Spring tulips will keep your kids on track

Summer vacation is fast approaching! The thought sends both thrills and chills down any parent’s spine. It’s a season that makes memories to be sure, but at the same time challenges parents to keep kids busy for up to 73 days! Your family may find that summer vacation goes a bit smoother with “spring tulips” to guide your way. These flowers hold playful goals for the summer, and will record your family’s most memorable activities as the summer flies by around you.

Spring tulips are easy and fun for any family to do. First, cut out a few dozen tulips, or other flower-shaped form, from construction paper. The resulting flower should be between three and four inches long, in order to fit a sentence or two. You’ll also need to designate an area of a wall, refrigerator, or other open space, where these flowers will be displayed.

Throughout the spring, encourage your family to come up with fun activities that they would like to do over the summer. Especially if the weather is still keeping you indoors, this is a great mental escape for everyone. It’s an enjoyable activity at dinner, or when tucking little ones in at night. By the end of spring, try to have 20 or 30 ideas with each activity written on one flower. Feel free to be creative and come up with things your family uniquely enjoys. They can be as complicated as “take a cruise,” or as basic as “play with water balloons in the backyard.” Often, the simpler the idea the better, and definitely the more flowers the greater the fun! Once you have all your spring tulips filled out, tape them up in the area you’ve set aside. Ideally you should display them just before the start of summer vacation.

You’ll find this flower garden to be a wealth of learning in the spring and inspiration over the summer. For kids of all ages, the garden gives them direct experience with planning ahead, goal setting, and the tracking of accomplishments. It’s a fun activity that will motivate them to brainstorm, be creative, and voice their opinions.

You’ll also learn that this garden is indispensable when the inevitable summer-boredom sets in. Instead of having to remind your children of all the wonderful toys they have to play with, you can simply prompt them to stroll through the flowers and remember the activities they have been waiting to enjoy.

As each idea is completed, the flowers can be taken down and tucked away into photo albums or scrapbooks. In the end you’ll be left with a stack of reminders of the summer that always seems to disappear too fast. You might even look back on the summer with renewed appreciation, as your family finds a way to enjoy every minute of the irreplaceable time you have together.