The more you spend on entertaining a small child, the less likely they are to enjoy it

As children get a bit ‘walkie’, Free Stuff To Do becomes a must for many parents.

It’s not necessarily from meanness. It’s because of an old law of parenting that says: the more you spend on entertaining a small child, the less likely they are to enjoy it.

The mo-money-mo-problems law only lasts for a while.

Tell an 8-year-old that “we’re all going on an exciting skip-diving adventure this weekend” while all his friends are Doing the Floss after murderising someone on the game Fortnite and you’ll get short shrift.

But for a few early years at least, Free Stuff To Do With the Children is a weekly search. And free stuff can be found in the most surprising of places.

Like an art gallery. Yes, an art gallery. You may have already thought of this.

You may have said things like “I want to expand their visual palette as much as possible so that their little plasticising brains can form the connections that will help them be more rounded people later in life”.

If you even think that, then they will punish you by becoming addicted to gaming, darkness and Refresher bars and wilfully opposing all your ambitions for them.

You need to play it cool. Don’t act like an art gallery is good for them.

Just think of it as the poshest playground they’ve ever been to.

It’s a large indoor open space where all the precious items are far up on the wall.

The floor is spotless. There’s one couch in the middle. There is nothing to share, wait your turn for, step in, fall over.

And there is a surprising side-effect. I looked at the paintings.

Yes I know when you go to an art gallery you’re supposed to look at the paintings.

But after a while a certain fatigue sets in: “Ok what’s this one now? ‘Peasants flirting on a road-side in Flanders’ by the Flemish Master Jan Van Stakelum. I see yes.

What’s the next one? ‘Dog Looking At Fish’ by Werner Franciskaner. Yeah ok.

NEXT! The Horse Fight by Peter Apfelstrudel. Terrific.”

You get ‘gallery-back’.

A slight ache across the lower back that comes from standing on hard floors trying to do something cultural on your City Break.

But bring a one-year-old who knows four animals: Neigh-neigh, Moo-moo, Doggie and He-Haw and she will only look at paintings that contain those.

And since you’re supposed to be some sort of guardian, you have to follow her. And lift her up to see the Neigh-neigh.

And you find yourself looking at the painting. Closely.

It’s one of only five paintings you will see that day because she’ll want to return to see the Neigh-Neigh again and again.

You read about the painter of Neigh-neighs. The little information plaque doesn’t mention if they were renowned for neigh-neighs but you have to admit, these are good neigh-neighs. And look! A doggie.

Actually the one-year-old noticed it first.

I hadn’t seen the doggie before, but there it is snarling at another doggie over an undefined carcass.

You can’t bring a cranky child in.

Docents (a word I learned recently that means the person who sits in a gallery room keeping an eye on things) and punters tend to look askance at a toddler lying on the floor banging their fists in rage and sadness.

You can argue that actually this is the only pure reaction to the Caravaggio’s ‘The Taking Of Christ’.

That by shouting ‘I WANT A LOLLIPOP’ your poppet is merely echoing Jesus’s pained resignation at his betrayal by one of his closest chums.

And after a while, not all paintings will be as straightforward.

I’m not going to be studying ‘Drunken Randy Peasants Going At Each Other At a Wedding As If It Were In The Midlands’ by Joost Van Der Horn with a child who might ask too many questions.

But still, it was a revelation.

From now on, When I go to a gallery I’m staying in one room and looking at a few things. Properly.

Especially if there’s neigh-neighs.