1. You are what you eat!
Start a summer garden and allow the kiddos to help out by choosing what to plant and making sure they have assigned tasks throughout the growing process. Too much work? Locate a pick your own farm instead!
2. Play tourist!
All of those attractions that allure to visitors to your town, is now your destination! Hit up the monuments, mountains, or government buildings that appeal to tourists!
3. Feed the wildlife!
Make a trip to the closest zoo and/or aquarium to see exotic species of animals and saline. Use this as an educational opportunity by explaining the habitats and origins of each animal.
4. Strike it out!
Enjoy some summer sports by going bowling or to a batting range and throw/hit some balls around.
5. Get wet!
Visit a nearby beach, lake, river, pool, water park, or turn on the sprinklers and have some fun cooling off!
6. Ice, ice, baby!
Another way to beat the heat, go ice skating! Don’t forget to dress for the cold temps in the rink or bring along a sweatshirt.
7. Sleep under the stars.
Head to the hills and go camping or stay close to home and set up the tent in your backyard. . Once you’re outside, lock up the house so no one’s tempted to go back to the comforts of home
8. Ride like the wind!
Head to a nearby theme parks, miniature golf course, or go kart track and have fun riding the rides, playing games, and competing against each other in your own head-to-head challenges.
9. Picnic at the park.
Pack a blanket and head to your nearest park or scenic point and enjoy dining al fresco. To add some more excitement, theme your food to a particular destination such as Italy or China.
10. Catch a show!
Have a movie night and allow the kids to set the mood for the evening. Let them choose the movie and the snacks – buy some boxes of candy for a real theater feel or bake some treats together earlier in the day!
Need more ideas? Your city’s alternative newspaper is a great a resource for free family events in your area.
About the author:
Kelly is a type-a-mom in Texas. She’s a 28 year old, married, stay-at-home mom to a very active 2 year old (born 9 weeks premature). Her days are filled with diapers and sippy cups and tantrums and songs and Sesame Street and she loves every minute of it. Her blog is described as the ramblings of a stay-at-home mom on family, finances, fitness, and trying to lead a green life in Texas.
Great tips. We do many activities and things around our home. We have to nowadays with gas prices.
These are great tips! We plan on spending a lot of time at our town the lake this year. Though I am slightly terrified of handling 4 kids by myself at the lake.
🙂
Thanks for letting me guest post, Annie!
What a great bunch of summer ideas, and most of them are fairly simple and budget friendly. Love that!
I love all of these ideas. My family never had much money when I was growing up and we always did things like this and I have the best memories of it. Mini-golf was my favorite!