Category Archives: Projects and Activities to do With Your Kids

 12 Ideas for Fun Summer Days at Home

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collage for summer ideas

Fun Summer Days at Home

When my kids were young, I liked to try to do some fun things that weren’t a part of our normal school year- to make summer days more fun. These are simple, inexpensive or free ideas that really just let kids be kids. There’s no need to get fancy or expensive. Kids’ imaginations are the best toy, when encouraged to be used, and simple fun is usually the most fun!

So- before summer bids farewell for another year, here are some simple, yet fun ideas you can enjoy with your kids.

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Character Trails Anniversary

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The Character Trails Book is…

It’s A Big Anniversary

It’s hard to believe it’s been 10 years since we released Character Trails, the second book in our Character with the Cousins series, but it has!

We know many of you have followed the ‘cousins’ through the 4 books in the series. SO, to celebrate we thought first of all, we’d catch you up on what those cousins have been up to the last 10 years and some of their goals for the future. Ten years makes SUCH a difference.

 

Discount for November:

Also, for the month of November, we are offering you a 30% discount on Character Trails: Learning to Walk in Paths of Righteousness. AND, I asked the cousins to recommend some of the Character Concepts and Uncle Rick Audios that have been their personal favorites through the years and we will offer weekly specials on those throughout the month.

Be sure to listen to this week’s podcast where I interviewed the cousins (Lauren was out of town, so she wasn’t able to be present). Cassidy, Luke, Anne, Adam, and Melody were all available to share a little bit of their lives with you.

Boyer Cousins Then and Now:

Just for fun, we had Cass stage a photo like the one on the cover of Character Trails, ten years later. The actual log they sat on for the cover picture is now thoroughly rotten, but we found a similar one in our same patch of woods.  Hope you enjoy it.

 

Character Training Curriculum:

Character Trails teaches kids 12 basic character qualities, providing stories from the Bible, history, and everyday life for each one as well as suggestions for practically implementing each one as they learn it. Our aim was to put character definitions and implementation on a level kids approximately ages 6-10 could understand.

So for the entire month of November 2021, get 30% off the Character Trails book. It would make a great Christmas gift for other families.

Purchase more Character Training Curriculum at www.CharacterConcepts.com

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 Ideas for Road Trip Fun in the Car

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Summertime is here, and it’s time for vacation or fun day trips!

I just took a few of my grand kids to the lake last week (about an hour away) and I heard the age-old question from one of them, “When will we be there? Are we there yet? How much longer?”

Time drags for little guys when they are all excited to be somewhere and yet we just keep driving.

Here are some fun in the car suggestions for things that have worked for us over the years to keep little ones occupied and excited (and to help you keep your sanity!!)

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Hand Print Art

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Easy Hand Print Art Ideas that Kids Love!

I LOVE summer! I love having more time to do fun things with the kids- used to be my own home-schooled kids, now it’s my homeschooled grandkids!

Here’s a super fun project I just did with my son Nate’s kids this week. I bought a pack of fabric paints and some tee-shirts at Michael’s craft store. To assure that the paint wouldn’t bleed through to the back side of the shirts, I inserted a big book into each tee shirt.

 

Supplies:

*Colored T-shirts

*Fabric Paint

*Paintbrushes

*Book/magazine/cardboard to go in between the shirts

Hand Print Art Is A Perfect Activity

Hand print art with Grandma

The kids chose which colors they wanted to use and how to decorate their own shirt. With Ella and Lynn, I painted their hands with white fabric paint. You pretty much have to cover their hand with a thick coat. Then carefully, hold their hand and place it on the shirt. Wash that hand up and repeat with the other hand.

Hand print art with kids Hand print art

Then I let each child write their name with color of their choice and add decorations like flowers, hearts, whatever they chose to make. Using Fabric Paint pens for their name is a very special way to make the shirts unique to each child.

Hand print art

When my kids were little sometimes I  added the meaning of their name as well.DIY Kids Tshirts

The finished projects looked so cute and the kids were really proud of what they had accomplished.

(BTW, a great idea for Father’s Day is to get a tee shirt for Dad, paint each child’s hand or foot and make a print on Dad’s shirt. Using a tube of fabric paint, write the child’s name and date below their print. Rick wore his shirt for years! It’s a fun personalized gift! )

This project was simple and a ton of fun!

Pin to Pinterest For Later:

~Marilyn

 

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How to Make a Poodle Skirt

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Shhh. It’s a surprise! I wanted to show you what the granddaughters and I are making for their little sisters for Christmas, but you’ve got to promise you’ll keep it a secret!

Back when Kelley and Kasey were little, I bought a big piece of pink felt and some iron-on applique poodles to make them poodle skirts, (you know, the kind that were popular in the ’50s) just for dress up fun. My kids LOVED to dress up.

Well, I never got around to it!

So, this year I’m teaching the older grandkid girls to sew and make these skirts for their little sisters (who love to dress up too!)

Maybe you would also like to know how!  It’s really pretty easy:

Continue reading How to Make a Poodle Skirt→

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Empty Tomb Cookies

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These cookies are an excellent activity to make with your children as your family prepares for Easter. We’ve given you a recipe before for Resurrection Rolls. This one is similar- Empty Tomb Cookies. I recently made them with 5 of my grandkids! Thanks to Faithful Provisions blog for the fun and excellent idea.

This activity involves making special cookies- where each ingredient and step is a representation of Christ’s death, burial and resurrection. Have your Bible with you as you make them! There are passages to read and thoughts to discuss as you make the cookies. It’s really a neat experience.

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Making a Resurrection Garden

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Have you seen the Resurrection Gardens that are all over Pinterest? (like the one pictured, below)

I think I first saw this project displayed on Pinterest by Melissa Holt. Thanks for the wonderful idea, Melissa. I’ve been wanting to do this for a few years now, and today we finally did.

I am currently watching 5 grandkids as their mom just had a new baby boy yesterday, and this seemed like a perfect project to attempt.

The kids gathered the pebbles and rock for the tomb from their creek this morning early before they came over. We had to run to Lowes to purchase the terra cotta tray. It cost $4.00.

Today we planted the grass seed. I am going to use this as a centerpiece for the Easter Season. Today is Feb. 28th and Easter is April 1 this year, so the grass should be growing well by then and we can enjoy it all during the season!

Here’s how our completed project (before the grass has grown) turned out:

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Teaching Your Kids to Care: Part 5

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Teaching kindness - one child helping another up a rock
Teaching Your Kids to Care

In the last 4 posts, I’ve tried to give you some “shoe leather” – real stuff-  you can do with your family, not just pie-in-the-sky ideas that sound good but aren’t practical. I’ve been doing this type of thing for MANY years now. I just completed my 37th year homeschooling and graduated my last child. Whew! But, I’m not done yet. Just beginning. I’ve got 16 grandchildren with number 17 on the way in March. And yes, I’m not their parents, but Scripture does hold me responsible to influence my grandchildren in a godly fashion.

I KNOW it’s not easy having a bunch of “littles” in your home to work around and cart with you in car seats when you go places. Believe me, I know all about it! But, listen to me- IT’S WORTH every minute of it.

What do you want to see at the end of your life? I want to see kids and grandkids and even great-grandkids who are thoroughly committed to the Lord, who are living lives pleasing to Him; a big part of that is investing themselves in others. People go to heaven. Things don’t. People can be saved. Things can’t. People can be encouraged and inspired to attempt great things for God and even do things that others may see as little things, but are really BIG things in God’s eyes.

Continue reading Teaching Your Kids to Care: Part 5→

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Teaching Your Kids to Care: Part 2

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Miss Part 1 of this series? Read it here

Mark 12:30-31: ” And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.’ The second is this, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”

We want to raise our kids to be kids of character. That means more than just mentally knowing what character is.  Sure, that’s the first step in training your kids. They can’t take steps to implement it if they’re unaware of it. After they’ve learned that though, it’s important to take action. How do we do it? When do we do it? How do we find needs?

First of all, look around you. Look at your neighbors. Look at your church members. Look at your acquaintances. Those are the people God has put in your sphere of influence. Begin listening to them. It can almost be like a treasure hunt to see who can be attentive/alert and find needs that others have.

Continue reading Teaching Your Kids to Care: Part 2→

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