Kids' Summer Bucket List

This summer, I am determined to make the most out of each day.  With a new baby coming in September and little ladies starting 4k and first grade in the fall, I want my girls to get as much attention from me as possible.  To do this, I am instituting a bucket list for my kids.  I picked a number of different activities (many of which are different than what we would normally be doing) and wrote them all down on index cards.  I am putting those cards in a jar and we will pick out one or two to do each day.  My goal is to make sure to take lots of pictures this summer and have a new blog post at the end of each week showing what we have been up to.

Here are some of the activities that I have planned for the summer:

Starburst Painting

Patriotic Paper Starbursts – for 4^th of July

Sparkly Explosion

Balloon Rockets

Glowing Water

Corn Syrup Painting

Bead Suncatchers

Make your own name stamps

Alphabet Scavenger Hunt

Stained Glass Pictures

Of course, we’ll also be including trips to the local zoos, hikes to the local state parks, playground days and sprinkler days.

We didn’t get started until this past Thursday because we were in Texas for a wedding, but here’s our first week worth of fun!

Flower Pot Activity

So the girls received some pots from Grandpa’s work.  They are bamboo pots which will decompose after we put them in the ground.  They also each included some peat and a bag of flower seeds.  Some of the bags said Marigolds and other bags didn’t say anything about it.

The girls had fun with the idea of having their own potted plants – especially after I finished my own flower pots for the yard.

Hopefully these will actually work.  But even if they don’t work out so well, the girls had fun planting them and checking them to see if they need watered or not.

Friday - Henry Vilas Zoo

My husband’s office had a company picnic for all of the employees and their families.  We all had the zoo to ourselves as it occurred after the normal zoo hours.  The girls had a lot of fun – mostly because they were able to go on the train and carousel and play at the playground.  My husband and I were slightly disappointed because most of the animals were inside so we ended up pointing out animals like rabbits, squirrels, chipmunks and birds.  

One of the things that the office did set up was a scavenger hunt for the kids.  They were each given a map and a page where they could put stickers for the corresponding animals on.  Our oldest was pretty proud that she could direct us around the zoo using the map.

Saturday we took the day off and spent most of the day sleeping and lounging.  Our awesome Texas trip completely had worn all of us out!:)

Sunday  - Object Rubbings and Sunscreen Picture

We attempted to do a few rubbings.  H and E picked out some leaves, sticks, bark, coins, paper clip and a button.  H got the hang of it faster than E, but they still enjoyed it for a little while.  Maybe if the swingset and sandbox hadn’t been distracting them, it would have lasted a little while longer.

As for the sunscreen picture – the girls loved getting messy and painting with the sunscreen.  The pictures themselves didn’t turn out too awesome, because it was hard to get the extra sunscreen off.  However, the girls were able to at least see how the sunscreen can block the sun rays so that the paper under the sunscreen didn’t fade like the rest did.

Monday – Alphabet Scavenger Hunt

We did a pretty basic scavenger hunt, which was definitely easier for H who can actually spell.  Both girls were able to contribute, but I made H write everything down to practice her handwriting.

Tuesday – Milk Art

The girls had a lot of fun with this one.  We got the idea from Domestic Charm http://domesticcharm.blogspot.com/2011/06/milk-art.html

All we needed were pans, food coloring, toothpicks, and milk.  We used skim milk, because that is what we had on hand, but you could use any type of milk.  The girls had so much fun making different color combinations. 

Hannah thought this one reminded her of Mario and Luigi :)

Wednesday – we took off again because of Summer School, an eye doctor appointment, and t-ball practices

Thursday – Water Absorption Experiment

We got this idea from the All for Kids blog

http://allforkids.tv/episode-guide/season-4/episode-37/absorbing-science/

The girls had fun watching the markers move up the paper towels after it was put in the water – although this took a while.

The water traveling up the paper towel into the cups was a great idea, but it took a while to complete.  There wasn’t any water in the second cup until after we left it in overnight.  We set up the pink cup the next morning before summer school and checked on its progress throughout the day.

Friday – slotted disks and puzzles

Homemade Slotted Disks

This idea came from the Having Fun at Home blog http://www.havingfunathome.com/2011/06/homemade-slotted-disks.html

I used an old Dr Pepper box and cut out about 30 of these disks for the girls to build with.  They had some fun experimenting with what they could build and how far they could be thrown across the room. :/

Make your own puzzle

I had purchased a lot of these blank puzzles last summer and used them for the guest book at a wedding shower and for favors at E’s birthday party. 

We just used markers and I let the girls design their own puzzles.  Hopefully they will be able to continue using these for quite a while.

Well, that was our first week of summer and I think the girls have had a good (if busy) time.  Hopefully you have found some ideas to use with your kiddos:)