There are certain times each year that are filled with a sense of nostalgia. Summer is certainly one of them. When I think of my childhood summers, I think of days spent splashing in the pool, riding bikes to our local ice cream shop, entering the raffles for summer reading contests, driving around New England to explore new places, and spending nearly every waking moment outdoors. I loved (and still do) a balance of planned activities and those that happen at a moment’s notice.
I believe in the power of building meaningful rituals and traditions for families. And, I believe that those traditions are made better by including hefty doses of fun, spontaneity, and surprise. Rituals can create feelings of delight for children and parents. They can build core memories that will lead to feelings of nostalgia later on. As they say, one day we’ll be calling right now “the good old days“.
So this summer, I invite you to play a fun game with your family that I call The Summer Game. The concept is simple and fun and the possibilities are endless. It’s fully customizable to your family, and depending on the age of your kids, you can really engage them in the creation of it. If you have younger kids like I do, you can take the lead and watch their excitement throughout. Here’s how it goes.
Step 1: Create a Fun Summer Calendar
You can use a regular calendar or create your own on a big piece of paper, but most importantly – find something that you can decorate and is visible to your whole family. From there, enter in the events you already know about. I recommend including drawings to make it as fun and visual as possible – if you have a beach day planned, draw a little sun and water on that date! If you’re headed to a birthday party, draw a few balloons.
From there, choose a number of dates where you have no plans and want to build a spontaneous adventure. Write “Surprise!” on each date you choose, and make it colorful, to help increase the feelings of excitement and anticipation. I recommend trying to find at least 8-10 weeknights and 3-4 weekend days, though more or less is fine depending on your schedule. You might want to color them in or make sure they stand out in some way – these are days that you’ll all be excited about.
Step 2: Choose Your Potential Adventures
First, decide if you’ll have two separate “Surprise” categories – one for weeknights and one for weekend days. If you have more flexibility in your family, you might just need one basket, so do what works for you. Depending on how old your kids are, you might have them actively participate in this – if they are younger, you might do this step yourself and/or with your partner. Think about all of the potential surprise activities you might do. What’s most important is that they can be done without any preparation, since you’ll be choosing them and doing them in the moment. Here are some ideas to get you started:
- Go to your favorite ice cream shop
- Roast s’mores outside (or on the stove)
- Have a movie night [if you have multiple kids, you might include a few of these with each kid getting to pick the movie for that evening]
- Have a water balloon fight [make sure to have balloons on hand]
- Have a 30-minute dance party
- Go on a family bike ride
- Have a picnic
- Take a mini-road trip to a new town in Central Mass
- Play an outside game
- Build an epic fort
- Head to the nearest lake/ocean and go for a swim
- Go on a nature walk
- Stop by the library and pick up new summer books
The possibilities are endless! You should think of what YOUR family loves to do most, write down each activity on a separate piece of paper, and put them in a basket (or two, if you’re separating weeknights and weekends). Again, just remember that these should be easy to do at the moment without any significant preparation required.
Step 3: Enjoy the Surprises!
Now that your summer game is ready, all you need to do is enjoy the anticipation of each surprise day or evening. When you get to a “Surprise!” moment, you’ll have someone in your family pull an activity from the basket. And then – you’ll go off and do it, creating memories that will last a lifetime!
And of course, be sure to share your fun activities by tagging us at @CentralMassMom. Here’s to a summer of fun and adventure!
