Dads' Day Out encourages Nelson fathers to hang out with the kids

Forget the Barbie doll, Lego and the ipad, the greatest gift a parent can give a child is their time. To make it easy for dads to spend more time with their kids, the Active Dads' group is creating child friendly events, especially for dads with kids under the age of six.

Spokesperson for the group, Solomon Rahui says mums are great at organising coffee groups for get togethers and support but there’s not much set up for dads.

“Active Dads is all about providing fun opportunities for dads to hang out with their children, “ he says. “We hope that through organised events the dads will build up a network of other like-minded dads and then get together on a regular basis with their kids.”

Active Dads is launching in Nelson with a ‘Dads Day Out’ on the 22 February at the Mega Slide at Tahunanui Beach.

“It’s been a huge success in Blenheim and we look forward to continuing it here in Nelson,” says Solomon. “We are encouraging dads, step dads, granddads, uncles or any guy who is part of caring for an under-six-year-old to take over the parenting reins for an afternoon and come along, and it also gives our mums a well-deserved break.”

The Dads Day Out is a free event on Sunday 22 February from 2-4pm at the Mega Slide at Tahunanui Beach. Sports Tasman will be there with their trailer of fun equipment, there will be face painting, Flossy the Balloon Lady, a bouncy castle, rides on the Mega Slide and more.

The Active Dads initiative is funded by the Ministry of Social Development through the SKIP (Strategies for Kids, Information for Parents) programme and delivered by Barnardos.

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