I've got the "eleven more days until school starts, this whiney kid is driving me crazy, what am I going to do with him" blues.
Zip Van Winkle has been up since 5:15 this morning. He played quietly by himself for 30 minutes then came to our bed and demanded we come into his bed. Nope, couldn't snuggle in our nice big king size bed, we had to go to his. Glad we opted for the full instead of the twin.
And the whining started shortly thereafter. Ok, first some coffee and then Mama has to start coming up with ideas to occupy you. After a cup and a half of caffeine I came up with this:
Stamp painting with foam shapes, plastic dinosaurs and action figures, duplo blocks, and cars. It took me longer to clean up then he spent occupied.
While he was eating snack I brainstormed and came up with a Photography Nature Hike Scavenger Hunt. I made up a list of some items I knew we would find at nearby "Big Rock Park" (formally known as Bear Creek Park #1), filled up our water bottles, grabbed the camera and off we went. Oops, forgot to go to the bathroom and there aren't any on the trail. Luckily we were only half a block away when I realized it. Back home and restart.
An hour and a half later after a nice long walk, some lessons in not putting your finger over the camera lens and playing on the big giant rocks we found everything on our list:
1 brown leaf, 1 small rock, 2 giant rocks, 1 stick as big as this paper (a repurposed #10 envelope), 2 pieces of trash, something green, something red, 1 flower, animal footprints, shoe prints, bugs and 4 acorns.
I am happy to say the hardest item to find was the two pieces of trash. Yes, I know the flags are not nature, but they were at the start of the path and I wasn't sure what else we would find. I could have held out for the Toyon berries a few hundred yards ahead.
Now we are home vegging to some Super Why on Sprout TV. The LeapPad may come out later and when that gets boring he can help me make cornbread to go with the ham and beans I have planned for dinner.
Then I get to come up with a plan for tomorrow. Any suggestions?
heatherhomefaker says
That scavenger hunt sounds awesome - you must be such a fun mom!
AshleyRose says
Scavenger hunts are fantastic! I still remember the ones I had with my grandmother when I was little.
As for ideas: I did early childhood art for years and my favorite Time-Suck activity was Paper Plate Masks, here's a link to it on one of my blogs:
http://asullivanillustration.blogspot.com/2013/01/a-little-something-from-old-days.html
Audrey Humaciu says
Cool idea. He mentioned a Sun Mask today (from a Tv show) now I know how we can make one.
My Half Assed Life says
School vacations are so hard. Once kids get used to having their daily lives planned for them they seem to lose the ability to amuse themselves.
Here from NaBloPoMo.
-Heidi says
I love the scavenger hunt idea!! I found you on NaBloPoMo Soup!