A few years ago when I still went to MOPS meetings, this was an idea that was introduced at one of the meetings. Write down lots of ideas of things to do over the summer. Each idea goes onto 1 clothespin. Then you put all of the clothespins together in a bucket. As your kids are whining and saying "we're so bored! what can we do?" over the summer, pick a clothespin out and do that activity. Then clip it to the top of the bucket when you are done. At the end of the summer, you have a nice way to remember all of the fun things you have done. We've done this for a few summers now and it really seems to help with making sure we get everything done that we want to do.
At the beginning of the summer, I sit down with the kids and we brainstorm things to go on the clothespins. If there was something we did last summer that we want to repeat, we just use that clothespin again. Each year we seem to add clothespins to our bucket as we think of new things to do. Here are the things we did this summer:
- play with playdough
- get $5 to spend at the Dollar Store
- go to the bank and deposit the $ from the allowance "save" jar that we have been saving all year
- make oobleck
- play in the sprinkler
- go to a movie
- kid interviews
- have a picnic
- 3D printing at the library
- build an indoor fort
- make a craft at Michael's
- play a board game
- water gun fight
- pick wildflowers
- go to the beach
- go to South Bend
- have Dairy Queen for dinner
- visit a splash pad
- make our own popsicles
- paint a picture
- go to garage sales
- make homemade pizza
- playdate with a friend
- sun art paper
- jigsaw puzzles
- water bottle craft
- visit the Little Free Library near our house
- read a book under a tree
- visit a new playground
- lollipop factory
- nature walk
- write a letter to cousins
- wash the car/bikes
- make s'mores
- Chuck E. Cheese
- concoctions
- water balloons
- have a lemonade stand
- mop the kitchen floor
- visit Fox Island
- Yes Day
I realize some of those sound more fun than others. (Honestly, though, the kids love to mop the kitchen floor. Probably because it involves getting water everywhere.) I try to have a variety of activities - some inside, some outside, some free, some that cost $, etc... We have other clothespins we never got to this summer (like "sleep in a tent in the backyard". Yeah, I'm okay with not getting to that one) so we will save those for next year. I really like having this bucket list. It helps us plan out our summer days so that everyone gets to do the things they want, and we all have fun.
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