Our "Summer To Do List"

Last year we made a list of activities we wanted to do over the summer months and hung it on the fridge. We did everything except going to the zoo, but have since decided that is a fall thing because the animals are less lazy then (as are the people walking around!). I just finished making our list for this summer (yes, I know it is the end of June, but living in Oregon, true summer is just starting! And I have until September until the kids return to school).

I figured I would share our list in case anyone else is in need of family fun ideas. A lot of these would make great date ideas as well! I have seen some super fancy ways to display such "bucket lists" on Pinterest, but ours just goes on colored paper, and each item on a small sticky note-then we pull them off as we accomplish them. Some things we will inevitably do more than once because they are things that are cheap, easy, and close to home, while others take more planning. Other activities are very easy to combine, such as kite flying and day at the beach. This list has some things specific to our area here in the Willamette Valley, but I encourage you to find things close to you and make your own list! It's fun. I even go as far as penciling in the ideas in my planner for weekends we have the kiddos, because otherwise we end up wondering where the weekends have gone! One entire week the boys go to soccer camp, which is not overnight, but they are wiped OUT each day, and two whole weeks they go to their dad's, so we make sure we can fit our activities in. The list was made gathering input from all my boys over the last week or so, and then researching some other cool stuff to do around here.

Here it is:

Summer To Do List

• Aquarium and day at the beach
• Camping
• Watch Perseid meteor shower
• Tillamook Cheese Factory
• Read! Alone, together, outside, out-loud! (My kids earn incentives for time reading (Matt) and knowledge of letters and sounds (Zay)).
• Bowling
• Kite flying
• Planetarium (we have a smallish one in Eugene and a big one in Portland)
• Go on a carnival ride (or 3!)
• Sleep under the stars
• Tour a lighthouse (Heceta Head)
• Watch fireworks
• Family bike ride
• Linn County Fair
• Swim in a lake
• Oregon Garden
• Browse Yard Sales
• Bonfire
• Drive in Movie
• Chuck E. Cheese just for fun, no birthday parties!
• Picnic in a Park
• Swim in Calapooia River (it's like 10 minutes away!)
  

I also made a list of a few fun things (for days that 5:30 -when my other half comes home- cannot come soon enough!)

• Photo shoot of my boys outside
• water balloon fights and games
• 4th of July Crafts
• Tie-dye t-shirts
• sock bubbles
• fluffy stuff summer snowball fight (it is cornstarch and shaving cream molded into snowballs)
• rock collecting and/or skipping rocks at the river
• swimming
• coloring pages
• make oobleck
• garden/weed flowers (my boys actually like weeding!)
• I also have some other science type experiments, but that'd take another blog post to organize! 

What do you do for fun each summer? I'd love to hear about it.

Happy Summer!