Summer Fun Camp Success!
So every summer for probably the last five years Holli and I have held a summer fun camp. It's for ages 3 to 8 year. We have a theme for each day and then do fun crafts and activities based around that theme. We also send home a note to the parents that let tells them what their child did that day! This year's kid's camp was so much fun! We didn't have as many kids as we normally do but we still had a great turn out and a great time! I wish we could post pictures of everything we did but some people might not appreciate pictures of their kids on the internet! So instead I will just let you know what we did and post pictures of the crafts themselves!
"All About Me"
Holli had done a similar theme to this in her Child Development class so she came up with most of the ideas! We traced the kids on newsprint paper and let them draw themselves. We also had them make a mask of their face. It was made out of a paper plate!
Holli and I have decided that there are a million uses for paper plates as you'll soon find out! :)
We also had the kids draw out their families!
The activities we did were a couple of games. One was called "Bones, No Bones!" We got this idea from some website. It was hillarious! The kids really seemed to love it. What you do is you start describing an animal. When the kids guess what it is they start acting it out. Then you randomly call out "No Bones"! The kids then have to pretend like they don't have any bones and fall to the ground. Then we say "Bones!" and they get back up and act like the animal! We did this a few times with each animal! It was so funny to watch them just collapse to the ground! The other game we did was the "Hokey Pokey". These two games allowed us to talk to the children about their bodies while having lots of fun!
We always give the kids a snack as well. This year it was kindof difficult to come up with snacks for the themes. For 'All About Me" our snack was jello and cheez-its! Not mixed together of course! :) In our past experience we knew that jello wasn't always liked by kids for some strange reason, so we gave them cheez-its too!
"Happy Campers"
We let the kids create their own campfires with red and yellow paint and popsicle sticks. They were all so cute!
We also created a coiled snake with.....you guessed it- paper plates!
It was fun to see the kids get creative with how they designed their snakes!
We also played a fishing game. This was just a blue tarp that the kids got to throw a "fishing rod" over and get a prize - bug fruit snacks! We also played a super cute game called "No Bears Out Tonight". I used to play this with all my cousins when I was little. I loved it!
What it is: One person is "it". This person is the bear! So everyone else waits inside and counts to 20 while the bear is outside hiding (it's best played at night). Then the kids all come out in a line and follow a leader all over the yard chanting "No bears out tonight, no bears out tonight!" They have to follow the leader wherever she goes and say the chant exactly as she says it. If she says it quietly, everyone else says it quietly. If she says it super fast, they do too! Etc. Anyways, while the kids are going around the yard, they are looking out for the "bear". Eventually the bear will come out of his hiding place and try to tag a kid. Once the bear is spotted, the kids are allowed to leave the line and the game then becomes a game of tag! It is super cute! The kids just love to try and find the bear before he comes out of hiding! Lots of screams! Lots of fun!
We also created a tent with the kids using chairs and blankets. Then we read them some camping themed stories with a flashlight! The kids really seemed to enjoy this! Our snack was an adventure for this one. We made s'mores in the microwave! Super sticky but totally amazingly yummy! We definitely had to let the kids wash up after these!
"Playing With Food"
This one was so fun! We let the kids make fruit loolp necklaces. They also made a pasta picture frame out of popsicle sticks. These turned out super cute!
A fun craft/activity we then did was they played with "playdough cookies". It was basically sugar cookie dough but different colors because we added food coloring. They created different shapes or animals with there piece of the dough then we baked them. These became their snack later on. Another game we did was we played "Fruit Basket". I don't know if this is a common game that people play or if it's just something common we play in our family. This game is a favorite with me and my cousins as well.
Anyways, what we do is, depending on the number of people of playing, you assign everyone a fruit. There needs to be at least 2 or 3 people with each fruit. Then someone is in the middle. They call out one of the fruits. The people who are that fruit have to then get up and switch places with the others with that fruit. Meanwhile the person in the middle is going to try and steal one of their seats. Whoever is left without a seat is then in the middle. The person who is it can also call out "fruit basket". If they say this, everyone has to get up and change places. This game can get pretty crazy when we play it with family but it is super fun! I think the kids enjoyed it too, though they were a lot more mild then we were used to! :) We also had a matching game prepared for the kids. It was with pictures of different foods. We ended up not having enough time to play it though!
"Bird Buddies"
This theme was the most challenging "prep-wise", but it was fun! We let the kids make these super cute peacocks using paper plates for the tails. We let them use stickers to help decorate them!
They also made cute turkey hats. These were so funny! Loved them!
The favorite craft of the kids, so it seemed, was the binoculars! We let the kids decorate a couple rectangles of paper, pre-cut. Then we wrapped these around toilet paper rolls, taped them together, and attached string. They loved these!
We had pictures of birds all over our living room and we let the kids use their binoculars and look for all the birds. This entertained them for so long! Cute!
We also played "Duck, Duck, Goose" with them. One of the little boys who is just barely three years old, (I won't say names!) was so funny! He didn't really understand the game exactly. He would follow the person who was "it" while they were going around the circle. Then when the person who was "It" would say "goose" to someone he would just start screaming, laughing and start running around the circle as if he were "it". It was super cute and so fun to watch! :) Our snack was peanut butter crackers and cheese crackers. You know those ones that are the "Austin" brand...I think! There were a few kids who didn't enjoy this snack so we had to get out our leftover cheez-its for them. Oh well! :)
"Color Explosion"
I absolutely loved this day! The crafts were ADORABLE! First we made a coffee filter butterfly. We gave the kids each a coffee filter and told them to color it however they want with markers.
We just let them scribble all over it with different colors. Then we took them outside and squirt them with a squirt bottle and hung them out to dry. This made the colors all blur together creating beautiful designs. We then folded them up and put pipe cleaners around them to create the butterflies. We had lots of kids on this day so we didn't get this part finished in time. We'll be delivering them to the kids soon.
My sisters and I had so much fun with this craft that we made like three each after we finished cleaning everything up! :)
Our next craft was kites. We had a picture of a kite and we let the kids decorate them. We gave them sequins to glue on and glitter. Then we gave them a crepe paper tail. So cute!
We also played "Balloon Relay" using colorful balloons. The balloons would pop on the grass though so we ended up using balls. What they did was they had to hit the balls with swimming noodles across the lawn...while racing another kid. Whoever got to the end first won! We also did a colorful egg scavenger hunt. This was basically an Easter egg hunt with a different name! :) The eggs all had prizes in them! Our last activity was we let the kids play with homemade play-do. They loved this! The snack was the best of all though! We made rice krispy treats with Fruity Pebbles. These were delicious and colorful! We ended up making two more batches afterward because they are seriously delicious!!!!
"Road Trip"
This day we didn't have very many kids but it was still lots of fun! First they painted in the colors of a street light. They just love painting.
They also made a school bus. Well actually they just glued yellow tissue paper all over it. This gave it a cool texture!
We also had the kids create a train. First we traced the kids arms to create the shape for the train. Then they cut it out and cut it in pieces to make the different cars for the train. We let them glue it on a big piece of paper and color it. Then they glued on some cotton balls to make the steam.
We also did a fun obstacle course outside. The kids had fun racing eachother. We also played "Red light, Green light"! This was so cute. We told the kids they couldn't run so it was fun to watch them try to walk as quick as they could! Our snack was yummy CARamel corn. Tasty!
"Make Believe"
On this day we did crafts and activities that had the kids use their imaginations.
The kids created their own monster puppets. We let them cut out and design a monster then helped them glue it to a paper bag. We also helped them use googly eyes, yarn, and crepe paper too! They turned out super cute!
We were going to have them make up stories with their puppets at the end but we ran out of time. We ended up telling them the story of Goldilocks and the Three Bears with these puppets we made out of wooden spoons. So fun!
The kids also made a crown using....yep paper plates! We let them glue on pom poms and foam stickers. I seriously love these crowns. They are so adorable!
We also played charades. The kids had to think of an animal and act it out. They got pretty creative! Our snack was lemon creme, strawberry creme, and peanut butter creme cookies. These were three different cookies....not mixed into one! :) haha! They were pretty yummy!
"Water Wonders"
This was our last day. It's always the most fun! The kids (most of them) came in their swimsuits ready for our water day! :) We had the sprinklers on the trampoline and a fun slip 'n slide! We let the kids do two crafts which was new this year. Normally they just play in the water the whole time. This turned out to be really fun for the kids.
They made Hawaiian leis using cut out flowers and straws.
They also made maracas using beans and....yep...paper plates! The kids got to color the paper plates first to decorate it! Theirs were much cuter than ours! :) 
While the kids did their crafts we had leftover snacks on the table that they got to snack on. Mainly it was fruit loops and our caramel popcorn. I think the kids liked this too! :) We also played some games with the kids. We had a water balloon toss, which, as always, turned into a water balloon fight! We have the kids pick up at least 3 pieces of balloons and throw them away before they got another balloon! This helps keep the yard cleaned up! We also had squirt guns for the kids to play with! It was all just super fun! For snack, they got to have a couple otter pops!
I hope this is ok that we put these pictures on here! They were just so cute I had to...if it's not ok just let me know and I'll take them off! I don't think that very many people look at this blog though so it should be ok! :)
We really had a blast this year! Thank you to all who came. We just love your kids! They are so cute and fun to be with. We are seriously just laughing the whole time, having fun! I can't wait 'til next year to have another Summer Fun Camp!
