2017 Summer Bucket List Final Update + 2017 FALL BUCKET LIST!!

We managed to knock a bunch of additional items off of our Summer Bucket List since our last update. This was not a banner season in terms of bucket list accomplishments, but I think it definitely marked a turning point in the kids' growth—they are in dire need of free down time and quite capable of entertaining themselves. They'd wake up pumped for an activity but then just ask for time to putter about. That being said, fall is definitely one of their favorite seasons and they were all about creating a new fall list!

First up, here's how we finished up summer:

16. New science exhibit -- we loved the new to us exhibits at the California Academy of Sciences!

17. New historical site -- our report on Angel Island and Alcatraz are still on the way, but I'll note that we had an unexpected amazing trip to historical Angel Island.

18. Have a picnic -- we had a lovely picnic lunch on the top of a waterfall in Yosemite—post to come this week!

19. Find a new beach -- we found new beaches at both Angel Island and in Yosemite.

20. Workbooks -- the kids were total champs at working on reading, math, and writing over the summer and completed several workbooks each.

21. Rock climbing -- Yosemite!

22. Find a waterfall -- Again, Yosemite. Our bucket list thanks you.

23. Baseball game -- G O N A T S

24. Ride in a boat -- boat to both Angel Island and Alcatraz.

25. See sunrise -- we left really early for Cali and caught the sun coming up on our ride to the airport.

26. See sunset -- and then we saw the sun go down behind Golden Gate Bridge our first night there!

27. Watch a meteor shower -- not technically a meteor shower, but I'm counting the eclipse for this one. It was super cool.

28. + 29. Two new museums -- we went to several new museums this summer, but I'll count the DeYoung and San Fransisco MOMA (post also yet to come) for this.

30. New science project -- saltwater taffy slime!

31. + 32. Two service projects -- the kids both helped their grandfather deliver food with Meals on Wheels and Cami also chopped off 10+ inches of her hair for Locks of Love.

33., 34., and 35. -- three new NPS passport stamps in California at Muir Woods, Alcatraz, and Yosemite.

Now, on to the Fall Bucket List!

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2017 Summer Bucket List Update #1

We're a little late with our Summer Bucket List update this year, but we've been knocking things off in a somewhat more random haphazard way this year. The weeks the kids have been home from camp or we haven't been traveling had been filled with absurdly hot weather and other extracurricular  activities, so we simply haven't had a whole lot of down time to really get at our list. Plus, now that the kids are older and more independent, it's easier to just kind of putter about. We don't seem to need our bucket list to spur our every day activities. But, we've still tackled a good number of things so far this year ....

1. Summer playlist -- the kids are killing me with our playlist on repeat. Despacito needs to die. But we can cross that off our list!

2. Unplug for a day -- ironically the kids have had a lot of technology-free days this summer as a result of losing technology privileges for what feels like constant squabbling. They currently have audiobook privileges only, but they're always hopeful.

3. Buy lots of peonies -- I got a big bunch of beautiful peonies for my birthday -- thanks fam!

4. Cook together -- the kids have really bumped up their helping around the house game this summer and have actually been helping me cook quite a bit. I think their chocolate chip cookies were insanely good.

5. Go running together -- they are both into cross-training and strength and conditioning for their various sports, so we've been running together a bit (although not so much now that it's hotter than hell in DC!).

6. New hike -- when they are home from camp, they must assist in Penny duties. So we picked up a Rock Creek Park trail map and have been discovering all new hiking trails.

7. Water balloons -- easy fill water balloons are a total game changer. We had an epic water balloon fight over July 4th.

8. Sparklers -- the kids' grandparents put together a stunning display of sparklers and fireworks for the holiday. Penny was not happy.

9. New art museum -- we LOVED our visit to Artechouse.

10. 1 new science experiment -- we had a blast using saline solution to make a whole new kind of slime last week!

11. Family olympics -- our friends returned for another epic family olympics over July 4th. This year we had a bucket-filling contest, an unwind-a-streamer race, a shaving cream head/cheetos toss, a three-legged race, and the water balloon fight. And everyone cheated.

12. Swim club cookout -- the kids love our new pool and the swim team! Every Tuesday the pool lights up the charcoal grills for you, so that's when we grill :)

13. New sewing project -- Cam has been taking sewing lessons and made a quilted pillow and is working on a backpack now.

14. 1 new service project -- the kids accompanied their grandfather on one of his Meals on Wheels deliveries and got a big kick out of helping him. I hear they were a big hit too.

15. Chase fireflies -- we had a great dinner with the kids at our friends' house and the kids spent a lot of time debating the best way to catch but not kill fireflies. They caught at least a few when they stopped talking.

Summer Workbook Fun

We haven't been crushing our Summer Bucket List in our usual fashion this year (although I promise an update next week!), but I am so proud of the fact that we've managed to make time to get a little math, reading, and writing in almost every week day. Sure, summer is about not-school, but also we really needed to be better about avoiding the seasonal slide. In any event, we're sharing our ways to make summer workbook time more fun over on the OOLY blog today -- check it out for a little colorful inspiration! 

The 2017 Summer Bucket List -- 85+ Ideas to Save Your Summer!!

Woohoo!!! Summer is here! Well, not technically, but our kids are out of school so I'm calling it. And around our house that means it's Summer Bucket List time. The kids took a heavy role in making the list this year and I loved seeing how their interests have changed since last summer (or not). We carried over a few of our favorites from past lists as well. And we had a fair number we didn't get to check off our Spring Bucket List, so those make a reappearance. All in all though, we are pretty psyched to get cracking!

p.s. need additional inspiration for your summer? Don't forget that Banish Boredom is chock full of fun ideas from science experiments to family field trips!

Final 2016 Summer Bucket List Update

We had a fabulous summer! I finally feel like I had just the right balance of camp, travel, and free time with the kiddos (although I think they actually would have liked more camp). We actually didn't knock that many more items off our Summer Bucket List this last month--mostly because we had a lot of DIY projects left and we were either traveling or out and about in DC because we've been doing work on the house. But 73 things for the whole season isn't too shabby (last year we hit 55 and 46 the year before that). Here's how we finished it up!

61. - 62. 2 New Museums -- we went to lots of new museums this summer, but the two I'm counting are the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art and the National History Museum of Ireland.

Balloon Stamp Painting

At this point in the summer, the kids are sort of over trying new things. They are over each other. They are frankly over me (how dare they!). But they both donned immediate huge smiles, laughed, and had a total blast when I broke out this balloon stamp painting project last week. I honestly can't remember where I spotted this project first—somewhere in the depths of Pinterest, probably. It's not an original idea, but it's a truly fabulous outdoor paint project. I highly recommend giving it a try to get you through these dog days of summer!

2016 Summer Bucket List Update #2

We had a good Summer Bucket List haul in July. Between our beach trip and a lot of downtime at home, we were busy bees!! We are up to 60 things at the end of the month ... BUT we have 59 more left on our list so we best keep after it. How's your summer going so far!?

23. - 38. Fifteen geocaches -- I'll admit it. We are Pokemon Go obsessed in our house. I do like that it's a fun new form of geocaching and we had no problem catching fifteen fairly quickly.

Whale (Dolphin) Watching off the Jersey Shore

The kids' grandparents booked an amazing whale watching tour over our July trip to the Jersey Shore. I've seen killer whales once on a Seattle ferry ride, but the kids never have. And with all our recent watching of Shark Week, they were pumped to get out on the water and put their newfound marine explorer skills to work. We didn't spot any whales, but we saw a TON of dolphins and had a beautiful (and much cooler) ride along the shore.

Blow Painting

Blow painting certainly isn't an original art project—I've seen it all over the interwebs and art books. And there are absolutely more involved projects based on the simple premise (we've got some in the works!). But we finally got around to trying blow painting and so loved the process and results of the basic project that I had to share.

Ocean City, NJ Boardwalk

I truly never really heard about New Jersey growing up. Maybe that was just a Midwest thing. Sure, I knew that it was a state (I think), but not much beyond that. And anything I gleaned as I grew older was not favorable.

Grow Your Own Crystals!

This science project was one of our most favorite from our Summer Bucket List so far! The crystals grew incredibly fast and are super sturdy. And we are all about anything mythical these days. Head over to Honest to Nod to check out how we made these awesome unicorn crystals!

2016 Summer Bucket List Update #1

I feel like I say this every year, but it's truly hard to believe that we are a month into summer already! It's making me a little sad to see it zooming by, BUT we are crushing our Summer Bucket List. So at least there's that. We've knocked almost a quarter of our items off the list. Some are serving double duty, but with over 101 items on the list, I'm taking some liberties.

Did you make your own bucket list?! We'd love to see what everyone is up to this summer!!

*links to Amazon are affiliate links.

1. New library -- our favorite local library is closing for renovations this summer, so we finally checked out the public library closest to our "new" house. Win!

Tips to Create Your Own Summer Bucket List

Still thinking about what activities to include in your summer plans? We're well into our own Summer Bucket List, but if you'd like to make your own, check out our tips over at Z Living!

Icy Goop

We are no strangers to making goop (our basic recipe even made it into Banish Boredom), but I thought we could do a cool take on the activity to make a great combo of art, science, and sensory fun. Enter icy goop.

Alphabet Hunt Bingo

A few years ago, I put together a Number Hunt Bingo game for the kids and it turned out to be SO much fun. We put an alphabet hunt on our bucket list that same year, but never got around to it! I was determined this year and liked that the kids were a little further along in their reading than when I first thought of the idea. It forced me to get creative and come up with different levels of challenges using the same cards.

I put together two separate sets of alphabet hunt games. First, bingo cards that we used to explore our neighborhood. At first I let the kids mark off any letters they saw. Kane went up to one or two street signs and did just that and very quickly found Bingo on most of his cards. Cam said she didn't want to take the "easy way out" -- she was looking for "a challenge." So she picked a row of letters on each Bingo card and went out in search of those particular letters. And she usually picked letters that were difficult to find (Q, W, etc.), but found them all over the place -- on city buses, campaign signs, license plates, house placards, etc. Pretty telling of their personalities! To give Kane an extra challenge, I said he had to find words that started with the letters on the card -- not just any word that contained the letters. That slowed him down a bit.

Once we got back to the house, they each picked a bingo card and then found corresponding letter "prompt cards" I made. If they'd used the letter E to get bingo, for example, they picked the E prompt card. Then they had to think of as many words as they could that started with that letter. They had a lot of fun and thought of some great words. Kane particularly got a kick out of thinking of Harry Potter and Star Wars-related words that started with the letter Q.

If you're looking for a fun game with a broad reach in reading skill, try it out! If your kiddos are on the young side, just go searching for the letters on the Alphabet Bingo Cards. And if they are starting to write, have them practice writing letters on each prompt card. If they are older, try one of the variations we did. We used pencils to mark off our Bingo sheets, but you can also use Bingo chips and do this at home just by looking for items you see around the room.

You can download the Bingo cards by clicking RIGHT HERE. And the Alphabet Prompt cards by clicking RIGHT HERE.

Enjoy!

2016 Summer Bucket List -- 101+ Ideas of Family Fun for the Summer!!

I can hardly believe that our kiddos are out of school in just a few days! While summer doesn't technically start until June 20th, our summer starts when school is done. So that means it's time for a new bucket list! We crossed a paltry 19 items off of our spring list—it just wasn't meant to happen for us this past season. But we are back and we mean business. Follow us along on Instagram to see our progress—we'd love to hear what everyone has going on too!!

2015 Final Summer Bucket List Update

Well, we didn't hit all 75+ items from this year's Summer Bucket List. I blame July. July was pretty pitiful in terms of crossing things off. But our August vacations helped put a good last dent in it. We came out at 55 activities for the season. Better than last year (46), not quite as good as the year before (60). In any event, our whole family is now a bit obsessed with the bucket list idea, so I'm thinking we might do one for every season (although, obviously not as prolific as the summer lists since school's in session). We'll see .... Here's how this summer ended up.

41. Stargazing -- we finally explored the Rock Creek Planetarium and joined one of the Wednesday Young Planetarium programs.

Dip-Dyed S'Mores!!

Happy National S'Mores Day, all! We've had s'mores sitting on our Summer Bucket List all season and when I spied this technicolor take, I knew we had to give it a try. The kiddos were a little impatient (who could blame them), so our colors didn't end up quite as bright, but it was a super fun and colorful take on a traditional treat! Plus, no campfire needed!

Here's what you'll need to make ours:
- gel food colors
- giant marshmallows (these are an actual thing and easier for the kids to hold and dye)
- graham crackers
- choice of chocolate bar

Place a few drops of each food color in separate bowls and add a bit of water. I suggest keeping the diluted color at a level roughly equal to the middle of the marshmallow -- we liked the double-color look the best and it's easiest to do that way. Dip a marshmallow in the color and hold for a minute (or 20 seconds if you're my kids). Flip the marshmallow onto its undipped end to dry -- about 10 minutes (or 20 seconds if you're my kids). Dye the other end of the marshmallow in another color. Set aside to dry for another 10 minutes.

Turn your oven to broil. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and assemble the s'mores. For our first batch, we did a graham cracker, topped by a marshmallow, and then a bit of chocolate bar. The chocolate ended up melting and sliding off the giant mallow, so we recommend putting the s'mores together as: graham cracker + chocolate bar + marshmallow. Place them under the broiler for just about 1 - 1 1/2 minutes. Top with another graham cracker and go to town.

2015 Summer Bucket List Update #2

July was a total whirlwind -- between camp and lots of travel, we just didn't get to go at our Summer Bucket List like we did in June (see our first update here!). We were monumentally busy, just doing things that weren't on our list -- LOTS of beach time, taking family to see favorites places, adjusting to new camps, etc. And even though "back to school" talk has already piped up, we're looking at another whole month of summer fun. In the meantime, here are the few additional activities we knocked off our list.

33. Dye hair -- Cam got some temporary hot pink streaks, which were fabulous.

2015 Summer Bucket List Update #1

Ooooweee!! We've made it through the first month of summer break and are due for a 2015 Summer Bucket List update. We are en fuego this year, I'm not gonna lie. We have a bunch of camp and trips coming up, so I'm expecting our rate to slow down a bit. But the kids are on a real mission this summer -- we've crossed a whopping 32 activities off our list through July 4th!! Check it our below and get to summering!

1. - 5.  Five new geocaches -- I'm not sure if we've just really nailed picking solid caches or it's the few years experience hunting that we've got under our belt now, but we found all five caches we looked for thus far.