I think the author of Simplicity parenting might address the indoor/outdoor issue by talking about the abundance of stuff typical Ameican kids have inside their homes/rooms--generally plastic crap and way too much of it that can only be played with in very particular ways. Kids aren't making forts etc. inside because they are too overwhelmed with all of the stuff inside. When we remove the excess and allow them unstructured free time they can be creative in that way inside.
This is cracking me up, I always cringed at all the plastic crap my kids would get from relatives at Christmas and birthdays. Somehow though, I think many kids are innately programmed to be creative despite sometimes stifling parenting, and all the plastic junk. Several examples come to mind beyond the common experience of the kid preferring to play with the cardboard box than with whatever came inside it.
One summer we stayed at a hotel while visiting grandma, grandma showered the girls with really nice expensive dolls and toys but my 2 year-old spent the whole time playing with the little shampoo bottles from the hotel bath, she gave them names and personalities and made clothing for them out of the wrapping paper from the gifts. I asked her later why she preferred the shampoo bottles to the pretty dolls and she explained that she could make them be whatever/whoever she wanted to whereas the dolls were already "done" by someone else and that was no fun.
Another time I tried to organize my kids room: I bought neat under-bed boxes for each toy type and told my girls I expected them to pick one thing to play with at a time and put it away before taking out another box. After nap-time (my nap-time) I was appalled to finad that they had everything out at once. I demanded an explanation and they showed me their masterpiece, explaining that in order to play with Barbies, they needed the blocks to build the palace for Barbie's ball, the legos were absolutely necessary to make colorful furniture for inside the palace, colored construction paper was required for fancy rugs and of course the remote control tonka truck was required to bring Barbie to the palace in style, oh, and dress up jewelry had to be used to decorate the palace if it was to be believable...etc etc(!)
Another day I opened the girls bedroom door and found the whole room (wall to wall and floor to ceiling fan) had been turned into a giant 3 dimensional spider web with the knitting yarn tied around absolutely everything, my 3 yr old had worked on it all night and was very proud of herself. Since the little one never slept more than 4 hours a night, I guess she had more than enough free time no matter how much structure I crammed into the day.
