What Works for You?

We are already to the end of our second week of summer vacation (man that flew by...please go slower...thankyouverymuch). The first week all the boys did was watch TV and play video games. GASP!! Seriously...I am a teacher who advocates daily reading and workbooks to her future students and here are my children vegging out in front of everything noneducational. When I was a kid on summer vacation I was out from sunup to sundown, but living in AZ (with over 100* daily temps) and the times that we live in, that is hard to do now-a-days.

What to do???

I talked to some of my friends and using some of their ideas and suggestions, Ryan and I came up with something that may work in our house!

So this past Tuesday I took the boys to Michael's (one of the bestest stores EVER!) to get the supplies that we needed!

They each got their first initial of their first name to paint in the color of their choice.

( I love love love that when Brendan concentrates his tongue is always out!)

When the paint dried, I hot glued some wire (and my fingers OUCH) around the letters and let dry. When the paint and wires dried I hung the initials on my kitchen wall near the pantry & fridge. (not exactly my kitchen decor, but the boys made them so I love them!)

Since we have wires we need magnets, right?!

So that is what we have...star magnets!

What's the deal with the star magnets you ask?

Well...the boys can earn 1 star magnet each for a variety of things like doing chores, reading for 30 minutes, doing 5 pages in their workbooks, or doing random acts of kindness. But in addition to earning stars...they can also loose them! Yep...they get 1 warning if they are fighting with each other or whining or throwing temper tantrums or not listening and then they can loose a star...sad but true!

We have only been doing it for a few days (since Tuesday to be exact) and it is working fabulously! They love earning their stars! Oh and when they earn 10 stars they get to trade them in for something fun like going to McDonald's for a Happy Meal (which is something they don't get very often) or a trip to Sonic for a favorite slushie or a trip to the ice cream shop, just to name a few!

Something else that we are doing is going electronic free for at least 2 hours a day. That means no TV or video games. They can play games, go swimming, read, do workbook pages, whatever as long as it doesn't have an on/off switch!

This is HUGE for us as we are a TV family...including me & Ryan! We always have the TV on, but with this new rule Ryan & I are also going electronic free. It's very exciting!

So tell me...How do you keep your kids entertained or contained or educated during summer vacation?? Please share...I would love to know!!