Essential Summer... a To-Do list for the happy child

Have you seen this post over at Rae Grant's blog My Little Hen ? I loved and was inspired by it. So much so, in fact, that for days after I read her list, ideas from my own childhood kept popping into my head along with ideas from when my older girls were younger...so many other summery ideas that I just had to start another list to augment Rae's. If you have any additional suggestion as to what should be on this list, don't hesitate to share it in the comments! (This means you, too, Naya, Sodie, and Mado!)


-Blow HUGE bubbles (look at Childhood Magic for an awesome post on a giant bubble tool you can make)

-Make lemonade...all different kinds
.
-Catch a pint of fireflies..and let them go (half the fun is punching holes in the tin lid with a hammer and nail)

-Go caving (or spelunking if you're hard core...its nice and cool in there!)

-Befriend bats (build and hang a bat-house if you can)

-Try out 'sun paint' (we do this around the summer solstice)


-Run through the sprinkler (or make your own Slip-n-slide type thing)

-Pick fruit at a pick-your-own farm (or in the wild!). We pick wild blackberries and farmed blueberries every year...and peaches if we can

-Make jam with some of your fruit to savor in the winter

-Wash the car with a bucket, hose, and sponge

-Press those beautiful leaves and blossoms (that you can't resist picking) in a flower press or a heavy book

-Make ice cream in a crank-handled ice-cream machine... take turns, earn your treat!

-Go to a carnival (overwhelming for littles, but thrilling for not-so-littles)

 -Wade in a creek...catch a frog or crawdad if you dare (I'm a scaredy-cat. I scoop them from behind with a net. Toucie and Mado just bare-hand it.)

-Chase butterflies...maybe identify one or two?

-Make a daisy chain (or clover blossom chain, or black-eyed-susan chain, or...)

-Set up a badminton net for impromptu matches (no need for rules! just bat it back and forth)

-Watch the Perseid meteor shower around Aug.12 (we lay on our trampoline in blankets for this)

-Have a campfire...cook over it...sing around it

-Feed hummingbirds

-Make a birdbath and keep it full of fresh water throughout the summer

-Build or create something that works with solar power (like a thermometer, solar oven, sundial....)

-Eat a big, ripe tomato like an apple

-Kiddie pools (any water vessel, really) + ice cubes = fun....also, water balloons, squirt guns, etc.

-Play horseshoes  ...it is a game that spans multiple generations (or even croquet...I never quite get around to croquet...)



I'll keep adding to this as I think of things. What is on your essential to-do list this summer?

Birthday ideas for the young child

Toucie turned 5 at the end of April.....we had a really lovely celebration. Us bigger folk in the family always end up having just as much fun as Toucie and I think the reason is that I've learned (now that I'm on my fourth child) to keep things VERY simple and to let every family member involve themselves as they wish. We have followed a basic rule of thumb when it comes to the number of guests to invite: 1 guest for every year of the birthday child's age. I never plan games or activities...just a general theme, like "play in the creek", or "play in the new sandbox". With hopes that it might spark someone else's party planning imagination and prove useful, here is a little list outlining Toucie's springtime birthday celebrations from age 1 to age 5:

Age 1: Playsilk Party
-------
-1 one-year-old friend and his mama came to our home for lunch.
-Favors/Activity: my mama friend helped me dye 10 white playsilks with koolaid and I sent 5 home with her.
-Food: soup and bread for mamas...lots of nursing for the babes :)
-Special present: a store-bought rainbow silk and a wooden horse swing (Nova Naturals)
-1 1/2 hours long

Age 2: Creek Party
--------
-2 two-year-old friends and their mamas met us at a local park with a crystal clear wading creek.
- Activity: playing in the creek, pouring endless cups of water, trying to catch frogs.
-Favors: we made big batches of homemade play dough beforehand and put big balls of the stuff in big paper cones (after wrapping the dough in plastic wrap). We attached the recipe for homemade playdough and added 2 cookie cutters to each cone.
-Food: nibble trays (muffin tins in this case) of fruit/veg/cheese/crackers/etc in toddler-bite sized pieces and cake :)
-Special present: a huge yellow wagon and a wooden ride-on 'bike'
-Supposed to be 2 hours, but everyone had so much fun it lasted for 3 1/2!

Age 3: Sandbox Party
-------
-3 friends of mixed ages (and their parents) came to our house for cake and to inaugurate the new sandbox that Daddy and I had built as her birthday present.
-Activity: Play in the sandbox, of course! We asked each guest to bring a bag of playsand in lieu of a gift. Each child emptied their sand and mixed it with the rest, and so their gift became a 'forever' part of the sandbox.
-Favors: I used the sandbox sand to make a stack of 4 sandbags (palm-sized, like beanbags) out of pretty fabrics for each child.
-Food: just cake this time!
-Special present: well, the sandbox...plus a wheelbarrow/shovel/rake
-2 hours long

Age 4: Garden Party
-------
-4 friends of mixed ages (and parents) came to our house to have a "garden party" and some snacks and cake.
-Activity- planting a bed full of sunflower seeds and puttering in the dirt.
- Favors: each child received a big tin watering can (just like the one Peter Rabbit hid in!) inside it were some big tissue paper flowers and a cd that I made of favorite gardening/growing songs. Also an invitation to come back at summer solstice to see how high the sunflowers had grown.
-Food: nibble trays of fruit/veg/cheese/crackers again...this time served in clean flower pots. Cake!
-Special present:
- 2 hours long

Age 5: Rain Party
-------
-4 friends (the fifth one couldn't make it) of mixed ages and their parents met us at a local park where we set up under a picnic shelter with a fireplace...we chose this spot because rain was forecast. We wanted to be outside in the rain, but have the option of shelter from lightening should it become necessary.
-Activity: play in the rain and in the network of little rills that criss-cross the park. (We also brought frisbees, hula hoops, balls, kites, and bubbles to take advantage of the park's broad spans of green lawn)
-Favors: a large, colorful umbrella for each child, tied with a ribbon.
-Food: baguettes and cheese/veg and fruit/hummus...and, instead of cake, two birthday pies as requested by the birthday girl
-Special present: she got her ears pierced...she'd been asking since she was 2 yrs old.(I got mine pierced when I was 5) Also, with much ceremony, she got her own library card.
-3 1/2 hours long (what stamina!our friends can really go the distance!)

Too much Spring Cleaning!

Today dawned warm and full of sunshine...mild enough for breakfast outdoors. We are all ready for this warmth. Ready for the sun on our faces. Ready to exchange days spent in the house (with a few trips out for fresh air) for days spent outside (with a few trips indoors for sustenance and supplies).

We are still in the throes of Spring Cleaning, but we thought we could work and enjoy the sunshine at the same time. Toucie decided her babydoll laundry needed attention:

"Mama" is washing while Moke (Toucie's doll) looks on.

Wow...this is going great...she is so absorbed in her work "This is totally ideal", I think to myself.
I move away to tend to work of my own, fondly glancing over to check on Toucie every once in a while.
Lots of good work getting done...maybe I am pretty good at this mothering thing after all!

Um...Touce, what's behind your back?

Oh no....Moke was not due for a bath. Cloth doll- 100% wool insides - 100% cotton outsides - completely soaked in grubby water. Too much cleaning, Toucie!

"But Mama, she loved it! Look, she is still smiling!"

For the record, if this should ever happen to a Waldorf doll at your house (whether by accident or design), just make sure to press out as much water as possible with dry towels, and hang up to dry where there is lots of air circulation. The dryer is not a good idea since water + heat + agitation + wool = felt...this could result in a lumpy mess. Also, I recommend hanging dolls with feet pointing down so water can drain away from the head. The head is the most dense part and you really want it to get dry all the way to the core. Moke came through her adventure just fine and now joins the ranks of other non-washable dolls in our family that have been washed. (I should make them all some dolly-sized T-shirts..."I survived Toucie's childhood")