Works for Me Wednesday - Summer Boredom Busters

The challenge for this week's WFMW is to find ways to keep your kids busy when the dreaded "I'm bored" whine starts. Well, at our house my kids know those words are the equivalent of saying "Mom, please find me some chore to keep me busy and out of your hair for the next twenty minutes." Now, no kid in their right mind is going to ask for this more than a few times so I don't hear the whine of boredom, but I do see it in their faces. Summers are supposed to be lazy and carefree - but I've yet to have one of those. We have a steady stream of neighborhood kids (and those who aren't quite as local, but then I become Taxi Mom as well) in and out through the summer. DD10 also has good friend she likes to spend time with in the summer that doesn't live too far away, but during the school year their schedules just don't line up. We do the summer reading program at the library (whoo hoo for Mrs. Connie, she's the best!), visit lots of local museums and zoos and we have our weekly Girl Scout meetings and several trips and events. You would think with all that our summer is pretty full, but no, my friend, it's not full enough to keep my kids busy. But, we're not done yet. We're also homeschooling this summer. We're taking off this week and then next week we'll be back to the books. We're covering math, science, social studies and spelling. I'm counting the summer reading program as our literature through the months of June and July so we're not doing any of that and I'm giving them a grammar break after their research reports (just 'cause I'm nice like that once in while).

Some of our planned outings for this summer are

• the Joplin museum complex (free on Mondays)


• George Washington Carver birthplace (free)


• safari sanctuary & blue bell factory tour (with our church)


• precious moments park (free)


• Independence zoo and water park (with Girl Scouts)


• Prairie Days Festival (with Girl Scouts, but counting as history field trip)


• Troop camping


• Family camping


• Tulsa zoo

Granted, we won't be on the road or educating every minute of the day. For those times when the kids really need something to do we set up a fort (with the new house they can make a mondo-fort upstairs), pull out the art supplies or spend the day at the pool. Free (or very inexpensive) fun to be had with little-to-no prep time for mom.

Works for Me Wednesday

Once again my house is calm, peaceful and without the force that is MIL. So, what's a girl to do with all this wonderful free time? Return to blogville of course! Today's meme is Works for Me Wednesday hosted by We Are That Family, and it's one of my favorites. Once I realized it was Wednesday I began to ponder what little tidbit to share today. We are not particularly interesting people or impressively frugal or talented in rare circus feats (although we are working on the frugal part, the other, not so much). But, I did find something pretty cool to share (no, not sword swallowing or jumping through fire, but still pretty cool, I think). This nifty little plant is called house leak (if you are my mother) or stone crop (if you are MIL). My mom said the name came from planting it under the leaks in your gutters so it was well watered, my mom is true hill-folk, so that's probably not the name. I'm not sure what you call it, but it's an awesome cure-all. It's a lot like an aloe plant, but I think it's lots prettier and you can plant it anywhere. In the summer it gets pretty little flowers on the top, usually yellow or pink, and comes back year after year. To use if for any kind of owie (burns, stings, scrapes, etc) mash up a few leaves and use like antibiotic cream. My mom used this on me when I was little and I've used it on both K and S as well as Hub. It doesn't smell funny or burn so the kids like it and it's got a soothing feel, and for some reason Mom's Magic Mush (as it is so lovingly called around here) seems to work better than the pricey stuff from the drug store. Maybe it's the mom touch added to it.