Most of us are a couple of weeks into the School Holidays now and if you’re kids are anything like mine, the novelty of lazing round the house and playing out has started to wear off.
I spend the first two weeks of the holidays at work so it was up to my dad to entertain them most days and to be fair, he did a great job with trips to the beach, the park and even a day trip to Edinburgh but now I have a couple of weeks off, they have high expectations that we’re going to be doing something different every day. Being the fantastic mother that I am (or is it more just because I’ll take any opportunity to write myself a list), I spent a whole morning last week writing out a holiday plan so that we have a list of things to do that mean we can have as much fun as possible on our budget.
First of all, I checked the websites of all the musuems in our area to see what activities are on over the holidays. Most museums round here are free and they’re all running Summer Holiday activities for children so I’ve written a list of who’s doing what and when, along with any charge for the activity (the maximum is £1 each). We’re going to be doing everything from making Saxon princess jewels to decorating plant pots over the next few weeks.
I’ve looked on the websites for our local parks to find out if they’re having any fun days and managed to find a Teddy Bears Picnic going on tomorrow and we’ve had fun choosing the teddys we’re going to take if only the rain holds off.
Our local cinema are doing Saturday morning showings of childrens films for £1 each and the nearby bowling alley are d
oing bowling and a meal for £4.95 per child so they’ve been added on to our holiday plan aswell.
The nature reserve near us are doing bug walks for £1.00 each and I’ve also found a slightly more expensive bat walk for £5.00 each that I really fancy doing myself so it’s on the list as a maybe, depending on the weather I think.
We’re planning on a weekend camping, just somewhere local that won’t cost much and we’re going to borrow the equipment if possible so we can see if we actually enjoy camping before we buy our own gear. We’re going to prepare ourselves for our first camping experience by having a campover in the living room one night which is more my sort of camping.
I’ve also looked at as many websites of local attractions, farms and anything else I can think of to see if there are any special events on over the next few weeks and added them on to the list along with the price of a family ticket so we can budget for the things that we do want to do.
We have plenty of things to do at home as well, everything from washing the car (their request) and water bombs to making finger puppets and gloop (stay tuned) and lots of baking and cooking. It’s usually the free things that the kids enjoy the most – chalks on the pavement, homemade bubble mix and water pistols in the garden, anything that involves getting wet or messy always goes hown well here!
We’re also planning a car boot sale to clear out some toys and clothes that they don’t want anymore and the money we make from that is going to be spent on paint or wallpaper for the kids rooms as Mr Frugal has two weeks off straight after my two weeks and we’re planning on roping him in to a bit of decorating.
So there you have it, how to have fun in the Summer Holidays without having to take out a loan or spend a fortune. If you’ve got any more ideas, I’d love to hear them though as we could do with a few more things to add to our list….
