It’s been hot outside — or so I’ve been told. (I have icebergs floating in my veins from the deliciously body-numbing air conditioning at work. This morning I turned on my space heater so I could thaw. How pathetic.)

If the heat is heatin’ up and you want to have some cool-down fun with your grandchildren, grab some squirt guns and some sidewalk chalk.  Fill your squirt guns and head out to your driveway or sidewalk.

With the chalk, draw a bull’s eye on your sidewalk.  Give each ring in the bull’s eye a point value.  Have your grandchild stand five steps away from it and see if she can squirt the center of the bull’s eye.  Give her five chances to hit it and add up her points according to the ring in the bull’s eye that she hit.

Have her take three more steps away from the bull’s eye.  Give her five chances to hit the bull’s eye.  Add up her points.  Have one or two ‘prizes’ for her to choose from according to the points that she got. (The larger the prize the more points she needs to have made.)

You could do a couple of variations to this activity.  With the chalk, write the numbers from one through ten.  Give your grandchild simple addition or subtraction problems.  After she figured out the answer in her head, she is to squirt the ‘answer’ number with her squirt gun.

Write out the alphabet.  Give her words to spell.  She spells them by squirting the letters on the sidewalk.

Have her draw a simple picture (like the outline of a flower).  Time her to see how long it takes to wash the picture off the sidewalk by squirting it.  Have her do this two or three times to see if she can beat her time.

Grandma needs to have a squirt gun for this next activity.  Set two containers (plastic bowl or cup) a few feet away from you.  See which of you can fill your container with water by squirting the water from your squirt gun into it.

End your activity with a good old fashioned squirt gun water fight.  Then, sit on your porch and eat a popsicle.

What activities have you done with your grandchild to cool off during the hot summer heat?

Excuses, excuses, excuses.  That’s all I’ve got.  Excuses as to why I haven’t posted anything for a whole week.

Excuse #1:  I had an activity every single night last week.  (And I work during the day.)  So when is a granny supposed to post something to her blog, I ask you?  As you can see, it didn’t happen.

Excuse #2:  Not only do I work full-time during the day, I do freelance writing in my spare time.  (Spare time = 2:00 a.m.)  I have a writing deadline coming up so I am furiously pecking away at the keyboard.

Excuse #3: Well . . . uh . . . mmmmmm . . . I think I have run out of excuses. . . .

Because I’m squinched for time, I am re-posting something that I wrote last summer.

Bike-oree

You’ve probably heard about Boy Scout Jamborees or Boy Scout Camp-orees. This is a Bike-oree that grandma puts on for her grandchildren.

First, give your grandchildren crepe paper strips to weave between their bike spokes. Then, cut strips that are one inch wide and eight inches long. Wrap tape around the strips at one end making a pom-pom and tape a pom-pom to the end of each handlebar.

For this activity, you’ll need some chalk and your driveway. (If you live near a school or a church you could possibly use their parking.)

Draw a path on your driveway. Have your grandchildren see if they can ride their bike (trike, hot wheels, even roller blades) while staying within the lines. When they are fairly successful, time them. Have a little competition to see which grandchild can do it the fastest. When that ‘path’ has been conquered, wash it off and draw a more difficult one.

To add more of a challenge, get items to place along the path to turn it into an obstacle course. Things like boxes or buckets or grandma’s terra cotta flowerpots (especially if they are looking as dead as mine are at the moment). You could even tape balloons to your driveway on your obstacle course. You could have the grandchildren ride between the balloons — or ride over them and pop them.

Next, give them a balloon and a broom and have them sweep that balloon from one end of the driveway to the other — while riding their bike. You might need to have a grundle of balloons on hand in case they accidentally get popped. Again, you can time your grandchildren to see who can do it the fastest. Or divide them into teams and see which team can get the most points by sweeping balloons across the ‘point line’ in 3 minutes. (You could substitute a light-weight plastic ball for the balloons.)

Drag those boxes back out (the ones that you used for the obstacle course). Give each child a small basketball, nerf ball, or plastic ball that came with your fat bat. Have them do ‘drive-by’ baskets where they try to get the ball inside the box. (Of course you will put the box 3-4 feet away from where your grandchildren will be riding. Of course.)

Play ‘bike limbo’ where grandma and grandpa hold a broom and the grandchildren see if they can ride their bike under the broom. The grandparents will lower the broom a little bit each time making it a wee bit more challenging for the grandkids.

Give your grandchildren a ping pong ball. Set out a wide-mouth bottle, shortening can, or empty oatmeal box. See if you grandchildren can drop the ping pong ball into the container as they ride past the bottle/can/box.

Get out your old embroidery hoop or cut rings out of cardboard or see if you can find some plastic rings at your local dollar store. Put out a 2-liter pop bottle. Have your grandchildren drop the ring over the bottle as they ride their bike past the bottle. See who can put the most rings over the bottle in one minute.

Here’s something that you can try if you’ve got a little bit older grandchildren. (Older than what? you ask. I dunno. Just older . . .) Have two grandchildren ride toward each other. As they pass, see if they can give the other person a ‘high five.’

Drag those boxes out for yet another activity. And the broom. Gotta have the broom for this activity. Find something that you can put on top of the box — another box, an empty 3 liter pop bottle, that type of thing. Something that could be ‘swept’ off the box — not too easily but not too hard either. Then, have your grandchildren ‘joust’ by riding past the box trying to knock that item off the box.

Does grandpa have any wood on hand? Say a piece of plywood and a short piece of a two-by-four? Put the piece of plywood over the two-by-four. This will be a ‘jump.’ Have your grandchildren ride over the jump.

Well, this ought to keep them (and you) busy for a little while. Do you have any ideas that could be added to this bike-oree? If so, I’d love to hear about them!

I know that you have all been on pins and needles waiting, waiting, waiting to see what little craft I came up with for the grand kiddos to do while at Bear Lake for our family reunion.  Well, folks, here it is.

Announcing: Bud and Betty our Bear Lake Buddies!

(I felt so proud of myself for coming up with such a clever name for this activity. That was one of the reasons I stayed up so late the other night making my samples.)

Aren’t they just the cat’s meow? (I’m assuming you can tell which is Betty and which is Bud . . .)

I knew that the grandchildren would not be able to add the pipe cleaner arms nor the yarn hair. Oh, well.  In fact, they didn’t even draw the faces.  (I did.)

Here’s how the buddies looked at the lake.  They are hovering around a yellow cow sand toy.

At times, we chilled out in the shade.

At times, we played in the water. (Well, not grandma. She barely took off her fleece jacket . . . ) Sad to say, that is NOT our boat in the background.

Only one grandchild had the interest to make edible sparklers with grandma. But that was okay. All the more for us to eat. (We DID share with others. Honestly.)  I love edible crafts because you don’t leave any evidence behind as to just how craft-challenged you are.

Only two grandchildren could stand still long enough in front of their art show display for their picture to be taken.  The grandchildren (with a little help from their parents) colored pages from a coloring book, made butterflies out of coffee filters, and made a very simplified version of a ladybug. (Natalie is eating an edible sparkler.)

What fun things are you planning for your family reunion?

We’re off to Bear Lake for our annual family reunion. The lake sits on the Utah/Idaho border.

Lake = water.

Weather forecast = rain.

Rain = more water.

Saturday’s temperature is supposed to be 77 degrees.  That’s not quite warm enough for me to get into the water.  But, I can play at the lake’s edge with the grandchildren which is fine with me.

Because I’ll be gone, I’m re-posting some water activities that I shared last summer.  I hope you have fun doing them with your grandchildren.  (And, I hope the weather is warmer where you are so that you will enjoy getting wet!)

Flotsam and Jetsam
We all know that flotsam and jetsam refers to stuff floating in water.  Right?  Good.  So, the idea behind this activity is to get a Ping-Pong ball to float in a plastic cup.

Divide your grandchildren into pairs.  Give one grandchild an empty plastic cup with a Ping-Pong ball inside.  She is now known as the “Great Cup Holder.”  Give the other grandchild a spray bottle filled with water.  This grandchild is the “Sharp Shootin’ Squirter.” Have them stand six feet apart.

On ‘go,’ the Sharp Shootin’ Squirters try to squirt enough water into their partner’s cup so that the Ping-Pong ball floats.  The first team to get their ball to float is the winner.  Then, switch so that the Great Cup Holder becomes the Sharp Shootin’ Squirter and the sprayer turns into the cup holder.  Again, see which team can be the first to get their Ping-Pong ball to float.

There’s only one rule:  if the team members get closer than six feet, they have to dump out the water in their cup and start over.  (You might want to have a large bucket for easy refilling of the sprayers.)

You might want to have a squirt bottle for every grandchild.  Before the activity, they can draw designs on the bottles using markers.  Then, they can take the squirt bottle home with them — or keep them at grandma’s house for their next visit.

Gentle Jumping
Drag out your long jump rope and paper cups for this activity.  Your grandchildren will take turns turning the rope for the other jumpers.  Each grandchild is given a cup full of water.  The object is for each one to run in, jump six times, and run out without spilling water from her cup.  The one with the most water left in her cup is the winner.

Soggy Jogging
Divide your grandchildren into two teams.  Give each team an old pair of loose fitting sweat pants and a bucket of water.  Place a lawn chair for each team about 15-20 feet away from the starting line.

On ‘go,’ the first person dunks the sweat pants in the bucket of water and puts them on.  She runs down to the lawn chair and once around it and back to her team.  She takes off the sweatpants and gives them to the next person in line.

The next person dunks the sweatpants in the water, puts them on, runs down and around the chair and back.  The winning team is the one who finishes first.

Water Ball
This game is easier to do with just 2 grandchildren — or you and one grandchild.

You’ll need several water balloons, a plastic bat, and a bucket full of water.  Decide who is the pitcher and who is the batter.

The batter stands by the bucket of water.  The pitcher stands several feet away with four water balloons.  The pitcher tries to toss a water balloon into the bucket of water.  The batter ‘defends’ the bucket by hitting and breaking the water balloon so it doesn’t land in the bucket.  The pitcher scores one point for every balloon that successfully lands in the bucket.

Switch positions.  The new pitcher (who has four water balloons) tries to throw the balloons into the bucket while the new batter tries to hit the balloons so they don’t land in the bucket.  Continue playing until you run out of water balloons or interest wanes.