Creative Family Fun

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Terri Thompson

Summer Bucket List, Revisited

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I’m sure you’re wondering how our summer bucket list is going. I posted our list here about two months ago and I thought it was about time to update you on our progress. We haven’t completed everything on the list or even most of it. And, I can tell you that we probably won’t ever complete the whole thing. But, that wasn’t the point. The point was to have some ideas and to make the most of our summer. That we have done.

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Summer Bucket List

1. Host a cook-out

2. Camp out in our backyard – This one won’t happen this year, since we sold our tent at our garage sale! But, we did go on a real camping trip over Memorial Day weekend. That should count, shouldn’t it?

3. Take a trip to the zoo

4. Make a sunflower playhouse – This is a work in progress, it’s getting bigger and prettier every day. Here’s a couple of our latest pictures.

5. Go stargazing – I’ve been waiting for it to start getting dark a little earlier since I want Lizzie to join me. This may happen in September, but it’s still summer until late September, right?

6. Go hiking – I took the girls to a small trail close to home. They had a great time and turned out to be quite good little hikers.

7. Take a trip to the farmer’s market

8. Go rock hunting – You can check out this post to find out about our rock hunting!

9. Visit a state park<

10. Play in the sprinklers – several times!

11. Go on a nature scavenger hunt

12. Make ice cream – It didn’t turn out so well, but we made it nonetheless!

13. Go on a picnic – a few times!

14. Make homemade lemonade – we haven’t done this yet, but I think I’m going to stock up on lemons during my next grocery trip.

15. Host an ice cream social party

16. Make salsa from my garden – I hope this happens, but I’m not sure. My jalapeno plant shows no signs of actually producing a pepper. But, I do have quite a few banana peppers that I’m not sure what to actually do with! Any ideas?

17. See a fireworks show

18. Go to our county fair – This won’t happen either. I chickened out. I really don’t enjoy fairs all that much any more… and I just couldn’t muster up the courage to go.

19. Visit a small town festival – We went to Children’s Day at our local hometown festival. The girls had a blast and it wasn’t nearly as scary crowded as the actual county fair.

20. Swim in a lake

So, there you have it. We’ve completed eight of a list of twenty. There’s still some weeks of summer left and still plenty of time to accomplish some more. And that homemade lemonade… yep, that’s going to happen soon!

Did you make a summer buck list? How is it going?

Racing

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Never, ever underestimate the power of simple play.Children don’t need complicated, or expensive toys all the time. Sometimes all it takes is a suggestion, an opportunity or a spark of imagination.

In this case, all it took was the flag off of our bike trailer and a suggestion from me: “why don’t you run races?”

Off they went, running, running, running.

They ran simple foot races. They chased each other. They even tried starting at the top of the slide and running once they reached the bottom. In the end, I had two exhausted girls. It was a good day!

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Shape Hopscotch

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I refilled our “Go Outside” cards this week, since they were such a hit (actually, I have to confess to remaking the whole thing since the first set mysteriously got torn in half!)One of the new cards was “Play Shape Hopscotch.” I had been trying to think of ways to help AJ learn her shapes when the idea for shape hopscotch popped in my head. Why not replace the traditional hopscotch board with a series of shapes?

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I drew basic shapes in a line, the girls found their hopscotch rocks and started playing.

They threw their rock, announced the shape it landed in, near, or first bounced in (whichever was applicable) and started jumping. The rules were loose and they had a blast.

I should have brought a book outside with me because they most certainly did not need my participation with this game… at least, they did not need my participation after I drew the board.

It was free. It was easy. It was fun. Aren’t those the best activities?

Cardboard Boxes

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I’d like to present you with Exhibit A or one of the many reasons why we keep empty cardboard boxes around the house far longer than most people.This morning, it was turned into an impromptu art project.

After the girls dumped all of their crayons and colored pencils in the box, they decided to actually start using them. We discovered that colored pencils made a really cool sound when you colored really fast with them (and an even cooler sound when you used more than one pencil).

They also tried coloring in just about every angle possible.

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The top, the sides and the bottom all got colored. AJ did all her coloring while lying inside of the box.The masterpiece has been completed for the time being, although I’m sure it will be worked on throughout the day. Didn’t it turn out great?

Story Time: Books About Pond Life

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We’re finishing up our pond theme and reading the rest of the books in our book basket. These three have been particular favorites. They fit in with the relaxed week we’ve been having. (Can you see our overall theme here? Yep, we’re relaxing and enjoying the end of summer.)

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Days with Frog and Toad by Arnold Lobel, fit in perfectly with our days.These classic characters are wonderful examples of how to enjoy your day. Any of the Frog and Toad books are great read-aloud choices; this just happened to be the only one on the library shelf!

I discovered The Caterpillar and the Polliwog by Jack Kent purely by accident. But, I’m very glad I did. It’s a sweet story about a caterpillar who meets a polliwog one day. The caterpillar had been talking about how she was going to change into a butterfly. The polliwog is convinced that he is going to change into a butterfly as well and spends so much time wondering when that is going to happen that doesn’t even notice he’s changing into a frog. At the end, instead of being disappointed that he is not a butterfly, he finds delight in being a frog.

In the Small, Small Pond by Denise Flemingis a must for any pond theme. This one was much more appealing to my 2-year-old than the other books with it’s big bright illustrations and close-up view of the many animals you can find around a pond.

Some of the other books in our basket were:

Emma’s Turtle by Eve Bunting

Little Quack by Lauren Thompson

Little Quack Loves Colors by Lauren Thompson

Tadpole to Frog (LifeCycles) by Camilla De Bedoyere