How to Rock Summer Break – Part 3: At Home with Kids

Summer break does require some winding down at home for us. Time to bring out the Christmas and Birthday gifts that haven’t been played with in a while! Time to try out some new toys, too, and have some special moments along the way.

Exploring Outside

We sunscreened it up and headed outdoors to check out the river, trees, and leaves for bugs. The river is one of their favorite spots! I think the noise of the water is exciting for them, and how refreshing it feels as water vapor splashed on you, looking at it move from the bridge… We saw dragonflies, ants, flies, wasps, bees, and ladybugs!

Themed Play

We had a “Train Day” since I had borrowed a kit from the library with train-themed books. I made a playlist of music from Dinosaur Train, Chuggington, I’ve Been Working on the Railroad, Casey Junior from Dumbo, etc. so they could dance while they played. My kids really like constructing roads and seeing how long they can go over bridges. You could really have fun with food! At bedtime we brought out a flashlight and read the Shine-A-Light book “On the Train”.

See more about how our kids like to play with trains here.

Open-Ended Toys for Creative Building

Legos and other similar blocks are awesome for open ended play! My boys have recently started experimenting with making all sorts of shapes from dinosaurs to rocket ships. Most of the time they don’t need help with creating what they tell me they want! It helps with problem solving, spatial and shape recognition, and communication.

We bought Magnet Tiles for the kids last Christmas, and it’s seriously one of our very best toys in both quality and amount of time the kids can play together with them! Here they were making spaceships, different 3D shapes, and a tent out of magnet tiles.

Special New Toys

My son has always been about cars, trucks, trains, and things that go. It wasn’t long before he started talking with us about “Robot Cars”, mentioning them in his prayers and at bedtime… Finally we figured out what he meant when he death-gripped a Transformer in Nursery while in California.

What started as a trip to Target for one medium-priced Optimus Prime has rapidly exploded into an obsession for my boys, including my husband who grew up with Transformers. They now pretend play for hours, and request movies and spinoff shows about their favorite toys. Baby W got into fist fights stealing his brother’s toys, so now we have 2 of each in trucks, police cars, and jets—plus the odd Bumblebee.

The toys are very loved so they have all been perpetually broken, lost, and slept with at bedtime. Now the toys don’t leave the house so that when they get lost we can limit it to the house—that means tantrums whenever we go out, but at least I don’t have to deal with heartbroken sobs all day and night because it got left at a friend’s or the park.

Spa Day

L hasn’t actually come with me to the nail salon or the spa, but we totally need to! When the boys were napping, I set up some soaking tubs for her and busted out the nail polish for some fun. It turns out I am a horrible nail technician! I had to redo her polish like 3 times! She was so patient and loving, though, and didn’t move a muscle. It was fun anyway just to try pampering her… Maybe next time I should be brave and let her paint my nails.

Games

If the kids have limited screen time and can get along if they play a little bit on a device, it can be such a fun time for all.

Check out the next post about How to Rock Summer Break, with family time.