Play is how all children order and understand their world, whether it is hop scotch or block building or doing a puppet show it is all important for our children developmentally.
Play builds fine and gross motor skills (moving pieces on a Board game or playing jacks or hop scotch, climbing and dance) as well as building neural connections. By engaging in play, children get the chance to try out behaviors like when they play with kitchens, capes and other dress up clothes and mimic home behaviors or friend situations or imagine their fears.
Play has many components, particularly now: free play (puzzles, dolls, blocks, manipulative), family time (dance parties, meal prep, sing a-longs, board games, make a family tree, work outs or go to Outer Space (https://images.nasa.gov/)), social time, music and art time and language arts time (reading books, talking about words, making signs...) Maybe if some adults had played a little more as children, they wouldn't have so many mid-life crises and revert to acting like children!
Art and creativity are critical for all children. Whether it is crayons and paper, stickers, collage, easels, finger, q-tip, cotton ball, fork or anything else you can think of to dip in paint and create, use boxes and toilet paper tubes to create wonderful pieces, chalk on paper, sidewalks or a chalk board, do origami, make musical instruments, make necklaces or do and use anything you have to have fun.
Movement is so important: jump rope, obstacle courses, work outs, dance parties, yoga, learn to break dance (www.utube.com/watch?v=zPdQ1gN7Ngo), do handstands, find things in the house/apartment that start with a certain letter, form the alphabet with your body and hopping around the room,
Learn a new skill like tying knots (https://animatedknots.com/basic-knots) or learn to crochet or knit, bake a cake, make tissue paper flowers (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SejtYvy7TGY) or learn a new language a little bit a day (https://www.duolingo.com/) and then cook a dish to go with the country the language represents.
Don't feel like you are failing if you can't fill every minute of every day, make the day fun, have a schedule, do different things everyday. Your kids may say they are "bored", you may feel "bored" without sports, activities, friends, outside etc, but it is healthy to be bored sometimes, it leads to creativity, makes you more goal oriented and is actually essential to your well being!
Random act of kindness : write any teacher, coach, professor, Dean that you ever had a letter and tell him/her what a great job they did/do and tell them how much you appreciate them!