100 Things to Do This Summer

We have entered our second week of summer vacation! Our 100 Things to Do poster is up and we are already beginning to mark our progress with stickers. 

We have kept some old favorites from our previous lists and added a couple new ones. The girls look forward every summer to creating this poster so it has now become one of our family traditions! 

Some of our new additions this year are: 

• Watch Shark Week! Starts Sunday, July 31st. Maybe we will have a repeat Jaws viewing on our Friday Movie Night this week as well.

• Make clothespin mermaid dolls.

• Make crayon "sun" catchers.

• Build a bat house.

• Make monkey bread. We usually make the cinnamon-sugar recipe but there are some other great recipe variations here.

• Letterboxing / Geocaching.

There are some things on our list that will be repeated many times over such as "Ride bikes", "Visit the library", "Eat from our garden", or "Build a fort". 

This poster is a great go-to list for the kids to find inspiration in their summertime. It also gives them a perfect excuse to argue over who gets to mark the next sticker on the list!

What is on my personal summer manifesto? 

• I want to keep the TV off and keep the girls' creativity on by spending time outdoors, playing, drawing, creating, and reading!

• I hope to carve time into each day to read, write, sew, cook and play (both with and without the kids!) 

• Spend time cultivating Sophia's great interest in bugs and butterflies. I think we definitely need a magnifying glass and new bug-catching net (however she does pretty well catching things with her own two hands!) 

• Do a Summer "Spring Cleaning" using the guidelines in the book, Organized Simplicity. I hope to do this for every season. I love the changes I see in my home when I do this detailed purging and cleaning!'

•  Complete ALL 100 Things to Do on our list this summer!!!

What special things do you have 

on your "summer list" this year? 

Beat the Heat for Only $1

Today, another sparkly star was placed on our summer wish list of 100 Fun, Frugal Things to Do!

It was humid outside, with a high temperature settling at 88 degrees, so I told the girls to get their bathing suits on while I filled up a bucket of water balloons!

I had bought 75 water balloons for only one dollar! We saved water by not filling up the wading pool or using the sprinkler (we used water to fill the balloons but it was minimal in comparison) and for the cost of only one dollar it was a great way to cool off on a hot summer day!




*Another fun idea to Beat the Heat for Only $1: visit AMC Theaters to find theaters participating in the Movie Camp. Each Wednesday at 10 a.m., until August 5th, attend a movie for only ONE DOLLAR!

** I was overjoyed to find a link to my 100 Fun, Frugal Things to Do With Kids on the blog, Wise Bread this morning! I was one of the Editor's Picks for the Carnival of Pecuniary Delights: Sweet 16 Edition! Yea!

*** Another note: Only one day left to enter to win 2 great sustainably sourced products from Ecostore USA!

Make Necklaces from Cereal O's

Yesterday, on another impossibly beautiful day, we made necklaces outside using a very thin ribbon that I dug out of my craft supplies and some brightly colored cereal O's.

The girls exclaimed they had "SO MUCH FUN!" making the necklaces!




Behind Gracie's scrunched up face are cheeks full of O's.


And then they proudly wore their cereal necklaces for about 10 minutes...before they were devoured!


*If you haven't already, enter the giveaway from Ecostore USA to win 2 of their sustainably sourced plant and mineral based products!

It is my first sponsored giveaway and I would love for it to be a success!*

Homemade Play Dough Recipe

As part of our list of 100 Fun, Frugal Things to Do This Summer, we made a batch of homemade play dough!

The girls took their handfuls of brightly colored dough to the deck where they cut, twisted and molded their clay into whatever their imaginations desired!

Making only the one batch, I divided it into three large handfuls which I colored red, blue and yellow. This allowed me to sneak in a lesson of mixing primary colors! Wonderful!

Here is a fantastic recipe for Homemade Play Dough that was kindly passed along by my Mom. With 7 children of her own, she has gone through her fair share of "play dough" recipes. I would agree this one is definitely the best!

Easy to make and mold, can be stored in the refrigerator in a ziploc bag or container and is edible (however not very tasty as Isabella unfortunately found out)!

Click on the recipe below to enlarge for printing purposes! ENJOY!

100 Fun, Frugal Things to Do With the Kids

I thought our Summer Wish List was in need of a re-haul after reading this post by The Inspired Room.

I bought a big sky blue sheet of poster board, printed and cut out all the activities, then arranged and glued them on!

We will put silver glittery stars in the boxes to mark all the fun things we do!

Here is a list that we hope to complete by the end of the summer!

1. Swim in Grandma’s pool
2. Have a picnic
3. Outdoor movie
4. Get a treat from the Ice Cream truck
5. Go to the beach
6. Play baseball
7. Swim in the lake
8. Go to the mountains
9. Visit a yard sale/ flea market.
10. Go to the library
11. Fly kites
12. Play in the rain
13. Camp in the backyard
14. Keep summer journals
15. Sleepover party
16. Blow bubbles
17. Eat veggies from our garden
18. Make your own pizza night
19. Sunday Sundaes
20. Ride bikes
21. "Kids Make Dinner" night
22. Press flowers
23. Visit a national park
24. Make s’mores
25. Go to the playground
26. Make smoothies
27. Chase butterflies
28. Catch fireflies
29. Bake cookies
30. Invent a new dance routine
31. Wii Sports Family Tournament
32. Build a sandcastle
33. Tie Dye!
34. Make homemade butter
35. Create a blanket fort
36. Play frisbee
37. Write haikus
38. Visit a museum
39. Decorate the sidewalk with chalk
40. Fill our summer reading journal
41. Send packages to grandparents
42. Make pet rocks
43. Learn a new card game
44. Make popsicles
45. Play hopscotch
46. Sleep downstairs
47. Learn a magic trick (or 2)
48. Make cereal necklaces
49. Have a water fight!
50. Learn some knock knock jokes
51. Play flashlight tag
52. Make homemade snow cones
53. Read a chapter book together
54. Homemade play dough
55. Watch a children Anime movie
56. Go berry picking
57. Family Game night
58. Leaf printing
59. Make a birdbath (to bird watch)
60. Mini book from 1 sheet of paper
61. Learn about clouds
62. Make our own bookmarks
63. Find summer constellations
64. Make boxes out of popsicle sticks
65. Roller skate
66. Finger paint
67. Do a science experiment
68. Take a walk
69. Pop popcorn on the stove
70. Invent a new ice cream
71. Do a 500 piece puzzle
72. Have an Alice in Wonderland tea party
73. Make ice cream in a can
74. Watch Shelley Duvall’s Faerie Tale Theatres
75. Make a giant “spider web” from yarn
76. Host a yard sale
77. Free Bowling
78. Watch a meteor shower (Aug 12,13th Perseids)
79. Play restaurant
80. Muffin week
81. Make brownies
82. Watch fireworks
83. Ride scooters
84. Paint a picture
85. Create ATC’s to hand out to friends
86. Do yoga with Mom
87. Make a friendship bracelet
88. Handwrite a letter to a friend
89. Play hide and seek
90. Wash the car with Dad
91. Decorate a pair of flip flops
92. Create pictures with colored pasta
93. Make our own stamps
94. Make magnets
95. Eat breakfast for dinner
96. BINGO night
97. Attend an outdoor concert
98. Learn origami
99. Make chocolate dipped frozen bananas
100. Have the best summer ever!

Weekly Agenda

I have been a bit off-kilter this past week. Two weeks of school vacation can do that, I suppose. We have not found our rhythm yet but we are getting there.

I have been writing down goals and preparing for the weeks ahead! So, I am hoping for a fun (and mildly organized) July and August!

Here's what is on our to-do list for the week:


It has been ridiculously rainy this past week so we haven't been out to water the vegetable garden. We were surprised to see how big our plants have grown!!

We will be keeping a close eye on these yellow flowers that will sprout zucchini soon! We have tomatoes and cucumbers, also! Yum!


My poor sock monkey is need of some serious repair after all the love the twins have been giving him lately.

Once I send the girls' on a treasure hunt for his other arm, I hope to stitch him as close to new as possible. However, considering my hand-sewing skills, he may not stay fixed for long.

Yogurt smoothie anyone? This is a staple in our house during the summertime!

Today, with a desperate need of a trip to the grocery store, I threw in whatever remained in our refrigerator.

This was the instant tasty concoction:

-One 32 oz container of low-fat vanilla yogurt, about 1/2 cup frozen blueberries and 1 cup of frozen peaches, blend and serve!

*We used both organic yogurt and frozen fruit.

*Tip* If you are searching for organic fruits, buying them frozen can be less costly per pound and perfect for making frozen yogurt smoothies or milkshakes!



I also want to bake more of this delectable bread this week!

This was my first attempt using the Master Recipe from the book, Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day: The Discovery That Revolutionizes Home Baking, that I stole borrowed from my mom!

This bread is too good! I have become hopelessly addicted to this delicious sourdough bread and I am not sure I can (or want to) be saved!

The Master Recipe makes 4 loaves each time you make it and it stores wonderfully in the refrigerator in a lidded container until you are ready to bake.

I was "ready to bake" every day this past week and I went through 4 loaves of the free-form loaves pictured above, 2 baguettes and I gifted two loaves of Ciabatta to my Mom.

You can read more about this book over at Baker's Banter, a blog by King Arthur Flour.

Oh, and if you are looking for another perfect bread to bake, this has been a "no-fail" recipe for us: *Harvest Grains Bread*.

I was also inspired to revamp our Summer Wish List from a post I read on The Inspired Room.

I plan to make something more creative (than our current one) with glittery stickers to mark our progress! And, if it involves glitter...it's sure to be great! Right?

I hope to post our new and improved list later this week!

Happy Monday, everyone!