Are you at a loss for ways to keep the kids entertained? Don’t let the summertime blues depress your family. Numerous thrilling activities will keep kids entertained and active for hours.
Free Summer Holiday Planner is a paid collaborative post with Very designed to showcase their range of printers. Summer holidays, you either love them or hate them. Over the years I have veered from one camp to the other and the longer my children have spent in school the more I have come to love the time off over summer. However, I have one child that loves school routine and that is where the summer holiday planner came from.
Water sports are a great way to have fun, stay active, and get outdoors. Whether you’re looking for something to do on your own or with family and friends, there is no shortage of water activities for you and the kids to enjoy! From swimming to kayaking, paddleboarding to surfing – the possibilities are endless! We’ll look at some of the most popular water sports suitable for both children and adults. So whether you’re keen to explore new waters or just want an exciting activity in which you can make memories with loved ones – this list of fun water sports has something for everyone!
We wote the event and date on one side and then they boys drew an image to represent the time on the other. This is Maxi’s airplane. We used Glotto Metallic Pens, which we received from YellowMoon. They are brilliant on the stones and really stand out. We are keeping our stones in a kilner jar, one for each of the boys and I hope to have two full jars at the end of the holidays, so I can varnish them and place them in the garden.
These Free Summer Holiday Activities are perfect for helping your budget stretch over the summer and also show that you can have lots of fun without splashing out all the cash. Summer holidays can be expensive for parents and carers and it can be hard to say no to things that the kids want or want to do, but I have some great free things to do in the summer holidays with kids and tips to make your money go further.
Create a memorable and fun summer with your children using our free summer bucket list template. This Summer bucket list has been so popular we created a second one with activities for you and also a blank one for your family to create your personalised summer bucket list.
Over 101 Ideas for Summer Activities for Teenagers is a paid collaboration with Goodfella’s Romano Pizza. As my boys are getting older I am finding that keeping them entertained over the summer is getting more expensive and it appears that I am not alone in finding it pricey, A study by Goodfella’s Pizza discovered that during the six weeks summer holiday parents spend an average of £127 a child to stop their offspring becoming bored. “I’m Bored” is one of the phrases that I have banned here, in fact over the years I have used it to my advantage with our Bored Jars. So I have partnered up with Goodfellas and their […]
Summer holidays, you either love them or hate them. I am never sure about which camp I am in. I love spending time with the children but do worry about the cost of summer activities. I relish not having to get up each morning and giving up the school routine, but I don’t like hearing the words “I’m Bored” That is why I came up with the bored jar (about four years ago).
One of the things that my boys love the most is water play, and summer is the perfect time to have some water fun as a family. The summer is all about making memories and I am working with fab® ice lollies for their Sprinkles of Summer Fun campaign.
Just because we are having a free range summer, it doesn’t mean that we can not plan some activities and ideas for things that we want to do as a family. I was inspired by Frugal Family’s post on how they plan their summer holidays to share how we plan ours.
So this morning we all sat at breakfast and decided on things that we wanted to read, do, make and places we wanted to go. I sat and wrote them all out on Post-it Super Sticky Notes from 3M . The boys would have had we had more time and will any additional ones!
We used a different colour for each of the activities and then used some lovely heart ones for major things and day trips we are planning.
Our list this year is wonderful and wide ranging and includes:
Visiting lots of different parks – We tend to take a picnic with us.
Visiting local museums and art galleries – I tend to tie this into times when they have free activity sessions on. Your local council is a great source of information on this.
Woodland centres and forests. The Forestry Commision has an enchanted wood at Dalby Forest with a magical adventure play area with a fort, storytelling seats and carved insects hiding in the trees. They also have some great free fairytale activity sheets and ideas too. The woodland trust also has a great Nature Detective website with over 150 ideas for free things to do.
Visit the cinema and bowling alley. We always make sure we look out for great deals and this summer Cineworld have some great family deals, which I featured on A Thrifty Mum.
Outdoor play – including cricket, football, rounders, minibeast hunting, camping out in the garden, playing with friends, cycling, scootering and having their own olympic games.
Making and baking – I always encourage the boys to be as creative as possible and this summer they are going to make their own cakes, pizza, biscuits and picnics. They also want to make a windchime, birdfeeders and dream catchers. I think that it is always fun to collect items from your trips to places and use them in your crafting, such as shells and pebbles from the beach, which can make rock monsters and memory stones.
Thank you to Post-it Super Sticky Note for provided me with lots of Post-it Super Sticky Notes to write our activities on. Did you know that they are so sticky that they are going to cover a London Taxi in them and drive it around London to prove it. You can get your name on a Post-it Super Sticky Note, that will then be stuck on the Taxi by visiting their Facebook Page www.facebook.com/PostitUK. My name will be on the Taxi! Six people will be invited to remove a note off the taxi and if your name is on it then you would be a winner.
Do the summer holidays fill you with dread? Do you worry about keeping your children occupied without spending a fortune? Do you dread the words “i I am bored”? Or worry about the very English summer we are having? If so I can help you!
I took the boys to school this morning, which calls for a celebration in itself. But I was shocked to hear the amount of parents bemoaning the holidays and saying “roll on September”, even more so as there children could hear them say this. I appreicate not everyonbe enjoys the holiday time as much as I do, but really why would you be so misaerable to spend time with your children. I judt don’t understand why people would have children if they didnt like spending time with them.
Today was in inset day (teacher training) at MaxiMads school, so MadDad took the day off and we exchanged some Tesco Club Card points for vouchers and decided to go Flamingo Land for the day, hoping that the fact that the children were all back at school and that it wasn’t a weekend would mean shorter queues. We woke up and the sun was shinning, so I packed a picnic, towel and a spare set of clothes for the minimads and we set off. We arrived at 10am and were only about the 40 car in the car park. The boys were very excited and jumped on to the first ride they saw, the […]
I picked up a chocolate coin maker from Marks and Spencer in the January sale for £1.50 and have had it in the cupboard since then, well me and the mini’s had our first attempt at making our own coins. You can only make four at one go and need to use cooking chocolate, but it was great, if not messy fun. MaxiMad melted the chocolate in the microwave and then poured it in to the four moulds that we have. I then popped them in the fridge to set, whilst the two of them licked clean the jug!! Once they were set, we took them out of the moulds (we […]
We have tried to make the most of today, as the Mini’s are pretty much over their virus (poss swine flu). The day started with nude wii (only the boys of course – I would scare the neighbours) So we have been to the supermarket, been to the park on the way home. Called at the opticians to pick up MiniMads new glasses. An ice cream with monkey blood and sprinkles (raspberry sauce to the uninitiated), whilst I unpacked all the shopping. Magic painting, I do have more than one book, but both boys wanted to do the Backyardigans, so they shared and they shared really well. Whilst the boys painted, […]
As both the boys are still not fully recovered from what we think might be swine flu, but also just may be a nasty virus, they are not allowed out of the house and are getting a little stir crazy. Even the garden was out of bounds for most of today due to torrential downpours, so I decided to do a really simple art project with them. I took a candle and drew a picture (very simple picture, as I am no artist) on to some paper and then gave them free rein with the water colour blocks. They loved seeing what was coming out, although they did have a tendency […]
One of my Friends mentioned that they had used blackboard paint on the door of their playhouse and I had a light bulb moment – ding! We used the boys birthday moneys last year to get them a playhouse and at the time painted it in two shades of green as they had requested. I also knew that we had a tub of bright blue chalkboard paint that we had used to paint the top of the small table in their bedroom, so we all set about sprucing up the playhouse. MadDad gave the whole of the house another coat of the protective paint, I painted the door and the two […]
Me and the boys went to Danby Village Show this afternoon with friends and had a great time. It is a traditional agricultural show and very popular, as it is set in the beautiful North Yorkshire Moors National Park and Danby is a lovely village. It was made all the nicer as the sun continued to shine. The main event was the appearance of the Glaisdale Fox hounds in the main arena and I was really surprised by Maxi Mad as he stroked one of the Fox Hounds (he is scared of dogs). This pack has established since 1877 and now hunt within the grounds of the law. The boys loved […]
Today was another raining British summer day today, so we decided to paint some stones that we collected the other weekend at the beach. The minimads have been examining bugs and lady birds lately in the garden, so I thought we could make our own colourful stone bugs. This was a really easy activity for them and they both wishes we had collected more, so we will next time and I will varnish them and we can give them as presents to family. They basically painted them in poster paint of their chosen colour and then let them dry. Then they did the detailing and stuck on googly eyes. They turned […]
MaxiMad has wanted to make skittles from drinks bottles for a while, so we started collecting the bottles (thanks Grandma) and once we had 15 we decided to make a start. I knew it was going to be a long and messy project so was prepared for this and PVA’d the bottles, so that the paint would stick. The boys decided to do a first coat of white paint, so I added a little PVA to the mix and let them slap it on. That took a day to dry. I then added another coat overnight, to fill in any gaps. Today we decided to paint the bottles in bright […]
