Around the World in 80 days!

Hello world! We have been so busy setting up the daycare in the new house and navigating LOTS of changes that I have completely neglected the blog. Going to try to do better, if we can do so without letting other more important things go ;).

Summer is just about 80 days long. We needed a theme to build our summer camp around and "Around the World in 80 days" seemed like the perfect fit. It has been so fun so far!

Our first week we spent getting to know all the campers and getting our school age kids used to the daily routine. A few things we are doing over the summer:

*Older kids get an hour of reading time every day. Some kids love this more than others, but it's one of the most important things we can do to keep them sharp for school in the fall. Plus it gives them some structured "down time" in the middle of the day, which is important for all kiddos. To help keep them excited about this we are also...

*Taking trips to the library once or twice a week. We usually go on Mondays to check out books to read for the week and have been trying to make it to story time on Thursdays if we have the manpower. We have also signed up the kids for the summer reading program.

*We take field trips to see the PTA movie every week for some of the older kids. It has been a lot of fun and a nice diversion.

*Water days! Enough said ;)

*Lots of outside time: picnics, walks, sidewalk chalk, bubbles...

*Indoor and Outdoor Art projects coordinated with our themes

I am also SO SO happy to announce that due to the generosity of Joey's brother and a little overordering on his part, we now have a few patches of grass in the backyard! Once the sod is established in a week or two we should be able to spend more time out there now much more comfortably. We'll move the picnic tables back there and start using the sand and water table for different sensory activities outside. You can also see that the block wall on the south side of the house is now complete, which gives us much more room to play and explore.

We still have a long ways to go. That will take a lot of time, hard work and money so the progress might be slow. But I think that you would be surprised and how much fun dirt and a big old tree can be. I thought it was so ironic that we finally got a little green back there and all Maren wanted to do was still just play in the dirt!