Creative Summer Ideas

Ideas for Creating Summer Memories

(I know there are tons more that you can find on Pinterest and other resources, but these are some of our all-time favorites, tried and true.)

1. Summer vacation trip. This is a big one. If it’s something you can do, go for it. Most of our family summer trips involve going to the beach with family. We are fortunate to have family who live in Charleston, so since I was a young girl we have made the trek to Charleston for many years creating countless memories. Since this was a “tradition” for me growing up, it was one I wanted to continue with my own family. It wasn’t “the beach” that made it special, but the family.  Now when I take my family (and mind you, it’s not consistently every year), we still do some of the same traditions I did as kid on vacation there, from crabbing, to eating at the same restaurant, to touring the city. We have also begun some of our own traditions. By far, going to the beach is one of our favorite summer memories.

2. Barbarian Night: This is an all time favorite that the kids still talk about. Before I explain this one, remember the “O” Optimize the yes, because Barbarian night entails pretty much what it sounds like. You will eat like barbarians…no plate, no utensils, just serve the supper up on the on table. You may want to invest in a cheap disposable plastic table cloth. Dig in and enjoy as you and the kids get to eat hog wild! I promise it did not ruin them of their manners.

3. Slip N Slide (or Redneck Water Park): This one we still do. Go to Lowe’s or Home Depot and purchase the contractor’s plastic sheeting. Let it out as long as you have room, preferably down a hill. Then lather it up with soap and get your hose spraying water on the sheeting and start sliding! This plastic sheeting will last a long time, but if you do get a rip or tear duct tape on the back works great!

4. Summer Scavenger Hunt: This can be done anywhere, but we did ours around downtown Chattanooga, the North Shore area, and Coolidge Park. You will begin at your house and have a certain amount of envelopes numbered. The kids will open the first envelope with a catchy or rhyming clue. They will guess where that clue is and you will drive them there and do the activity that was mentioned in the clue. For example, It’s a place where many a fish you see, find some running water down steps, go splash and say “Wee!” (For those not from Chattanooga, that would be our Aquarium.)

Once they’ve completed clue #1 give them clue #2, and so on it continues with as many clues as you see fit. Your final clue could involve the other parent or another adult being at the ending point with a picnic. This one is really endless on how many different things you could do around Chattanooga and even in your own neighborhood.

5. Tour Chattanooga! Don’t forget what all is around us to enjoy. We do live in the Scenic City and there are lots of things to do with little to minimal cost. You can drive up Signal Mountain to Point Park or ride the Incline up and walk to Point Park. Take a hike at Raccoon Mountain (they have easy to difficult trails.) Visit again for the first time, Rock City, Ruby Falls, The Aquarium, try a Duck tour, or check out the art district. Also, check out some places in Georgia, for example the town of Chickamauga and the battlefields.

6. Make a picnic table. This was a fun project we did with our kids. They got to help build the table then enjoy eating many a meal outside on “their” table they made. To this day, our kids love to eat outside. (Check Lowe’s and Home Depot, they used to have kits. Ours could be used as both a picnic table and or benches!)

7. Take a walk or bike ride on the Greenway. You can make the route as short or as long as you would like. When we had yearly passes to the Aquarium we would park the van along the Greenway and ride our bikes on the Greenway into downtown to the Aquarium. We would go in just to see our favorite exhibits and get cooled off then ride back to the car. We would also ride to Coolidge Park and play in the fountain and then ride back. I won’t lie, some trips were more challenging than others with 6 of us being on bikes! Still worth the memory.

8. Pick Blackberries. Sometimes we combined this with our bike rides when we lived in Nashville and there were blackberry bushes along the Greenway trail. We would tie a plastic grocery bag to their handlebars and they would fill them up with blackberries, then we would ride back and go make a blackberry cobbler. (Just did this one this morning!)

9. Go to the Farmer’s Market: Find a Farmer’s Market near you, and before you go let the kids pick a recipe to make with vegetables and or fruit. Allow the kids to pick out the produce, then go back home and make the recipe.

10. Themed Dinners: Get the kids involved to help plan a themed dinner night, from Italian to Chinese. Cook that type of food, decorate the kitchen in that theme, and even allow them to dress the part. Don’t worry about making this perfect, it’s more about the kids taking a part and being creative in their own way. It’s so much fun to see what they come up with on their own.

11. Take Your Pick Jar (or the I am Bored Jar): Decorate a jar and place in it simple things to do around the house or things to go do. You can write them on strips of colorful paper or use craft sticks. This is especially good when the inevitable “I’m bored” begins to be said. For example; go get ice cream, go play in the sprinkler, build a fort, have a water balloon fight, go to a movie. The ideas are endless! Have a stash of things from the Dollar Tree you can pull out and use that would be new to them. Such as water guns for water gun fight, or art supplies for craft projects. You can also have Mom’s pick or kids pick, whoever’s name is on the stick they get to decide what to go do.

12. Dinner Table “Dish” from the Day: This is a great way to get conversation going at the table, while giving everyone a chance to talk!  Everyone gets to tell about their day. Typically, my husband, Bill, would say this “corny,” yet cute, catchy saying…”whoever I point to has to tell me their favorite thing they did today.” When the kids were younger, they couldn’t wait to be chosen. And yes, we still do this one today…with lots of laughs as Bill uses his corny saying (I want to say rhyme…but obviously nothing rhymes!)

13. Display the Immeasurably More: Write down the “immeasurably more” God is doing on one sheet of paper with the Ephesians 3:20 verse “Now to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us,” at top, and on the other sheet of paper for prayer requests, write Philippians 4:6 “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.” Place in a visible spot, mine is on the refrigerator. Let all the family members write down the immeasurably more they see God providing. One the other sheet, to help all Make the Most of the Moment and not worry about what’s next or tomorrow, write their prayer requests. It’s a great way to see how God can take the requests and give the immeasurably more.

It is my prayer that you allow God to help you make the MOST of your summer memories.

How to Make the M.O.S.T. of Your Summer Memories

Making the M.O.S.T. of Summer Memories

            

Recently I was asked to share with Middle Valley Baptist on how to “Create Summer Memories.” Having four kids in 4 ½ years and being a stay-at-home mom/minister’s wife, I have had to get pretty creative in making summer memories. Some of it was out of pure necessity so we wouldn’t go crazy or harm each other! By far, some of the best memories were the ones that required little to no money! As I was talking and reminiscing with my much older kids, now 16, 17, 19, and 20 on some of their favorite memories, my oldest daughter looked at me, with a somewhat horrified face and said “Mom, you’re not going to tell them about our trips to Sam’s?” to which I replied, “Absolutely!” These trips involved taking our much younger children and pushing them around on the flatbed carts, eating the samples, and then ordering a pizza from the deli. Exciting, right? Well, actually it was for our kids at that time, and to this day, even Mary Allyson says it was one of her favorite memories!

I am going to date myself when I say this, but it seems summers aren’t as lazy and laid back as they used to be. Carving out the memories may take more intentionality these days, but one word of warning, don’t get on FaceBook, Instagram, Twitter, or Pinterest and compare your summer to someone else’s! What you’ll see there are picture perfect profiles, with picture perfect “vacays” and no “staycays!”  You will not see your friends’ post that their toddler who’s being potty-trained cleared the hotel’s pool. Nor will you hear how excruciating the car ride was with the un-relenting questions and arguing.

So how do you create summer memories? As I was praying over what to write and share, it occurred to me that my audience already has the resources at their fingertips. They can google, get on Pinterest, and find blogs on this very topic. However, as I prayed, God gave me one word to focus on that would benefit all of us making great summer memories for our kids. That one word is MOST, and to give a twist on the topic, it would be, “How To Make the M.O.S.T. Of the Moments God Gives You.” To make this easier to remember we’re going to use the word MOST in an acrostic.

“M” stands for Maximize the Moment. Simply put, practice being present in the moment. Make the most of the moment by enjoying it and living in it, rather than anticipating the next thing and focusing on what’s next, maximize the moment that’s before you. When we rush through the moment, we miss the fullness of that moment. Don’t miss the now, for the next. One concept I try to put in place is to be present in the moment. The idea is to not rush the moment because the idea is to create a memory and that’s hard to do if you’re rushing through it to get to the next thing. Maximize the moment by not missing the moment. This one will step on some of our toes, but have you noticed you miss moments because you’re too worried about capturing them and posting them on FaceBook, twitter, or instagram? One of the best things we can do to maximize the moments in our summer memories is to put the phone down.  Here’s a side note, many of you like me think you can multi-task. Research shows that just by looking at your phone or leaving a task it takes at least 10 minutes to re-engage and get back to the train of thought where you left off! So, sit back and take it all in, Maximize the Moment, so it will create a memory!

The next thing you will want to do in creating a memory is to “O” Optimize the Yes! Essentially, say yes to as many things as you can and leave the no’s for the big ones. Having more yes’s gives kids a greater respect for the no when it needs to be implemented. For example, you’re tired, you’ve just cleaned up the house again for the 40^th time, fixed three meals and umpteen snacks and the kids ask if they can build a fort in the den! Typically what our kids are asking for isn’t something we can’t provide or something that is morally wrong, it usually comes down to our own time and selfishness! UGH! Now, please don’t hear me say to give your kids whatever they want, when they want it. There are boundaries we already need to have in place, so the “yes” is an affirmative, not something that gives entitlement or to just appease. Some of our best memories have come from the “yes” moments, not necessarily those that were planned. For example, riding on the flatbeds in Sam’s Club. This concept continues into the teen years as well. I still try to give more yes’s than no’s, so when there is a need for a no they respect it. So when the youngest asks to go practice driving, and there’s nothing standing in my way except my own desires, I try to make it a yes!

As we move to next letter, keep in mind that the “M” Maximize the Moment and the “O” Optimize the Yes go along with the next letter “S” Stop and Share in the Moment. Don’t hang out on the sidelines, be an active part in the moment, allowing the memory to go deeper. Instead of just being the conduit to creating the opportunities and memories, stop and share in the moments, participate in the moment. As it ties back to the letter “M,” as you stop and share in the moment being an active part, it helps you savor and maximize that moment even more. It also ties back to the “O” as we stop and share in the moment by saying “yes” to being a part. Kids love when we join them in the fun, even the big kids!

Just the other night we were having a great conversation at dinner when the phone rings with our youngest reminding us to come pick her up from swim practice (yes, time had slipped away…we forgot.) Instead of us all dispersing, with someone going to pick her up and the others cleaning up, my husband said let’s continue this conversation in the car and all go get Annabelle! The dishes could wait, but this was a moment we all wanted to share in, so we all piled in the car continued the conversation and picked Annabelle up. She did wonder if it was some type of intervention! LOL!

Last, the letter “T” stands for Trust God For The Immeasurably More. Ephesians 3:20 says, “Now to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us.” You may be thinking how does this apply to Creating Summer Memories, well we’re looking at how to make the MOST of them and the one that can do that is God, much more than a travel agent or pinterest. I have watched God do the immeasurably more with the smallest of family memories to the greatest. He’s taken what might have seemed as an insignificant moment and made it magnificent, and I have seen Him take a really great moment and make it over the top majestic. The key to this one is allowing Him to work and us relinquishing the control.  One year we finally got to take the kids to Disney World. Already, God had been at work in putting this whole trip together. However, my husband, Bill, just wasn’t sure of it all. He just kept saying, I know we’re going to get to the park and they’re going to stick it to us! I kept trying to reassure him that everything was taken care of. That first day before we went to the park, Bill had been up praying and having his quiet time before we all got ready. As we drove to the park, the kids were all excited as there was a sky writer plane over the park writing something. Finally, we could see that it said “Trust Jesus!” Not only did the sky writing plane write it once, but twice to “Trust Jesus.” I looked at Bill and he looked a little shaken and I asked what’s wrong. He said, you’re not going to believe this but, this morning as I prayed I told God I was still anxious about this whole trip and that I needed to trust Him, but He was going to have to write it in the sky! Well, its obvious God did. We will never forget that moment, nor that trip, because God truly gave us the immeasurably more, and it was because of  Mickey’s Magic, but my God’s almighty power who wants to do the immeasurably more!

It is my prayer that all of you will make the M.O.S.T. of your summer memories as you allow God to help you create them and watch Him do the immeasurably more.