or gliding around together on ice skates, which you can do at a rink or on a safe, thoroughly frozen pond.

Arts and Crafts

• Artistic teenagers can use the sights and sounds of winter as inspiration for several activities. Fill your house with homemade winter decorations, such as wreaths made out of pine cones or glittery window snowflakes made from fabric paint. Make your own holiday gifts and wrapping paper. Bake and decorate holiday cookies, or investigate your family heritage and make treats unique to your ancestry, such as candy canes, stollen bread or eggnog. Outdoors, make snow mosaics made by freezing colorful objects in a sheet of ice, or draw snow art by spritzing snow with colored water and laying out seeds and vegetables in creative patterns for hungry winter animals.

Volunteer

• Teenagers must often fulfill community service requirements at school, and winter is a great time to do that. Winter is a difficult time for many people, especially the homeless, and many organizations depend on the spirit of the holidays to encourage volunteers to lend a helping hand. Teenagers can organize a food drive or a gift donation drive at their schools, or they can raise money through bake sales, raffles or theatrical productions to donate to a charity. They can also serve food at a soup kitchen, read to the elderly or needy children, help out at a religious center or volunteer to shovel snow for those who can't.