summertime fun cards--cool ways to fill hot days

Today was not the day we expected.

As Maddy's last official day of Kindergarten, our plan was to celebrate! Have fun! Relax! Hang out poolside for a little par-tay with our awesome group of walk-to-school friends.

Instead, we were stuck here at home almost all day, waiting around for the garage-door repairman who came hours late and stayed way too long. Grrrr.

So to pass the time and to put ourselves in a happier place, we brainstormed some cool things we could do with our summer ahead--on days when we were not stuck at home and when we really could celebrate the season.

Don't get me wrong--I am a big fan of letting kiddos roll solo occasionally, so they can figure out ways of occupying time on their own and even experience boredom once in a while (imagine that!). But I do know that summertime is fleeting, and I thought that if we wrote down a few fun activities we wanted to do, maybe we'll be more inclined to set aside time for them.

• Summertime Fun Cards: These fancy-schmancy Summertime Fun Cards began as boring little Index Cards but got all beautified by our big ideas and beautiful pictures.

We started our brainstorming for our Summertime Fun ideas at breakfast, when I said, You know what we have to do this week, since it's the official start of summer? We have to think about all of the fun things we want to do in the three months of summer and write them down so we don't forget. How's that sound? I know I want to eat crabs and go to the Splash Park before summer ends. What do you want to do?

Voila! Cora added a picture of corn on the cob!

We came up with a few really great ideas--Cora mentioned eating dinner at the pool about five times, Owen wanted to golf at the golf course with Daddy, and Maddy was throwing out ideas left and right. She wanted to have play dates, go to the beach, and eat lots of ice-cream.

I wasn't sure how we'd do it, but I knew after our conversation that we had tons of ideas to put somewhere, sometime in the next week or two.

Funny how things work out. As we waited and waited for our repairman to never actually arrive for his scheduled 10 o'clock appointment, I realized we'd be stuck most of the morning waiting for the guy. So we got to work.

I pulled out some Index Cards, and Owen, Cora and I got to work. As they gave me ideas, I wrote them down then passed them along to my two illustrators for some illustrations.

By the time Maddy came home, and our repairman missed his 12:30 newly-revised arrival time (seriously!), we sat back down at the table so that Maddy could add her ideas to the Summertime Fun Cards. She was psyched and came up with some really cool things for us to do.

Some of our Summertime Fun Cards, just hangin' around. . .

We talked about picnics and pool days and day trips and tie-dye. Our mouths watered at the thought of eating crabs, ice-cream, Italian ice, and our favorite pizza. We reminisced about fireworks and fireflies and eating breakfast outside, and we got more excited about the fun summer ahead.

. . . just waiting to be a part of our summer.

Then I punched holes in the card, threaded some yarn through the holes, and hung up our garland of Summertime Fun Cards on our railing--crossing my fingers that Brady won't notice them and eat them for a snack.

And that's it.

I used simple words that the kids would be able to read themselves (Maddy definitely and Owen maybe) and include a picture to support the sentence. Pictures usually help emerging readers work through tough words, and there's nothing wrong with using them.

I'm not sure if we'll just put an 'X' over the card when we complete it or put a smiley face sticker on the card once it's finished--we'll figure it out as we go.

But I do know that the garland is gorgeous. It's full of ideas, and it sure has given us a few things to look forward to in the upcoming summer months!

If you need a starting point, you can download our Summertime Fun Card Ideas to use as inspiration by clicking here. It's not perfect (and I know it's missing the good ole baseball game among other things!), but it's a work in progress. (And we were supposed to be at a pool party when we made it!)

If you think I left a summer must-do/ must-see/ must-have off of our list, please let me know!

And three cheers to summer!