Summertime Fun...any inexpensive ideas and or suggestios???

We went to Monkey Joe's for the first time today! It's a huge room filled with bounce houses of all kinds....giant slides, obstacle courses, etc. It was waaaay too much fun! Kids of all ages would really have a great time there. You should google it and see if there is one in your area. And it was very affordable...kids under 2 yrs are $5 and over 2 yrs is $8 to play all day. Another plus is it was a fantastic workout for me too :) We'll be going back for sure!

Fill a wading pool with water and bubble bath! more fun than just playing in regular water. Also, if you have a local zoo that you can get a membership to it is well worth the cost. We have a deluxe membership that gets in our whole family plus up to three guests everytime.

I love scavenger hunts and hikes in the woods or nature hikes in the neighborhood. We have a state park nearby, and I plan to start "hiking" w/ my 18 mo. old this year. Local park playgrounds are great for running off excess engergy. Let them have a lemonade stand or make a play house outside or do relay races in the backyard. We used to spend hours making up the obstacle courses, then hardly any time at all doing them. Have summer camp at your house for week! You can make microwave s'mores, sing camp songs, have outdoor activities and arts and crafts. Maybe the older ones could camp out one night in a tent, or just camp out in the living or family room one night and have a "campfire" inside (using tissue paper and flashlights). Sidewalk chalk is great for all ages. There are usually many great Vacation Bible Schools around. My husband's family got to attend not only their church's, but also other community churches, as many of them have similar type programs, if you are not limited to a specific denomination (for instance, we're Catholic, but many of the other CHristian churches have similar programs that we can attend). Library summer reading programs - some do this for prizes or different activities. FREE!!! Get a group together to host an ice cream social. Cooking "class" - making things like slushies, smoothies, fruit treats, etc. One new thing a week. Everyone can help in the kitchen! When we would stay w/ my Grammie for 2 weeks in the summer, our favorite activities were: Finger painting w/ homemade finger paints (using corn starch), visiting U-Pick berry fields and farmer's markets, attending church cake walk/summer activities, Make a summer family journal/scrapbook to record all the things you're doing. Anyone old enough for 4H yet? That's mostly free, and some of the smaller ones can even do Mini 4H, and the littlest ones could do their own projects, and you could judge them at home, if they're not old enough to officially participate.

Wow, StorkWatcher...those are great ideas!! I'm printing them out now...

Here's a really silly one that work well if you have mature trees in your yard. Let the kids paint the trunks with washable paint. It eventually washes off (or you can do it) and the kids have a blast. You can probably paint other things, but we've always stuck to the trees.

Vacation Bible Schools!!!!! Most, if not free only charge a nominal fee. the most I have ever paid for vBS was $20. And that got my son five days, going fro 9a, - 2 pm (took a sack lunch everyday). He has a blast! The other VBS's he has attended have been free, but shorter days. I have never known any child that attended VBS that did not have a fabulous time. Besides having fun, they learn excellent lessons and values. Whether you are members of a church or not, they will welcome your children with open arms. One summer our oldest son attended three separate VBS's, and loved every one of them. They were spread out across the summer, and really helped break it up.

my best friend also has a lot of kids like me - between us we have 20 kids! so we are already a group without much planning. she taught me a fun summer plan. each day is a set DAY. meaning monday is library day, tuesday is swimming, wednesday is cooking, thursday is tennis, and friday we always plan a fieldtrip. we go to places that are usually free, ie: the fire station, local business' like an ice cream shop for a tour. we tour our husbands work. i change this around and do a 2 week rotation. i added movie day, water park day(we get a season pass for $25). we do cub scout activities. i buy muffin mixes for the kids to practice baking and we make freezer strawberry jam - so easy even my 2yo can help smash the berries. i love hearing all of your ideas! keep them coming. ps. today we flew kites - so much fun for only $2.

Wow!!! These are all great ideas!!!! I had thought of movie day...either renting movies and making popcorn or going to the dollar movies. Another idea was the park and arts and crafts, I even thought that making goofy skits was a good idea. Thanks!!! this is awesome, I can't wait to see what else there is out there.

Check your local pools for discounted days and times. My local pool charges 1/2 price if you go after 3 pm and it's generally less crowded then too, not to mention less uv rays! A lot of zoos, children's museums etc. have free days Do a "new" park once a week...my kids love the park but get bored with the same one. So last summer I looked up all the parks I could find within a 15 min. drive and we went to a lot of them. Picnics too... If you have a community center in your area, they have a ton of summer activities for minimal cost. Our local movie theatre does $1 movies once a week showing older movies that are on video, but you get the "movie going experience" Get one of those ice cream "balls"....where you make homemade icecream and the kids roll the ball on the floor back and forth. Have a "sundae party". The garden hose is still a favorite, my kids love running through the sprinkler without any fancy attachments etc. They also love to "wash" the car, each other etc.

We film our own movies. I have 3 girls 8, 4, and 2, and 2 boys 5 and 3 every weekend. Last weekend the kids made up a story about a troll, wizard, and three princesses, then we made some costumes out of clothes from around the house and grabbed some crazy props and the video camera and were off. We filmed in a few different places around town. A great tip for anyone who will be doing this is to ask each child what he/she will say next and then tape close-ups of each character individually, it makes it easier for little ones and if someone forgets the next line you can just re-tape it instead of an entire "scene." We started doing this to explain why the "bad guys" cant come out of the TV and even if we saw them in real life they aren't really bad. It really helped my SS when he got to be the villain and watch himself when it was over, then he really understood that he wasn't coming out of the TV or ever going to be a terrible wizard that terrorized his sisters.

Between my close friends and I, we have 6 toddler/preschoolers between the ages of 2-6. We let each other know about special events happening in the area (kid's concerts, special zoo days, library events) and also about special craft projects. This summer I am going to do a different theme each month. June is our aquatic themed month so we are learning about the ocean (we live along the coast), sea creatures, and the bay. We are visiting the beach, watching movies related to the theme (Nemo), making magnets of sea creatures, creating beach themed food, visiting the aquarium, and reading books each night that are ocean/aquatic life themed. In July we are focusing on flowers so similarly we will be visiting the botanical gardens and parks, reading books, making related food, etc. This method helps me organize and plan ahead and gives the kids time to really learn about the themes.

There have been a lot of great ideas posted! I have two kids of my own (2 and almost 3) and watch two more 2 year olds and a 7 and 9 year old. The two oldest have enjoyed going to Michael's Craft Store for their arts and crafts. They usually offer several weeks worth of crafts each summer. You can sign up for just one day, a couple of days or the whole week. Each day they made two projects and had a lot of fun. Plus, it helped break up the day. Also, you could look up pottery stores where kids pick out something to paint themselves and then pick it up a few days later when it's been fired. Local nature trails would be good to look into. The sprinkler in the backyard is always a hit. I also buy Summer Bridging workbooks for the older two and spend a little time each day working on them to keep up their school skills and get them ready for the next grade. They really enjoy the workbooks and have already asked if I'm bringing them again this summer. They ususally do two or three pages a day (not a lot) the activities are fun and they like "playing school" and having me check their work and draw stars or smilie faces. The younger ones usually color or draw during this time and have a little art time. Look into different movie theaters. We have one theater that offers a kid friendly G-rated movie two days a week at 10am for free. The library has story time and some also offer other activities. Our main library had special guests throughout the summer. They had a magician one day, a local singer that sang a bunch of kid songs and danced another day, etc. I don't know if you are fostering or not, but our OCS offers free passes to places like the museum and the zoo if you ask for them. If I think of any more I'll add them. Hope this helps and thank to everyone else for your great suggestions!

The Zoom website has a ton of fun and easy science experiments and activities to do with the kids. My son always enjoys upside down day. We eat dinner for breakfast and so on, doing night time things during the day and vice versa. It's a fun day to throw into the mix. Scavenger hunts are always fun. If you mix used coffee grounds and school glue, they make a "rock" that you can hide objects in. You could fill them with items from the dollar store or have one special thing that you hide every time you play (if you get the coin, you can get an ice cream, pick the next dinner, etc). Our town has a local beach that we love to go to.

Every kid I know loves going out in the backyard for a campout. It can take all night or only a couple of hours. Marshmallows and weenies roast beautifully on a hibachi grill. And there's something extra special about doing a star walk with someone who knows the constellations, or is just really good at making stuff up. My kids loved the feeling of walking outside at night. It was magical to them.