Importance of Recreation and Leisure Activities In Our Lives

* A man can never be idle with safety and advantage until he has been so trained by work that he makes his freedom from times and tasks more fruitful than his toil has been. By~Hamilton Wright Mabie

* It is in his pleasure that a man really lives; it is from his leisure that he constructs the true fabric of self. By~Agnes Repplier


We all need recreation and leisure activities to bring some joy and fun in our lives. It is a fact that recreation provides relaxation to our minds and as a result we can participate in our daily routines with more energy.

According to a difinition by "Open Site" Free Internet Encyclopedia:

Recreation is the undertaking of activities in spare time not spent working and sleeping. Such activities usually offer a balance of relaxation from work and stimulation from relaxation.

Recreation involves pursuing personal interests and includes games, sports, video games, watching television and movies, listening to music and the radio or participating in outdoor activities such as tramping and fishing. Eating, although necessary to survive, has turned into a recreational activity, pursued in free time to gain personal satisfaction.

In developed societies weekends and holidays are usually devoted to recreation. People often travel during longer holidays or on periods taken off work called vacations.

Recreational activities may also be played professionally as an occupation, at which point they cease to be recreation. This is most notable in sports, where some sports people made be paid high salaries to play their sport.

Cultural activities are an integral part of leisure and recreation. People participate in cultural activities for a wide variety of reasons: for enjoyment and entertainment, for personal growth and development, as a means of expression, to learn new skills, to meet new people and to pass on cultural traditions.

Leisure time is a crucial component of a balanced and healthy lifestyle. It is a time when people can do what they want to, separate from work and other commitments

Participation in physical activity is a source of enjoyment and has positive benefits for people’s physical and mental health. It can also contribute to personal growth and development and is a good way to meet new people.

Leisure and recreation are both crucial components of a balanced and healthy lifestyle. Leisure time is a time when people can do what they want to do, away from work and other commitments.

Recreation and leisure play an important role in social wellbeing by providing people with a sense of identity and personal autonomy. Involvement in leisure-time activities adds meaning to individual and community life and contributes to people’s overall quality of life. Recreation can encourage personal growth and self-expression and provide increased learning opportunities, satisfying needs not met in people’s non-leisure time.

For many people, participation in leisure and recreation improves their physical and mental health. Recreation often involves a physical activity or sport. Research clearly shows increased physical activity can lead to fewer health problems and higher productivity at work, especially when combined with a balanced diet and a healthy lifestyle.

The benefits for mental health are equally important. Several studies have demonstrated links between regular physical activity and a reduction in the symptoms of mild or moderate depression, stress and anxiety. Passive leisure also has benefits for mental health, by providing an outlet for the mind. It may provide physical rest, tension release and opportunities to enjoy nature and escape from the daily routine.

Participation in leisure and recreation activities can also have social benefits. It creates opportunities for socialisation and contributes to social cohesion by allowing people to connect and network with others. It can also contribute to family bonding when families do things together in their leisure time.

How people feel about their leisure time and also what they do in their leisure time?

- satisfaction with leisure time,
- participation in physical activity and
- participation in cultural and arts activitie.

The first indicator is satisfaction with leisure time. This measures how people feel about both the quantity and quality of leisure time available to them.

The second indicator measures people’s participation in physical activity. It gives us a sense of how active New Zealanders are. Moderate physical activity can improve a number of health outcomes.

The final indicator measures people’s involvement in cultural and arts activities. Cultural activities contribute to individual growth and provide opportunities for social cohesion and passing on cultural traditions.
Desired outcome:

Everybody is satisfied with their participation in leisure and recreation activities. They have sufficient time to do what they want to do and can access an adequate range of opportunities for leisure and recreation.

Leisure and Recreation


Recreation Plays an Important Role in Cancer Management

Recreation and Leisure Activities play a vital role in our everyday lives.
Passive activities relax the nervous system and help reduce stress.
Recreation and Leisure Activities contribute to significant reductions in inner tensions, depressive thinking and sleep disturbances.

Source: Eastern health

Hobbies and Leisure at "Parent Station"

The Parent Station is resource for pregnancy, parenting, women's interest and many other topics. You can read many Hobbies & Leisure Articles at the site.

Few article links:

- Get Started in Scrapbooking-It's Easier Than You Think

Side bar offers more post links for the topic like as:
Basic Color Theory Scrapbooking Ideas
Creating Scrapbook Pages that POP!
Guide to Creating a Genealogy Scrapbook Album
Quick and Easy Scrapbooking Makes Great Family Fun
Scrapbook Cost-Cutting Methods

So there is enought material which can guide you about the "scrapbooking" hobby.

- This article offers 10 fun activities to keep the children busy during summer: Fun Things to Do with Your Kids this Summer

- Photography section offers many useful posts about this hobby:
Digital Cameras: How They Work

The Parent Station sends out a Newsletter no more than once a week and no less than once a month.
Each Newsletter Includes:
A recap of what is new around the site
At least one opportunity to earn Prize Bucks
Helpful information pertaining to a variety of subjects, including (but not limited to): Women's Interest, Parenting, Marriage, Pregnancy, etc.
New information about our family of websites, including new topics, new sponsors, new features and more!

To Subscribe click here

Develop a Hobby For Your Leisure Time

Hobbies are a good pastime, as you can utilize your leisure time by developing a hobby according to your interests. By learning about various hobbies, you can decide which hobby appeals you the most. Either you engage yourself in a hobby or not, it is still fun to read about the hobbies, how people involve themselves in variety of leisure activities, hobbies or interests.

Leisure and Hobbies is onother hobby blog, offering posts about different hobbies.
Topics discussed are:

Stamp Collecting
Coin Collecting
Pet Fish
Pet Birds
Fitness
Hiking
Camping
Guitars
Outdoors
Hammocks
Barbeque
Skydiving

As in Stamps Collecting section there are many posts relating to the topic like as: Stamp Collecting - A Beginner’s Glossary, Tools for the Collector, Storing Your Collection, Stamps as Investment etc.

Site link: Leisure and Hobbies

Take the quiz to know 'which hobbies are for you?'

Sometimes it is difficult for us to understand and determine which hobbies match with your real personality and which you can stay with or enjoy for long. Selection of right hobbies is important because hobbies are for relaxation, fun and way of good pastime, but if hobby becomes a factor of stress for you, better to avoid that hobby or leisure activity.

LifeScript which provides personalized health and wellness solutions to help consumers, offers a quiz which can help you understand what type of hobbies are for you!

Hobbies can renew your lost passions and refresh, relax, and even energize. Whether you enjoy dumpster diving for antique treasures or wrapping your mind around a New York Times' crossword puzzle, hobbies can be an enjoyable part of your day. For the more adventurous kind, skydiving may answer the call for adventure while others prefer a creative outlet with arts and crafts. Take this quiz, and discover what types of hobbies are for you.

This quiz consists of 10 questions.

Start the quiz at the link.

Making of your own - "Board Games"

"Do-it-yourself" projects always inspire me, because as an educator, I know that it is a real pleasure to create anything. Even children love to make or create things. Like making board games is another fun activity which can be adopted as a hobby. As creativity is involved in making 'Board Games' yourself.

What do you need to make your own board game?

These supplies can help you get started making your own games and are available at most craft stores:

White foam board
Pencils
Colored marking pens
Construction paper
Dice
Large glass beads, novelty erasers (dinosaurs, cars, spaceships, etc.), or other good placeholders
Index cards
Laminate sheets (to make your game more permanent)

If you have access to a computer, you can use it to print photos or text instead of drawing and lettering them by hand.

These Web sites have ideas for board games and other tabletop games. Some are old; some are not. Whatever you choose, remember that the most important rule of any game is to have fun.

More at "Kids Point": Make Your Own Board Games

Some sites with board game making directions:

Parenting page at "BBC" Board Games in which your child has to take turn teach useful skills, including counting, matching objects, spotting details, sharing - and how to be a good loser. Offers games like "Run, rabbit, run!, Beetle, Lotto, and Pairs" for yound children. All the instructions are given:

Link: Make your own board game (BBC)

* Wiki How explains the process in detail with tips and other details.

* Making Snakes & Ladders Type Board Games

* Making Your Own Board Games

* This is the links where you can download and print the board gamesReady made games and games boards

* Board Games for Kids to Make from Scratch

* Making a Board Game

"Cavender's Boot City" for trendy wear

When you earn well, and work hard you deserve the best for you, which might be trendy, of good quality and providing you comfort as well. You might choose the name which is trusted for years, because at the stores, where quality and comfort matters, you don't have to think twice about your choice. Now online shopping has made our purchase process, simple and easier.

People who love to wear quality 'western' clothes or boots, they recognize "Cavenders" and now you can check the latest selection online.

'Cavender's online western store' which stocks large selection of the most popular brands of western wear and cowboy boots for men, women, and children. You can find styles from the biggest names like Wrangler jeans and more from them.

Since 1965 the Cavender family has provided quality western wear in the true spirit of the Southwest, with over 42 Cavender’s western stores pleasing cowboys and cowgirls.

Achievements:

- Thirty-five years in business
- Having 40+ stores
- and 800+ employees, Cavender’s Boot City and Cavender’s Western Outfitters have become synonymous with the well-dressed Texan.

Check the FAQ section for more information.

Making of 'Paper Planes' - Hobby

Making of paper airplanes is more than a hobby, 'a creative activity', which is fun to do. From the day I read that 'origami' or 'paper folding' activities can help in skill development, I have included few "origami" projects in my crafts syllabus. And making of boat, aeroplanes are among them. For example making a paper plane was really fun for my students.

I take Nursery class and age group is mostly 4 plus, so I try to do it in very easy steps. First of all I ask the children to watch me making paper plane. Providing them orgimai paper sheets (which I usually make with colouring poster paper), I ask them to decorate it with any kind of designs, even making simple circle or square shape is fine. Final step is again showing them to follow me in folding the paper in few easy steps. Last step is to fly the planes in class room, but most of them like to take their planes to home, as it is their own creation.

I hope that this idea can help parents or teachers in encouraging this simple craft or hobby which is fun to make. I am including many useful links where you can find more paper plane models.

* paper plane sites from 'dmoz'

* Author of the site "Amazing paper airplanes" Kyong Hwa Lee holds a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from the University of New Mexico and has been working for more than 25 years in the aerospace industries. He has designed more than 100 paper airplanes over a 30-year period. He co-authored "Paper Airplane Fold-A-Day Calendar". This web page is made to share his designs world wide with other children, their parents and their teachers who enjoy paper airplanes.

- Amazing paper airplanes
- Links to other sites having same interests

* From Alex's gallery of two dozen paper airplane designs, visitors have selected the Dragon Plane and Paper Helicopter as their favorites. The Dragon, an original design, flies "true and fast" and is "the best plane to hit your teacher with." The Helicopter is popular because it is both simple to make and simple to fly. You can peruse the rest of the planes by difficulty of construction (easy, medium, hard) or jump right to the fastest, longest flying, or most unusual designs.
Link: Paper airplanes

* A blog: Paper air plane idea

* How to make paper plane

* You can find and download many free paper airplane model kits at this site:

* Step by step instructions on making paper airplanes at "How stuff works?":
How to Make Paper Airplanes

More sites:

Joseph Palmer's planes are "designed to fly," not look like real airplanes. As a paper airplane purist, none of his designs require cutting, taping or weights: just a single sheet of 8.5" by 11' paper and your fingers. There are only four designs here, but the illustrated instructions are excellent, and judging by visitor feedback, all of them are great flyers.

Link: Joseph Palmer's Paper Airplane

Amazing fact about the world's first philatelist

There are many hobbyists around the world who love to collect stamps. But there are few who know the history of stamps collecting or other facts about this popular hobby. Do you know was the world's first philatelist, or stamp collector?

I found the answer at "Big site of amazing facts" and I hope that you would also enjoy this amazing fact.

How Did a Classified Ad Lead to the World's Most Popular Hobby?

"In 1841, the London Times carried a most unusual classified ad. It was placed by a young woman interested in wallpapering her bedroom walls. And she wanted to do it with postage stamps!

This young woman thus became the world's first philatelist, or stamp collector. The millions of philatelists the world over who followed her in stamp collecting, however, did not collect for the purpose of papering their bedroom walls.

Only a year earlier, in 1840, at the suggestion of Sir Rowland Hill, Great Britain had issued the world's first postage stamps. They were called the "Penny Blacks," and had the head of Queen Victoria on them.

Before these stamps were issued, people took their letters to the post office and paid the postmaster a fee for sending them. The postmaster then wrote the word "paid" on the letter and sent it off.

With the issuing of stamps, people could buy their postage in advance and simply mail them in public mailboxes that the British government set up throughout the country.

Every country in the world has its name printed on its stamps, except Great Britain, the first to issue them!"

Source: "Big site of amazing facts"

"Do-It-Yourself" - hobby

It was the first time when my husband wanted my help in interior painting for our teen age son's room. I was having holiday the whole July month, so it was fun to join him in painting the walls of the room. I realized that we created very unique paint design on the walls, which our son loved and we also saved money.

Hobbies can save us a lot of money, if we have interest in "Do-It-Yourself" activities. For example home improvement, or remodeling house or house hold
things can be very creative task for us, and naturally when it is done without any professioanl support, we can save money.

Hobbies are recreational activities which provide good times and learning experiences to cherish. But sometimes it is difficult to choose hobbies.

What is "Do-it-yourself" ?

"Do it yourself", often referred to by the acronym DIY, is a term used by various communities that focus on people creating or repairing things for themselves without the aid of paid professionals.

More details from Wikipedia:

The phrase "do it yourself" came into common usage in the 1950s in reference to various jobs that people could do in and around their houses without the help of professionals. A very active community of people continues to use the term DIY to refer to fabricating or repairing things for home needs, on one's own rather than purchasing them or paying for professional repair. In other words, home improvement done by the householder without the aid of paid professionals.



* These few "do-it-yourself" can be made when your have some extra time at home, and want to do some "creative job" like as:
DIY Hair Accessories, DIY Jewelry, DIY Knitting, DIY Model Cars, DIY Purses, DIY Room Decorations, DIY Soap
For more details: Do-it-yourself projects

* DIY Resources at "PesWiki"

* Wikiants is a free content encyclopedia for D.I.Y. projects: Wikiants

* Craftzine offers many craft projects. I loved the post about "Plastic grocery bag recycling" project. There are more posts which come in 'do-it-yourself' catagory.

* Make Stuff have many projects and crafts, which are fun to make.

* Dmoz lists many site links to 'do-it-yourself' topics like:
Auto Repair, Basket Making, Candle Making, Canning and Freezing Food, Cleaning and Stain Removal, Doll Making, Flower Arrangements, Furniture Refinishing,Home Repairs,
Jewelry Making, Knitting, Lace Making, Needlework, Redecorating, Sewing, Soap Making, Upholstering, Welding and Soldering, Wine Making, Woodworking.

- Sites with links to: Home and Garden
- Sites with links to: Home improvement

Another hobby site :Not So Boring Life"

I am starting my review of this hobby blog mentioning a post "The 10 Scariest Hobbies on the Planet" and those hobbies are:

Sky Diving, Kayak Shark Fishing, Rattlesnake Roundup, Cave Diving, Glacier Surfing, Storm Chasing, Bull Fighting, Lion Hunting, MMA Fight, Noodling( fishing with your hands). There are pictures or Youtube links, which has made this post interesting.

"Not So Boring Life" is hobby site dedicated to helping you not become Jack or boring for that matter.

Few pages:

- Hobbies Guide page have only guide for 6 hobbies (hope that site would add more)

There are pages about popular hobbies, types of hobbies and list of hobbies. But these pages are yet to be updated, as there are only names and not the links to detailed pages.

You can find more posts at side bar under "catagory" heading.

At "arts" catagory there is a good post about "Intro to Drawing" with links and essential information to learn drawing. Hope to see more posts like it.

Useful Resources and Links for "Board Games"

These site links and useful resources would be a great help for the people who love to play "board games" as well as for the beginners who want to search and select board games for their pastimes. These all sites offer FREE information, histroy, rules, and more site links for board game hobbyists.

*** "Games Info Depot" offers you information about board games of all shapes and sizes in this section of the Games Information Depot site. It provides more information about some of the board games like history, rules and strategy.

Site link:

*** Love to know provides with a vast array of information on board games. The information are in these catagories: "Family games, Educational Board games, Strategy Board games. You would get wealth of information at this site.

*** Board games: history and useful information at "tradgames.org.uk"

*** "Board games studies" is dedicated to research on board games and the history and development of board games around the world. Some of the research is very general and examines board games as a part of play and learning in different cultures. Other studies relate to specific board games and their evolution; such games include backgammon, mancala (wari, oware, awele, et. al.), Halma (Chinese Checkers), the game of India (Parchesi, Ludo, et. al.), checkers, chess, and others.

Site link: Board games studies

*** "Board Game Geek" is a website dedicated to the subject of physical board games. The site provides an extensive database of boardgames as well as an active community of users who discuss, argue, buy, sell, trade and play board games. The database contains over 30,000 board games and each game has its own Game entry which gives information about a game, user ratings, forums for discussion and a great deal more.

The Forums are a good place to explore to involve yourself in the community.

Site link: "Guide to Board Game Geek"

*** Dmoz directory offers board games site in these catagories: (Number shows the site count for that catagory)

Abstract (1,261), Animals and Evolution (11), Auction (7), Bluffing and Betting (10), Citybuilding (4), Economy and Trading (84), Educational (13), Exploration and Travel (15), Fantasy (78), Historical (80), Horror (63), Murder-Mystery and Deduction (26), Racing (48), Railroad Games (32), Science Fiction (153), Sports (51), War and Politics (239), Words and Trivia (160).

You can also get computer board games, video games, reviews and previews and shopping sites at the same page. I suggest you to search for each catagory which appeals you, because each page would show you a lot of sites and description of it, which would tell you a little about the site. You can select the sites with tips and information.

Link: Board games