INSPIRE CREATIVITY

Inspiring creativity in your children during summer vacation can be challenging. Our family is a lucky one, I will be the first to admit. With Jeff and I both working for the school district, we all have the summer together. Like some may believe, however, this is not just one big vacation. As teachers, we continue with the desire to inspire, and Zoe and Max make it challenging. They fight and argue, they get bored and stir crazy. It has been the busiest year of my entire life, and this summer I have vowed to stay busy, but in a mommy-kind-of-way!

I used to do it all the time with the child-care, and sometimes I forget that my own two kids love to create and play too. Now that I’ve got the house semi straightened up and break is underway, I was able to set up a few areas in the house to spark some interest. Maybe I'll have more inspiration to share with you as the summer goes on.

PROMPT THE THINKING
On the chalkboard supply closet door in the kitchen, I’ve simply written, “Tell me what you want to do this summer?” along with a couple of my own suggestions. I think the kids caught on fairly quickly. Zoe has a huge list going. She wants to play tennis with daddy at least once a week, practice her art, fill up the chalk board, and get a new dresser (hmmmm... sneaking in some wishes there). Max's cutest suggestion is, "Go to the Redwoods" which are hours from us in California. He learned about them in school? or a book?, and wants to go! I guess we'll cross them off as they are accomplished, and add to the list for awhile. I'll read Max a great story or two about the Redwood Forest and maybe share some pictures from when I went as a child (Mom, Dad? wanna send me some?) and then everyone will feel a sense of accomplishment.

NOTHING BETTER THAN A GREAT BOOK
Between the book fair at the end of the school year, and the last two Scholastic book orders, I’ve got several new books laying around the house. We’ve got poetry by Jack Prelutsky, bird identification and bird call audio books, and a new series of books that I just discovered called “Kids are Authors” books by Scholastic. I bought four of them, although I believe there are many more. These books were written and illustrated by one classroom of students as a yearly contest through Scholastic, and they even get their photo published in the book. They’re FANTASTIC! Check them out! I can imagine that Max (and maybe even Zoe) will be writing and illustrating several stories this summer (Thanks Jill, you started it!)

I’m leaving a few other books out laying around this summer, in hopes that the kids will pick one up and say, “Hey Mom...can we do this?”

Kid Concoctions book

Family Fun Crafts (a favorite for several years now)

Usborne Children’s World Cookbook

Daring Girl and Dangerous Boy books that we gave the kids for Christmas. I know that Zoe has been reading hers because when we were out in the canoe the other day we found a large feather (a Bald Eagle or maybe an Osprey) and Zoe brought it home and whittled it into a quill for writing with (now to get the ink for her).

START SOME ART
If you love to create, check out Family Fun magazine. I've always loved the ideas from this magazine, and I hate the fact that my kids are getting older and not as interested in the ideas that I pull from this awesome resource. I am a sucker for arts, crafts, supplies, and books related to creating. Over the years we've collected some wonderful items; paper airplane books, origami books, fingerprint books (by Ed Emberley, he's the greatest!), and watercolor crayons and pencils, color changing markers, rubber stamps, ink pads, shrinky dinks (who does not love shrinky dinks?), play dough, moon sand, oh, I could go on and on. Anyway, I've pulled out some of the Easter Bunny and Santa's latest gifts and put them in a basket on the table, easily accessible, and ready to be used (and they already have several times since yesterday). I plan to rotate the items in the basket throughout the summer, as I have plenty to fill it. Thank you Santa!

I found the coolest gadget at the dollar store today. It’s a giant chalk compass! We recently bought some 3D Crayola chalk and glasses (Max’s B-day money spending), and Max got some glow in the dark chalk from Louis’ B-day party the other day, so I believe we are set and ready to go in the pati-walk decorating (Aidan dear, I’ll never forget your new word). Here are a couple pictures of the kids playing with their chalk. I tried to get a good photo of the 3D chalk by taking a photo looking through the glasses, but if did not do the drawings justice. It is awesome. The red (hot) colors are up high and the blue (cool) colors are low. The kids were having a blast making obstacle courses for each other and trying to walk around them.

BRING THE OUTDOORS IN
When we had the daycare going, we always had some kind of critters in the house. One year we raised butterflies, and then after they hatched and laid eggs we ended up with another 30+ caterpillars that then turned into butterflies. We had a blast letting them all go.

Ladybugs are fun to raise. Do you know what a ladybug larvae looks like? Do ya? They are strange indeed. I love this site. It is called "What's that bug" and if you search on my name in google, you'll find a picture of my finger pointing at a strange bug that we found in the house one day. It was an assassin bug which I promptly let go in the garage (it was one of those good bugs). Anyway, maybe they can explain the whole Lady Bug Larvae to you a little better than I can. Click HERE.

I bet you’ve seen one of the strange fellows on you at sometime in your life and brushed it off like it was some creepy alligator critter, but hey, they do a lot of good in the garden. Gather a few, give them a leaf or two from the garden that are covered in aphids, and they will eat until they are too fat to move. Then…they will form cocoons, rest for a few days, and hatch as a ladybug. I’ve had nothing but success with this activity. We kept ours in a hanging insect bag, but any air ventilated container would work.

Have a great weekend everyone!