Creative Family Fun

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Outdoor Play

My Favorite Post of 2011

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So here it is! My favorite post of 2011!

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#1 Go Outside

I chose this post because it was a pivotal moment for the girls and I. This is the simple idea that got us outside more and sparked our creativity while outside. We rediscovered classic games like hopscotch and enjoyed the simple pleasures that can be found outside.

Now that you’ve seen my favorite, check out all these other wonderful posts from 2011!

Simple DIY Backyard Scavenger Hunt

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I’ve always thought scavenger hunts were so much fun. It’s at the top of my list of favorite outdoor activities.

So, we picked a perfect day to go on that backyard scavenger hunt that I had been planning ever since I created our Fall Bucket List.

This was a day for simplicity. I didn’t want to on a hunt for the perfect scavenger hunt printable. I wanted something quick and fun so I grabbed a sheet of paper and created this simple DIY backyard scavenger hunt.

Keep it simple with this fun & easy DIY Backyard Scavenger Hunt Idea. Grab a sheet of paper and get ready to have some fun.

Disclosure: There are Amazon Affiliate and other affiliate links in this article which means, at no additional cost to you, we could receive compensation for our recommendations. You can read our full disclosure policy on our Disclosure Page for more details.

Create your backyard scavenger hunt

I didn’t want this activity to be something that took a big effort, after all, it was supposed to be fun!

Before going out, I took a piece of notebook paper and wrote down specific attributes I wanted the girls to hunt for.

We were going to search for textures, colors, and even sizes.

I took a simple sheet of notebook paper and jotted down all the things were were looking for, leaving room to write down everything we found. I clipped it on a clipboard and were were ready to go.

Let’s go on our scavenger hunt!

We bundled up and went outside.

My oldest took off and started hunting. My youngest opted to play on our slide instead. (She just wasn’t interested in a scavenger hunt this time and that was okay.)

I was the recorder and the photographer. We had a lot of fun hunting and taking pictures of all our findings.

Keep it simple with this fun & easy DIY Backyard Scavenger Hunt Idea. Grab a sheet of paper and get ready to have some fun.

Here’s what we found!

Here are the attributes I included on our scavenger hunt. You can use these ideas or come up with your own things that are unique to your own backyard.

Hard: the wood on our play structure
Soft: our gloves
Green: some of the grass
Brown: our dog Charlie’s fur
Tiny: the rocks in the sand
Big: the climbing rope
Alive: the people
Prickly: the raspberry stems
Smooth: our skin

We had a lot of fun with this backyard scavenger hunt and it’s definitely something I would like to do more often. It was the perfect excuse to get outside and play on a blustery, cold day.

You may also like one of these outdoor play ideas:

10 Fun Walk Ideas for Families

Outdoor Shape Activity: Driveway Shape Maze

Leaf Collecting

Backyard Treasure Hunt with Picture Clues at Inspiration Laboratories

Sidewalk Painting

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Today, we took our art outside! The girls have been wanting to spend as much time outside as possible since the weather has been absolutely perfect.

I had planned on doing sidewalk painting during our art week anyways and this was the perfect day for it.

This is one of those projects that everyone is doing. Of course, everyone is doing it because it’s tons of fun and easy to prepare too! I used this post by Pink and Green Momma for inspiration and to find out how to make the paint.

The combination that worked well for me was one part cornstarch to one part water. I was also very generous with the food coloring. Keep in mind when making sidewalk paint, it will dry lighter and will also look chalky, thanks to the cornstarch.

We had great fun and I wished I had brought a paint brush out for myself. The paint was just way too tempting! We painted blobs and lines, circles and splotches. We learned that splatter painting was kind of cool and even made a few rainbows.

Our colors got all mixed up.Yellow turned to lime green and blue turned to teal. Of course, that just added to the fun!

And when we were all done, we took the muffin tin full of the leftover paint (which actually wasn’t much) and tossed the paint out onto the driveway. Splatter painting at its best!

This project was fun, cheap and relatively easy to prepare. We’re definitely going to do this again and again!

Beach Ball Fun

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So, what do you get when you combine a beach ball with a swing set? A whole lot of fun, that’s what!
It all started with a challenge: Can you swing while holding a beach ball between your legs?
Why of course!
After proving what incredible beach ball holding abilities we had, we moved on to other fun.How about beach ball kicking while swinging? No pictures, since this involved Mom tossing the beach ball at little legs while they were swinging. I missed more often than not, but boy was it fun!

We also tried rolling the beach ball under the swinging children, which again got lots and lots of giggles, especially when the little legs managed to bop the beach ball. (And in case you were wondering, yes, we were very safe. Two hands held on to the chains at all times and nobody actually stood in the way of swinging children!)

Impromptu fun… is there anything better?

Nature Scavenger Hunt, sort of

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We were feeling a bit cooped up one day last week. The girls were driving each other (and me) crazy and honestly, we were all bored.The evening promised to be more of the same since my hubby had an after-work work activity to go to. This just wouldn’t do!

I had our summer bucket list on my mind and nature scavenger hunts were particularly appealing. The only problem, time. We needed out of the house and fast! I most certainly didn’t want to take the time to prep a scavenger hunt.So, we did the next best thing. After packing up a quick picnic dinner, we piled in the car to one of our local parks and declared ourselves treasure hunters. We were going to go hunting for nature treasures.

Disclosure: There are Amazon Affiliate and other affiliate links in this article which means, at no additional cost to you, we could receive compensation for our recommendations. You can read our full disclosure policy on our Disclosure Page for more details.

All the gold and diamonds in the world could not compare with all the cool sticks we found. We don’t have any mature trees in our yard, so we’re not playing with sticks on a daily basis. But, the park we chose was full of fun sticks. We found long ones, short ones, thick ones, crooked ones and skinny ones. We even made a small collection to take back home. You’ve got to have sticks to play with, right?

I even tried my best to get the girls to pose in front of this stone chimney, but apparently they weren’t quite into the idea of posing… there were treasures to find!