Thanks for the birthday wishes! I didn’t end up knitting because I forgot that all of my knitting books and magazines are still packed somewhere, and I need the lace book to do the daisy pattern on the scarf. So much for that. But we weren’t home much anyway.
It’s incredibly dark outside. I just heard that it’s supposed to rain all week and all weekend. As in, Memorial Day weekend, when we are planning our big camping trip. I’m very aggravated.
I had a good idea, or at least what I think will be a good idea for an activity with the kids when summer vacation starts. We inherited an old picnic table in the move. I’m going to examine it, and if the wood is sound, I think the kids and I are going to sand and paint it. It’ll doubtless be a messy project, but they’ll really enjoy it and it’ll get something done that needs to be done. Plus, I’m hoping it’ll stave off Olivia’s inevitable summer boredom for a few days.
I’m compiling a list of ideas to make this summer productive and fun. Abigail and Veronica are frequently content to entertain themselves with what we have here at home, but Olivia seems incapable of it.
And now, I’m going shopping before the rain comes in for the week because I’d much rather be home watching the rain when it hits than out running errands with kids.
May 22nd, 2006 at 5:29 am
Really? That’s going to be a bummer; I was really hoping we’d have a sunny 3-day weekend. Sorry, I forgot to grab the yarn label this morning, so I’ll have to email it to you later.
As for activities, well…books books and then more books, making and then flying a kite (no, I am being serious), having her own little mini garden to watch, etc., books on animals/bugs/plants for her to look around for, books, watercolors/sidewalk chalk. Have you gone to your local library? They usually have summer activities for kids, plus, I think every library in the US does some sort of reading challenge for the summer. (No, I’m not biased at ALL with what I’d be doing if I had a free summer.) Or what about your Church? Are they having summer programs she’d do?
May 22nd, 2006 at 5:43 am
Yay for rain! It’s rainy here too on the Canadian long weekend. I’d be mad that my beach day got cancelled, except that I just found out I’m going to Redmond tomorrow to pick up my new spinning wheel!
The rain can go on forever. I’ll just spin the time away.
May 22nd, 2006 at 7:15 am
Claire from http://www.loobylu.com/ has started a new blog named Kiddley, where she presents activity ideas for kids. You can find the link on her blog. Unfortunately, I can?t open the site right now. There seems to be some problem. But maybe you just try tomorrow.
May 22nd, 2006 at 8:11 am
I hope you dodged the rain. I walked out of Safeway in Yelm and got soaked putting the groceries in the trunk. Then I had a nice damp ride back to Eatonville. Stay dry – and find that knitting stuff!
May 22nd, 2006 at 8:49 am
Another good reason to have year-round school. 🙂 Are you guys going to that letter-boxing thing again? (Is that what it was called? I mean the neato hunt for the hidden stamp thing…)
May 22nd, 2006 at 1:34 pm
Do you know the book Mudworks: Creative Clay, Dough, and Modeling Experience by MaryAnn Kohl? Some of the recipes are cooked; some aren’t. Almost all use ordinary kitchen ingredients?flour, salt, cornstarch, cooking oil.
Get that picnic table painted and you’d have a perfect place to do play dough because the kind with cooking oil is greasy and you don’t want it on good furniture.
When I did with kids in third grade, it was a great incentive for them to scrub their desks since they decided that was easier than putting a paper down.
May 22nd, 2006 at 8:07 pm
hi, its the same like here in germany, we had some sunny days at the first week in may but now it is rainy and cold and the forcast said it will stay as worst as now! Its a chance to look for a new knitting projekt for these days and hope my daughters will be rainy-relaxed.
May 23rd, 2006 at 2:39 am
Hi Laura, Something that kept my busy girl occupied for part of every day at that age was checking how many caterpillars were in her butterfly feeding garden. Dill, parsley, and milkweed plants will attract butterflies to lay eggs on them (those are food plants for 3 different varieties) and the caterpillars make for great summer fun. They will all 3 learn a lot about butterflies. We would watch and when the caterpillars get big, We would cut some limbs of our food plants and put them in water inside a butterfly “pavilion”, and watch them make chrysalis, then see the butterfly emerge, then release it. great fun!