We are home from our ridiculously fun and exhausting trip to the happiest place on Earth! Vacation highlights are coming soon and will be added to our Disney Travel Series, but in the meantime we are trying to transition back into normal life. Part of that is coming up with activities to make the most of our summer days. They always seem to go by way too fast, and we don't want any regrets around here! I'm going to try and share fun summer activities (at least 1) with you all each week, with exception of a few weeks that we will be camping and such.
Here's today's idea to add to your summer activities:
I love our technical world and all the advanced technologies, but sometimes I get fear that tablets and T.V.'s and advanced toys are robbing our children of childhood. At least the kind of childhood that I had. You know…good old fashioned imagination and outdoor play! I remember spending the majority of my summers building forts, running through the sprinklers, and earning a whole $5.75 at my lemonade stand.
So most of my ideas will involve the outdoors.
At home with the kids? Instantly access any of these printable activity bundles to keep them learning!
My toddler loves to play in the water, but our water bill can be pricey and I don't like the idea of the hose running water for long amounts of time. She gets bored too quickly with her little pool, so I tried to think of a water activity that wouldn't use a ton of water.
I had the idea to build dirt hills around funnels and have them spill water into a giant oil drip pan. This way, she can recycle the water through the funnels over and over…and over again. I added bubbles for fun.
It's hard to see because I haven't yet splurged on an awesome camera, but I had 2 transmission funnels that lead to the main oil drip pan. We made roads with tin foil, but we ended up taking them out and just driving the cars on the dirt.
We set this up in our garden area because we don't have a sand pit, but this would be super fun to build in a sand pit if you have one!
What inspired this activity? I went to a presentation on the importance of setting up “scenes” for child play. For instance, you can throw a bunch of play dough in front of your child…and maybe they will play with it for awhile, but chances are they will get bored quickly. But if you set up a “scene” and say “look! Let's open up a pizza shop and build a bunch of pizzas,” then all of a sudden their imagination takes flight and they have higher interest in the activity. Making the effort to do this takes more preparation time as the parent, but children will stay interested much longer. For this summer fun activity, I set up a car scene, and a farm scene, and a dinosaur scene, and then I grabbed a few of her little dolls and sea creatures so that they could swim around in the big resovoir of water. The intent was to let her play with it while I got some gardening done, but I had so much fun setting it all up that I ended up playing too!
If you are looking for more Fun Summer Activities, check out last week's post for 5 summer fun outdoor activities using kid's paint. You can also find a TON of Fun Summer Activities on last year's Summer Activities Bucket List
Do you have any fun Summer Activities planned that your kids Love?
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Collette - Meal Mom says
I am excited that this summer my son will be old enjoy to do activities this summer! I am just looking forward to spending time at the neighborhood pool!
livingthescream says
My daughters would love this so much! what a cool idea. It looks so creative!