Category: Summer Projects

Shark Ball Toss

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Shark Ball Toss (7)

Here’s the perfect sport to bring along to your family’s next day at the beach. The homemade charm has a leg up on all the koosh ball competition!

To assemble, cut about 2 inches off the ends of two empty (1 L) soda or sparkling water water bottles. The edges were rough, so we sanded them until smooth with squares of sandpaper. Travis thought this was neat, wondering if the roughness of sandpaper can ever be completely worn away.

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Paint the bottles with two coats of blue acrylic paint; let dry overnight.

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In the morning, we drew shark features on craft foam, including jagged teeth, dorsal fins, and eyes.

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Because our wiggle eyes had long lashes and our foam was pink and purple, our sharks had a decidedly feminine appearance!

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Now simply head to the beach (or another outdoor location) and bring along a tennis ball. Toss back and forth, catching the ball in the shark “mouths”.

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A word of caution: This is hard! The players really should only be a few steps apart and it takes some practice to give the ball the right toss out of one shark’s mouth and into the other.

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So don’t worry if kids just end up rolling the tennis balls into the shark bottles. That was fun, too!

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Octopus Bottle Buddies

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Travis has been a little bit homesick at camp, so we made a “buddy” to go along with him today… attached right to his water bottle!

The first step was to draw an octopus outline on craft foam, and this was tricky even for me.

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I copied an example in Highlights magazine and still needed a few tries, so I didn’t expect Travis to master the shape. But he sure loved drawing on extra craft foam (little sister, too!), making this a great art session even before we moved on to assembling the rest of the craft.

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As you draw, make sure the top two arms of the octopus reach up over its head and nearly touch; you’ll need to glue them into a loop that will hold on to the water bottle.

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Once you’ve drawn the octopus shapes, cut them out. Next, draw accessories on additional craft foam and cut out. These shapes will be simpler for kids to help with. We included a surfboard, sunhat, and a little ukulele. Think anything beachy and tropical!

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Use tacky glue or hot glue to add wiggle eyes and the foam accessories to each octopus, and glue the top two arms into a ring.

Once the glue dries, your new “buddy” slides right onto a water bottle.

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Travis chose the blue one to take to camp!

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Summer Gross Motor Skills

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Hula Hoop Workshop (6)

In these last few days before Travis starts summer camp, we’ve been doing lots of gross motor skills here at “Camp Mom“. Here are a few great ways to get moving in the heat!

Hula-Hoop Workshop:

Forgot traditional twirls around the waist; hula hoops are a fantastic summer boredom buster even if your kids haven’t mastered the hip swirling yet.

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To wit, today the kids decided to pretend they were the rings of Saturn with hula hoops!

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Simply put a hula hoop around your waist and spin!

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You can also practice rolling a hula hoop along the ground. Or jumping from one to the other. Hula hoops are fun any way you spin it!

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Jumping Bee:

Even if your child doesn’t know how to skip rope yet, you can turn it into a prop for a spelling bee. We laid the rope down on the ground and I had Travis think back to some of his kindergarten sight words. For each letter in a word, he jumped back and forth across the rope.

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He was so proud recalling sight words. “There is a sight word of the day and the sight word is ‘the’,” he sang to the tune of BINGO. T!

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H!

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E!

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After we’d gone through sight words, little sister Veronika started shouting out silly words for him to spell. Bigger kids, of course, can do this activity with longer words and while truly honing their jump rope skills. Last person still spelling without getting tangled in his or her rope wins!

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Dribbling King:

Some cheap bouncy balls from the grocery store were the perfect prompt to work on Travis’s dribbling skills. Take this activity to your nearest park and hop on the basketball court (or just outline a large area with chalk) and show your kids how to dribble.

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If you want to make it a competition, have the kids dribble with one hand while trying to knock away an opponent’s ball with the other.

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Travis got very protective of his ball when we played this wat though, and preferred to hone his new skills solo.

Play “Spud”:

If you need a reminder on this classic, here are the rules: The player who is IT tosses a ball in the air and shouts out a number. Other players can take that many steps away.

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Now, IT tries to hit another player with the ball (choose a relatively soft one). If IT misses, he or she gets an S.

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If IT makes the shot, the other player gets the S and is now IT. Play continues until someone spells out S-P-U-D.

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I hope these ideas get you moving!

Beach-Themed Sensory Bag

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Beach-Themed Bag (6)Here’s the perfect way to bring a bit of the beach home for your toddler after a day at the real thing. It’s a great way to extend the sensory play while remembering a day of fun in the sun!

While you’re at the beach, make sure to tuck aside shells or other little treasures.

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Once home, I filled a gallon-sized zip-top bag with hair gel. Either leave the gel clear, or add a few drops of yellow food coloring, if desired. Then add your beachy treasures!

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We had some beautiful finds, including a mussel shell, a razor clam, snail shells, and one that was nearly translucent gold. Veronika loved the contrast between the shells and the gel. “Bumpy!” she said first, followed by “squishy”!”

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It was fun to watch her move the shells around within the bag. Next time, I might bring home a little bit of the beach itself and add sand, too!

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Perfect beach house fun.

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God’s-Eye Key Chains

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The god’s eye symbol is a traditional votive object from Mexico. But minus the religious symbolism, the pattern is an excellent early weaving technique for grade schoolers, and a classic camp-style craft for a morning here at Camp Mom.

To start, I hot-glued pairs of toothpicks together so they crossed in the middle, and made several sets so we could weave multiple key chains. You can use regular glue if you prefer, but if so you may want to do it the night before so the glue is dry by morning.

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I showed Travis how to wrap yarn around the center to secure, then to start weaving around the toothpicks in a circle, wrapping the yarn around each toothpick before moving on to the next. The mechanics of this were a bit complicated for him, but I was so proud that he stuck with it in his own way.

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“Look, I’m wrapping!” he declared. When he had achieved the look he wanted, he decided it was finished.

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Meanwhile, I wrapped one in a more exact fashion to achieve the god’s eye look.

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You can then finish these with fun details, whether pom poms or beads. My craft bin is low on supplies but I had a few wooden beads which looked lovely glued to each toothpick point. Be sure to thread one of the beads through a final piece of yarn (use a needle, if needed), and tie this yarn securely to a key ring.

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These key chains would also make excellent gifts!

Patio Fun with Water

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Veronika has played with various kitchen utensils to keep busy in the past, but today we added a few twists to this classic toddler activity.

The first change was that we moved the whole game outside. I laid a towel on the patio and filled a large kitchen bowl with water, then added measuring cups, a whisk, a pastry brush, measuring spoons, and a few sieves.

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The sieves were great for pouring water into and instantly watching the water trickle back out!

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The other big novelty here was adding a funnel. I showed Veronika how we could place a funnel over an empty sparkling water bottle and fill it, then watch the water trickle down. She concentrated so hard on reaching way up with a measuring cup to fill the funnel.

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Then she loved dumping the water bottle out!

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She also enjoyed brushing water onto a strainer with a pastry brush.

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Whisks were fun to swish in the bowl.

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And of course there was the obvious appeal of pouring water right onto her skin, since the morning was already hot. Knowing this would be tempting, I’d dressed her in a bathing suit, so you might want to do the same!

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At the end when we had a big puddle of water on the patio, it was time for a splashy puddle dance.

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Garage Raid Obstacle Course

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If your kids need to get out some quick energy, look no further than your garage for inspiration. Old sports equipment, old toys, or anything else that will promote gross motor skills is perfect for this activity.

To wit, we pulled out Travis’s old scooter, an old play tunnel, leftover pool noodles, bouncy balls, a cornhole backboard, and a Frisbee. I arranged them in such a way that the items could be moved through as an obstacle course, then challenged Travis to the following:

Ride the scooter up to the tunnel.

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Whack the ball through the tunnel with the pool noodle, then follow it to the other side.

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Once through, toss the Frisbee at the cornhole backboard.

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The reward was bubbles! Travis loved popping them with the pool noodles.

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Little sister wanted to work her way through the course, too!

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We were glad we got out in the morning sunshine for this one.

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Pool-Noodle Hockey

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Pool Noodle Hockey (1)

We needed to get outside at “Camp Mom” this morning, and I knew just the silly summer sport for the kids. Pool noodles for hockey sticks and a giant blown-up beach ball for the puck made the perfect summer props to play an outdoor version of hockey.

Simply set up orange cones as the goal markers and then divide into teams. (In our case, it was Travis versus mommy and little sister).

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Then take turns whacking the beach ball down the field toward your opponent’s goal. First team to 10 points wins!

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Or you don’t even have to keep score. Kids will no doubt just have fun with the mechanics of chasing the beach ball around with the pool noodle, which is sure to elicit delight.

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Sponge-Ball Toss

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This game is an instant cool-down on a hot day. And you can tailor it easily, depending how wet your kids want to get!

Set-up just requires a few cheap sponges from the dollar store. Stack two together, and cut into 3 strips.

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Secure the strips in the center with a rubber band, fanning out the edges slightly. Make as many or as few as you want, and head outside the sponges and a bucket of water.

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First I simply showed the kids that if you soaked the sponges in water and then pressed onto the ground, they left behind fun starburst shapes.

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Little sister Veronika loved putting them in a bucket of water and squeezing out, delighting in the sensory element of the game.

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Travis’s favorite way to play was to launch them at the wall!

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Or squeeze them out like it was raining.

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Older kids may want to pelt them at each other, which is just fine as long as no one minds getting wet! We kept things gentler with a toddler around, but there was still lots of laughter and tossing.

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No matter how you play, these sponges are sure to provide cool-down fun.

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Nature Names

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Nature Names (5)

In the past, Travis has hunted for items in nature that go with each letter of his name. But never before have we crafted his name from nature! This was a neat twist to give purpose to today’s foray into nature.

Soft, delicate items will work best for this project, so I encouraged Travis to look for grasses, leaves, and petals. Mostly though, he collected lots of little pebbles, which ended up working fine.

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At home, we set out pieces of colored construction paper, and I encouraged Travis to think about how the letters of his name would look if dotted in glue.

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This was a little tricky for him and it ended up being easier to write the letter first, then dot the glue over the lines.

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He then could add rocks or bits grass and leaves to each dot, making for a pretty nature collage! We decided to make one for little sister’s nickname, too.

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Another successful project at Camp Mom.