How I am a Stay at Home Mom: Cheap Summer Fun

I see moms and kids all the time talking about being bored in the summer and I cannot understand why. We have a very small entertainment budget and are still able to go on weekly summer adventures. Here are some ideas for keeping your summer fun:

1. Utilize local resources. We live in a small East Tennessee town and there are tons of things available, even to us! A neighboring town has a park called the Splash Pad that is free to attend. My boys are happier to spend the day there than at any expensive park.

 

We also have a local pool that only costs $3 per adult and kids are free with a paying adult.

 

Local parks and rec websites are great ways to find out what is available in your area.

The library is also a great way to find fun, and generally free, activities. Our library has a summer reading program that my boys love, offering a special guest one day a week and an awesome closing program with fun and games.

They also recently hosted a Touch-a-Truck event with all kinds of trucks for the kids to check out.









Our library also sponsored a Kiddie Car Show which my preschooler loved! He also won the "Best Super Hero Car" award, so that was pretty much the highlight of his life.

 

On Wednesdays, our area offers a local farmer's market. It is a fun way to get some healthy snacks and check out some homemade and home-grown items.

 

2. Create your own fun! On a rainy day, I decided to pirate-theme the day. My preschooler had so much fun and it cost me no money and very minimal effort. You can read more about it here.

We also use our water hose to create lots of fun. We bought a very inexpensive Slip N Slide, though any piece of plastic would be fine (think $2 plastic painting cover). These kiddos would literally spend hours every day playing on this piece of wet plastic. They also add dish soap for extra slippery fun.






For one of the girls' birthdays, we did an at home spa day. They loved soaking their feet in the tub and painting each others' nails and I used stuff we already had at home.




3. Be responsible when you do plan costly adventures. Look for Groupons or similar deals. My husband and I recently purchased a local coupon deal for a dinner theatre for the two of us for $25. It was something fun and different to do and we could not have purchased dinner and a show for that price otherwise. I also got a Groupon for Yo Gabba Gabba Live! We would not have been able to afford this show regularly, but the Groupon cut the price to less than half, so it made it affordable.

Also, if you are planning a trip to an amusement park or similar place, check out their calendar before you go. We took a trip to Tweetsie Railroad while they were hosting "A Day Out With Thomas." For the price of admission, we also got extra Thomas events and a ride on Thomas the train.

Our local race track hosted an event that was both rally cross and monster trucks, so for $20, we got four hours of nonstop car action. It was a fun way to take the boys to the race without spending $100 per ticket.

4. Explore nature! We are blessed to be surrounded by some amazing nature where we live. My preschooler went fishing for the first time this summer. We are lucky enough to have friends who own a house boat, but you can find a fishing spot anywhere! Laws vary in different states, but in Tennessee, fishing is free until age 15. This was a great way to spend a day and only cost a can of corn.

 

 

Camping is another fun and inexpensive way to spend a summer day. Since we have a nine month old, we decided to venture into the backyard and do a little camping at home. The boys made a fire and smore's and it was a memorable and inexpensive adventure.

 

I have posted before about gardening, but it is a great way to learn about the food we eat and spend time outside together. The girls love to pick the peaches from the tree in the backyard and then be creative with ways to cook them.

 

 

 

5. Look for local businesses hosting events. Chick-fil-a always has awesome events for families. You can find a calendar of events on their website. This summer we attended their Mother-Son Date Knight and for the price of dinner at Chick-fil-a, we got to do family activities and pictures tableside and the boys got to joust in their free inflatable. They also hosted a Super Hero event, where kids got free kids meals for dressing like a Super Hero. Earth Fare and several other local restaurants have weekly kids events, so checking them out can be an inexpensive way to feed those hungry babies after a long day.

 

I hope my ideas help you create new adventures for your family this summer!

Adventures in Preschool: Arrrgh! It's Pirate Day!

We have been so busy this summer, I haven't posted any of our fun-ness lately, but I couldn't resist sharing our pirate morning adventure! I knew today was going to be a rainy, boring day, so I thought I would create a little pirate magic. 

When he first woke up, I had a pirate ship and a pirate cup sitting beside the potty, along with his pirate clothes.

 

We had a pirate sword and hat in the dress up box, but no telescope, so we made one! I just let him color a piece of construction paper (he chose to draw a pirate ship), rolled it up and wrapped it with tape. I know this is so simple, but he seriously has carried this thing around all day looking at stuff.

 

 

He was then greeted in the dining room by pirate books. This was a great opportunity to read and learn, not only about pirates, but also about the ocean they sailed. We talked about what pirates did and what they ate- which was a great segway to pirate lunch!

 

This happy little cutie loved his skull and crossbones and pirate hat sandwich. I used cookie cutters purchased for a pirate birthday party a couple years ago and he thought it was awesome.

We ended our pirate morning with a treasure hunt. Since we are working on letters, I just had him find all the things he could that started with C. 

 

 This was such a fun morning, doing thing we normally do, but with a pirate twist. And did I mention that it didn't cost anything? Arrgh! Now, that's a good adventure, mateys.

Adventures in Preschool: Shaving Cream!

I read this article not too long ago and it made me really want to try and work more sensory play into our days. You can read about our first experiment here.

Our sensory experiment today was playing in shaving cream. I used his little picnic table and just squirted the cream directly on it. After we were done, he loved spraying himself and the table off with the water hose, so this was a completely mom-free experiment. I have oodles of shaving cream in my coupon stash, so this was like a 25 cent project and he played with it for over an hour. I got to mop my floor, people! For 25 cents! Anyway, he really loved it and it was tons of fun to hear him giggling while I mopped.

Adventures in Preschool: Our Easter projects

My oldest just turned three and I am loving him being old enough to do fun stuff! I wanted to share our Easter projects with you.

 

I think my husband and I almost had as much fun as my toddler coloring eggs. When we were dating we always did fun holiday stuff and as married people, it is important to me that we still have fun together! These are our favorites:

 

This year, I found that coloring eggs does not last near enough time for a three year old. Plunking two dozen eggs into the dye and pulling them back out took him about ten minutes and he was ready for more! I was frustrated because it took me longer to put out the newspapers and get the dyes ready than it did for him to color them all. So, in saying that, I decided to let him also color the eggs I was going to use for Easter dinner. It really prolonged the experience because it took a little more soaking to get them colored (so we had a little lesson in patience) and he was happy to sticker the shell-on eggs while the peeled eggs were soaking. It was super fun and the next day it was fun for him to show everyone how he contributed to dinner.

 

 

I also loved this idea from one of my friends. They used a whisk to let the little ones color eggs and I just thought that was so cool (and much less messy!). We are definitely trying that next year!

 

 

 

This next project was not as three-year-old-friendly, but we happened to have some older friends on Spring Break this week to help out. I started this project by cutting wreath-size circles out of cardboard boxes. I then let them hot glue Easter grass on. Then we used foam shapes and glitter pens to decorate plastic eggs. They were then attached to the grass with hot glue. Lastly, I used a knife to cut the middle of the wreath out and attached ribbon at the top for hanging. This was a great project that they worked on for a couple of hours.

 

 

 

Lastly, I wanted to share our Easter bunny cake. There are lots of different ways to do this, but this one is just freestyled. My toddler is really into eating the legs, nose, arms, etc. off of his animal crackers and/or other assorted creature-shaped foods, so he especially thought it was fun. It made for such a fun centerpiece for the food table and was delicious to eat.

 

 

Happy Easter!

 

Adventures in Preschool: Conversation Heart Alphabet

I found these conversation hearts on clearance after Valentine's Day for .25.

 

After letting my little one color some, I wrote a letter on each one. I then let him sort them, put them in order and try spelling words. It was such an inexpensive and easy learning adventure!

Adventures in Preschool: Sensory birdseed experiment

I have decided to do some at-home preschool with my three year old. I am so excited to try new things with him and watch him learn and grow through adventures together! This is the first post about our new adventure and  I promise many many more!

Today I used a bucket of birdseed and threw in some dollar store lizards. These babies loved using slotted spoons to search for the lizards! It was a great sensory experience. It was also a great learning tool as I asked questions along the way (Where is the blue lizard?, How many lizards did you find?, etc.). They had so much fun and it took two minutes to prep!