How to keep your toddler's entertained

We have all had those days. You know the ones. Where you wake up in the morning, ready to embrace the day with your kiddos. You fed them a nice homemade breakfast in comparison to the bag of oatmeal they usually get. You actually showered and got dressed and are left feeling ready to conquer anything. You get the kids dressed and out the door and off you go on your first adventure of the day. A nice, long walk around the neighborhood. By the time the walk is over you have a toddler melting down and a screaming baby. But you are not going to give up. Today you are supermom! You wheel the stroller into the garage and pull out paper and finger paint. Painting should last a good half hour. Maybe an hour if you are very creative. But within 5 minutes the kids are paitning on each other instead of the paper and within reach of their grubby fingers is your car so you move on to something else. Chalk, bubbles, water play, whatever you have within reach you pull out ready to use. After awhile both kids are ready to go inside. You head inside feeling smug. You are an amazing mom. It has to be later afternoon by now and you haven't even turned the tv on once! And the kids got lots of time playing outside and burning out energy. You wouldn't be surprised if it's way past nap time and more than half the afternoon is gone. Until you look at the clock and realize that only an hour has passed. And worse it's only 9am. Your still two hours or more away from nap time. Now what do you do?

I have these days alot. When I first envisioned becoming a stay at home mom I imagined days spent making creative things out of legos, building a log house with lincoln logs, putting train sets together, introducing the kids to my favorite chapter books which we would spend hours reading, snuggled on the couch on lazy rainy days. But babies and toddlers are not kids. They have the attention span of a bumble bee and as much as I plan on days spent reading books, coloring, painting, blowing bubbles etc, in reality those activities usually result in a toddler eating crayons, the baby spilling all the bubbles and them getting into anything and everything. I never intend on letting them watch tv all day but some days it happens. Some days I get so burnt out of ideas on things to do with them that I'm lost for new activities to try with them. Let's be honest, shaking a rattle in front of your babies face is fun for only so long! So of course I turn to pinterest for ideas, and while I have found a lot in regards to toddlers, they still tend to be activities geared to older toddlers, not young 2's and babies. But one list I found I thought was good. The author even has a link to a pdf checklist format that you can print off and check off the activities as they are completed.

Click on above picture to be taken to link

Any other fun suggestions for activities to do with both babies and toddlers?