Summer Advent Calendar

I LOVE advent calendars and wanted to create one for our summertime activities. I am so happy at how it turned out. We started on June 1st and my kids are loving it too. It gives them something to look forward to each day. I made it so I can use it through August. Let me show you what I did.
I made ice cream cones, cupcakes, watermelon, popsicles and s'mores from scrapbook paper, I created the template for each, and pieced them together and then added embellishments. For the popsicle I cut a craft stick in half to make it look like a real popsicle. I added ribbon to hang on my advent board, then sandwiched everything together to make the back look nice. I then added contact paper to the back only, this way I can write on the back with a dry erase marker, then erase it and add activities for each month (June, July and August).



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Iheartnaptime

Sidewalk Chalk and Sidewalk Paint

In yesterdays post I mentioned that for one of our summer activities we made sidewalk chalk and sidewalk paint. We used two parts plaster of paris and one part water and food coloring.

We stirred until well mixed.

Then we poured them into our molds.

We let them sit until they were dry. It didn't take very long in the sun.

When they were dried, we popped them out of the mold and now we have some awesome sidewalk chalk. The kids thought it was the coolest thing to make themselves. Such a great activity and memory maker.

While we waited for our sidewalk chalk to set up we made sidewalk paint. I used equal parts of cornstarch and water and then added food coloring, stirred until mixed and then gave the kids paint brushes and they made their master pieces.

The sidewalk paint goes on like paint, but then dries like chalk, the kids were pretty fascinated by the change. They had such a great time with this activity, I highly recommend doing this with your kids!

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Summer Activities

I made this bucket quite a few years ago and now it has a couple of different purposes.
The original purpose was a game bucket. I have made several different kinds of game boards for my kids and these are different pieces that can be used for the game boards.


I have seen a lot of boredom buster ideas around and have wanted to use the concept, but in a different way. I don't want my kids to be bored before they use the boredom jar and I want to encourage activity, having fun and making memories. In a couple of posts I have mentioned that I had a little girl that passed away. It has been almost a year and a half since she passed away due to cancer. Going through this experience is probably one of the hardest things that me and my family have ever had to go through, but it has made me cherish my children and has made me want to strive to be a great mom to the kids we still have. So I came up with an idea using my already made bucket. I created activities for my children to do during the summer and put them in the bucket and every day each one of them get to pick out an activity that we get to do that day. I have also made it so if there is an activity that is an all day event I have printed those activities on colored paper and the days we are free we take turns picking out the colored paper. We have had so much fun with this idea, the kids get so excited to pick out of the bucket to see what they get to do that day. And the memories are priceless.

The activities we have already done are:

make a journal - I thought it would be fun for the kids to make a journal and then they can write in it each day about the activities they did that day and I am also going to print out some pictures of the activities so they can put them in the journal also.

Watch a movie with popcorn - we make this really fun we pop popcorn have different kind of treats and then we hand out tickets for the kids to purchase their food. We gather the bean bags and watch our movie. So much fun!

Carnival - We just used stuff we had on hand. I made cupcakes for the cake walk, we did a bean bag toss game using an old bike tire and a hula hoop to throw the bean bags in, we also gave out tickets for this game and they were able to redeem them later during the carnival. We had a fishing game, we have a swing set/playhouse that I hung a sheet over it to create the fishing station. I have a box of little trinkets that we use for various activities, and it was great for the fish pond. Last year I made wands for a fund raiser and have left overs and we used some of those, the kids thought it was great. We also did sand art, I also had this on hand from a previous activity. The carnival didn't cost me anything and took about 15 minutes to set up. The kids had
an absolute ball with it.

Have a dance competition - The kids just love dancing, we really didn't compete, just had fun.

Make a craft with mom - We made book marks.

Help mom plan dinner - My older son got this one and he actually had fun planning dinner with me, he picked what we got to eat - it actually surprised me that he liked this activity.

Eat ice cream or special treat - This one just happened to be picked the same day as the carnival so the cupcakes were the treat.

Go on a candy factory tour - Find things around where you live for the kids to do. This didn't cost us anything to go and the kids loved it, maybe because they get samples along the tour.

Play with sidewalk chalk - This was such a great activity. My kids had so much fun. Tomorrow I will post how to make sidewalk chalk and paint.

Make Play dough

Make Cookies

Run through the sprinklers

The other activities in the bucket are:

Make bubbles, play a board game (or create one), Play hide and Seek, Do an art project, Make finger paint and do an art project, go get ice cream, go on a nature walk, do a service for anyone of your choice, choose your own activity, draw a picture, make nature critters, go bowling, do down town activities, make smores on a stick, go to the park, go to the splash park, go for a hike, make an obstacle course, go to lunch/breakfast, go swimming, go to the mountains, ride the train, go to the zoo, Make play dough cookies, make ice cream sandwiches, go on a scavenger hunt. I have several other activities that are around our area, do what you have available. But most importantly, have fun, make memories and cherish your children.

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picnic

We were asked to do a two place setting for church. This is what we came up with.

Now I have a idea for girls to do for the summer. They can come up with a table setting by selecting their own colors or theme, for two and make a picnic basket to have when they go dating and for later when they are married.