Keeping Kids Busy This Summer

I am not the world's best expert when it comes to keeping kids busy during the hot summer months, but my mother, Janis is. She's been parenting for decades and can make you behave just by raising her eyebrow. She is a highly sought after babysitter because she knows what works.

I phoned Mom and asked some questions about time tested tips for keeping children occupied that do not involve duct tape. While she admitted that she's been sorely tempted to resort to duct tape she was happy to provide some suggestions.

Here they are in no particular order; some are better suited to older children.

1. Cooking: Assign the planning, cooking and clean up of one meal each day to a child. For example one child gets breakfast and another gets lunch. You could also pair 2 children to one meal.

2. Go for walks and bike rides; good exercise for Mom and children.

3. Create a "job jar" and fill it with jobs the children can do on their own. Each time a child whines about being bored, have them choose a job and complete it satisfactorily. They will stop whining very soon. (This worked SUPER on us kids:)

4. Start a bug and/or leaf project. Have the kids collect as many different kind of bugs/leaves as they can. The leaves can be pressed between waxed paper. This will keep them busy for hours. Of course you will be admiring more bugs than you ever though possible.

5. Garden Have each child create their own "mini" garden inside your bigger garden. They will get a tremendous sense of ownership and really rise to the occasion by wanting to take good care of it and eat all the produce. They may even show entrepreneurial skills by trying to sell the produce! (This also worked great for us kids; almost all of us are gardening nuts, now)

6. Backyard camping & picnicking Have the children plan a picnic in the back yard and make all the sandwiches and kool aide. They can even camp out.

7. Digging This sounds really simple; but I LOVED this. Give the smaller kids lots of good things to dig with and let them go to town. They will spend an hour just trying to reach China.

8. Have the kids play very hard physically. They will be wiped out after dinnertime.

9. Puzzles and books for those that just can't be coaxed into tearing around.

10. Build Tipi's in the back yard. This is my suggestion; I brought it up and Mom laughed and laughed. She probably didn't mention because she was so traumatized by us kids dragging all of her blankets and garden implements all over the yard. We had covert operations to sneak, just one more blanket or her belt to hold all the rakes together. There were many sad evenings when the Tipi had to be taken down so we could have blankets and sheets for our beds that night.

Have a fun filled summer!