Build a Fort

Welcome to Week 6 of our 8 Week Summer Boredom Buster Series. 

This week’s boredom buster idea is a great way to get your kids using their imaginations and learning to work in teams. 

Dig through your basement or garage and even possibly visit your local appliance store for old cardboard boxes.  Give them to the kids along with some old blankets, markers, and paint and let them build and decorate a fort.  If you have enough boxes and enough kids, let the kids split into teams and have a contest to see who can build the biggest and best fort.  After their fort is built they can use it to play in or hold secret club meetings.  This oldie but goody boredom buster idea will keep them busy for hours. 

Star Gazing

Welcome to Week 5 of our 8 Week Summer Boredom Buster Series. 

Take some time during the cool summer nights to star gaze with your kids.  It is a great way to wind down your day and you can keep the kids busy during the day researching and getting ready for the star gazing event.

How to Get Started

Check your family calendar or planner for a date that works best for everyone.  To make the most of your star gazing event, you will need to wait until after the sun sets and the sky is very dark, so be sure to pick a night when the kids and you don’t have to get up early the next day. 

Get your kids started on researching the constellations in the sky.  You can do this in a variety of ways and here are some ideas and resources to help get them started.

Create an Interactive Sky Chart - This online sky chart will show you where the stars and planets are in relation to your horizons and zenith.  It is a free application, but does require a parent registration.

Make a Star Finder - Kids can download this neat star finder project to help learn about the constellations.

Constellation Crosswords - Use these constellation word searches and crossword puzzles to help reinforce what your kids have learned.

Book It - Visit your local library to find some books on star gazing and constellations

Astronomy 101 - Use this online guide to help orient you and more easily find the stars and constellations.

Things You Will Need

Here is a quick list of things you will need to make the most of your star gazing adventure.

The star chart or finder

A big blanket or reclining lawn chairs

A red flashlight or a regular flashlight with red cellophane over the lens.  A red flashlight makes for easier night vision.

Snacks

Bug Spray

A dark location free of artificial light

Optional: Binoculars

Good Luck!

Kids Off The Couch

Welcome to Week 4 of our 8 Week Summer Boredom Buster Series. 

Keep kids from getting bored this summer with Kids Off the Couch.  A perfect blend of culture, family time, and film, Kids Off the Couch is a great way to help kids make connections, explore their local community, and learn through film.  Each week, the smart people at Kids Off the Couch, put together a Popcorn Adventure that includes a film and a related family activity designed to get kids and parents off the couch and exploring and enjoying their local communities.  Nestled in between the film and family activity are thoughtful conversation starters for each film to stimulate conversation and get kids and parents talking.  Families can choose to subscribe to this free service either via the Kids Off the Couch weekly newsletter or visit the multitude of Popcorn Adventures in the site’s archives. 

Some Things to Think About

Unless you have the movie in your DVD collection you will have to do some pre-work in terms of finding the movie either from places like your local library, your local DVD rental store, online swapping websites like SwapaDVD, or purchasing it directly from the Kids Off the Couch shop. 

Because the Popcorn Adventures get families off the couch and into their communities, you will need to make time on your family calendar or planner for the adventure.

Currently Kids Off the Couch offers detailed information and tips for adventures in New York, Houston, Boston, Chicago, and San Francisco, and Washington D.C., so if you don’t live in or near one of these cities you will have to do your own research to find the family activities nearby.  Kids Off the Couch will help you do this by showing you how to Google similar activities in your local town.  If you live in a small town or rural area, be prepared to travel a bit to find some of the activities in a nearby community.

Before you try your first adventure, be sure to read through the Kids Off the Couch tips to make the first adventure go smoothly.

Good Luck!

New Shipping and Blog Subscription Options

We have recently made some changes to our shipping options and blog. 

We have expanded our shipping options both within the US and Internationally.  Customers within the US now have two shipping options when shopping our store, USPS 2-3 Business Day Delivery and USPS 5-7 Business Day Delivery.  And for our customers outside the US, there are now two shipping options as well, USPS 6-10 Business Day Delivery and USPS 10-21 Business Day Delivery.

Our blog readers now have two ways of receiving blog updates and new posts.  Our blog readers can now subscribe to the blog via the RSS feed OR via email in the upper right corner of the blog.