17 Things Kids Did During Rainy Days in the 1970s That Are Rare Today

In the 1970s, rainy days made kids do creative, social, and hands-on things that aren’t as common in today’s childhood. While storms made neighborhoods sluggish, kids created blanket forts, floated paper boats, worked puzzles, traded baseball cards, and listened intently to radios. Families spent hours playing board games, baking, and doing crafts at the kitchen table without any internet distractions. Many kids also played outside, jumping in puddles and making mud pies, even though their clothes and shoes were wet and muddy. Some customs still exist today, but many have faded because of technology, changing lives, and indoor entertainment that changed how kids spend rainy afternoons.

1. Building Blanket Forts in the Living Room

In the 1970s, rainy afternoons often turned regular living rooms into huge indoor forts. Kids pulled heavy blankets out of their rooms, put couch cushions on chairs, and used clothespins to hold sheets together. During long storms, the forts turned into castles, secret hideouts, or pirate ships. The little compartments were frequently full of flashlights, comic novels, and transistor radios. Some kids even brought snacks inside and stayed hidden for hours while the rain tapped noisily on the windows. Parents rarely cleaned up the debris because everyone stayed inside on rainy days. Kids today still build forts sometimes, but fewer of them spend whole afternoons making large indoor worlds without tablets, streaming services, or video games nearby.

2. Floating Paper Boats in Gutters

When it rained heavily in the 1970s, kids ran outside with paper boats made from old newspapers, notebook paper, or grocery ads. Water flowed fast along curbs and gutters, making great racing tracks through communities. Kids ran barefoot through puddles after their boats, cheering as the little boats went around curves or disappeared into storm drains. People often had friendly competitions that lasted until their clothes got too wet and they had to go inside. Before sending their boats into the fast-moving water, some kids used crayons or little flags to paint them. Safety concerns, busy streets, and indoor activities deterred many kids from this simple rainy-day custom that once brought joy and excitement to suburban areas.

3. Playing Board Games for Hours

When it rained on the weekends in the 1970s, we would often play board games for hours at a time around the kitchen table. When it thundered outside, families took games like Monopoly, Sorry!, Life, Battleship, and Clue out of their crammed closets. For hours, the kids fought over the rules, tallied colorful paper money, and rolled dice across scuffed tabletops. Some games lasted all afternoon because there weren’t many distractions from phones or streaming TV. Siblings often became very competitive, especially when they played Monopoly, which seemed to last forever. Board games are still around today, but they don’t take up as much time on rainy days as they used to in many houses.

4. Listening to Radio Dramas and Music Shows

Kids in the 1970s typically went to the family radio when it rained, especially when the TV reception got blurry. Kids sat close to the speaker and listened to pop countdowns, local news, sports updates, or radio dramas that were being played again. The rain on the roof and a little transistor radio made the space feel alive. Some kids anxiously waited for their favorite Jackson 5, Carpenters, or Elton John songs to play, then tried to remember the words. Some people called stations to ask for tunes. Today, applications let you get music right away, so waiting by a radio during a storm is an uncommon childhood memory.

5. Making Scrapbooks from Old Magazines

In the 1970s, many kids made scrapbooks by cutting photos from old Life, Look, Sears catalogs, and comic books on rainy afternoons. They utilized construction paper, school paste, dull scissors, and old notebooks they had kept from other classrooms. They had time to make their own collections of movie stars, vehicles, toys, recipes, athletics, or fashion ads on a rainy day. Some kids wrote captions in pencil or colored the pages with crayons. It was like establishing a paper museum, which was silent but personal. Today, digital albums and online boards have taken the place of much of the slow cutting and pasting, making magazine scrapbooks much less frequent.

6. Watching Rain Through Screen Doors

In the 1970s, children often spent rainy afternoons sitting near screen doors, just watching the storm. They listened to water drip from gutters, smelled wet grass, and studied puddles forming in the yard. Sometimes they pressed their faces close to the screen, hoping the rain would slow enough for outdoor play. Older siblings told ghost stories, younger ones traced shapes on foggy glass, and everyone waited for the sky to brighten. It was a quiet kind of entertainment that asked for patience. Today, screens usually mean phones and tablets, so simply watching rain fall has become a rare habit.

7. Solving Puzzle Books at the Kitchen Table

In the 1970s, rainstorms regularly brought puzzle books to the kitchen table. Kids drank hot cocoa or ate peanut butter crackers while working on crossword puzzles, word searches, mazes, dot-to-dot pages, and hidden-picture books. Some families bought cheap puzzle magazines at the shop, while others utilized pages from newspapers again. Kids raced to finish before their siblings or circled hard clues for their parents to figure out later. The sound of pencils scraping across paper and thunder outside made for a peaceful afternoon routine. Digital games have replaced much of the peaceful paper fun, so many kids don’t spend as much time doing puzzles on rainy days anymore.

8. Recording Songs from the Radio onto Cassette Tapes

A lot of kids in the 1970s spent rainy afternoons next to tape players, waiting for their favorite songs to come on the radio. Local DJs spoke between songs, as fingers hovered over the record button. Timing was important, since one error could ruin the start of a song. Kids were proud to make their own mixtapes containing popular tunes, disco songs, or rock classics. Some people even made colorful song lists for each cassette case after that. There were no playlists or instant downloads, so the process was slow and depended on luck. Streaming services have made it simpler to find music, but the thrill of hearing songs live has almost completely gone away.

9. Reading Comic Books Under Flashlights

Kids in the 1970s typically went to their rooms or blanket forts with piles of comic books and a flashlight on dark, wet afternoons. Superman, Archie, Batman, Richie Rich, and Peanuts comics were great to read when storms shook the windows outside. Earlier in the week, several kids traded comics with their neighbors and kept their favorites for when it rained. Some people carefully stored their problems in drawers or cardboard boxes because it wasn’t always easy to find new ones. Flashlights made everything more exciting, especially when the power went out. Today, many comics have become digital or valuable, which means casual flashlight reading sessions are far less common than they used to be.

10. Playing Jacks on the Floor

In the 1970s, rainy days often turned hallway floors and living room carpets into places to play jacks. Kids threw the little metal pieces all over the floor and bounced rubber balls while trying to catch the right number before the ball fell again. The game required quick hands, attentiveness, and patience, especially in the later stages. While it rained hard outside, friends fought each other for hours. Some kids brought colorful jack sets in little lunch boxes or drawstring bags. Even though the game was easy to learn and cheap, it remained quite popular for decades. Today, fewer kids learn to play jacks since digital entertainment has slowly taken the place of many old-fashioned hand games.

11. Calling Friends on Rotary Phones

In the 1970s, kids would often stretch long, curly phone cables across rooms while talking to friends on rotary phones on rainy afternoons. They talked about school gossip, their favorite TV shows, their plans for the weekend, or their neighborhood exploits that were put on hold because of inclement weather. Some kids carefully turned the rotary dial since one wrong move meant starting over. Because the family had only one phone line, parents sometimes had to cut off calls. Children also had to keep trying later when they got busy signals. During storms, phone calls become a vital way to have fun with friends and family. Smartphones make it easier to talk to people, but the fun of long conversations on rotary phones is fading.

12. Making Mud Pies in the Backyard

In the 1970s, after severe rainstorms, several kids went outside to make mud pies in backyards, empty lots, or near garden patches. Kids made fake dinners by mixing mud with grass, leaves, and rainwater in old buckets, sticks, bottle tops, and broken kitchen tools. Some people painstakingly embellished their creations with flowers or pebbles before serving them to their siblings at fictional restaurants or tea parties. Parents frequently expected messy play during wet weather, even though clothes usually got dirty. Today, tougher rules about cleanliness, smaller yards, and more fun things to do inside have made this formerly traditional kid activity less common in many neighborhoods and families.

13. Putting Together Model Kits

Many kids in the 1970s spent rainy weekends building plastic model kits at the dining room table. During long storms, people liked to build airplanes, vehicles, warships, and monster figures from firms like Revell and Monogram. Kids painstakingly removed pieces from plastic frames, glued small sections together, and painted details with tiny brushes. There were instruction sheets all over the table, and the place smelled like glue. Some kids proudly put their finished models on shelves, while others hung airplanes from the ceilings of their bedrooms with thread. Today, fewer students spend whole afternoons putting together physical models since computer games and other digital hobbies have taken the place of many rainy-day diversions that required hands-on work.

14. Baking Simple Treats with Parents

In the 1970s, rainstorms often sent kids into warm kitchens where their parents made cookies, brownies, or banana bread from scratch. As the heat from the oven fogged up the windows, kids measured flour, cracked eggs, stirred batter, and licked spoons. During these afternoons, recipe cards with flour stains were passed down from one generation to the next. Some families cooked because they couldn’t go outside because of the rain, while others just wanted to eat something warm on gloomy days. The smell of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies generally filled the whole house before the storm was over. Today, prepared snacks and busy schedules have made it less common for kids to bake slowly on rainy days.

15. Watching Creature Features on Local Television

In the 1970s, when it rained on Saturdays, people typically watched vintage monster movies on local TV shows like Creature Features or Chiller Theater. While storms darkened the sky outside, kids gathered in front of big TVs to watch movies like Dracula, Frankenstein, Godzilla, or huge bugs. Between scenes, local hosts would sometimes come on stage in capes, makeup, or silly costumes. During the terrifying parts, kids shielded their eyes, but a few minutes later, they giggled at the special effects. In many locations across the United States, these programs became a fun thing to do on rainy days. Today, streaming services have replaced much of the shared local TV watching that used to bring neighbors together during storms.

16. Trading Baseball Cards Indoors

Kids in the neighborhood often got together to exchange baseball cards on rainy afternoons in the 1970s. Kids would spread out cards from Topps packs on the floors of their bedrooms or the tables in their kitchens as they fought about players, batting averages, and their favorite teams. Young collectors loved cards with stars like Hank Aaron, Pete Rose, and Reggie Jackson on them. Some kids preserved their cards in shoeboxes, while others put their favorite cards in plastic sleeves or old wallets. Sometimes, trading sessions lasted for hours since each deal had to be carefully worked out. There are still sports cards today, but fewer kids spend whole rainy days trading them with friends in person.

17. Writing Letters to Pen Pals

A lot of kids in the 1970s sent letters to pen pals from faraway cities, states, or countries while sitting at their desks or kitchen tables on rainy days. Schools, periodicals, and youth groups regularly set up programs to help these friendships grow. Children wrote about their daily lives, favorite hobbies, TV shows, and school activities on lined notebook paper, using colorful stamps. Some people put stickers or doodles on the envelopes before mailing them at the post office in their area. The wait for a response of weeks made the experience more exciting and required more patience. A lot of this slow but important way of talking has been supplanted by instant messaging, so kids don’t write pen pal letters as much anymore.

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