Usually, these end of the quarter Things I Like posts are dedicated to books each of the boys are loving lately. BUT, since I've been doing a lot of picture book posts lately for summer...we're going to take a slight break to just things they are loving. I surveyed them and the most popular answer was playing with the neighbor friends (which is wonderful, love that they have friends that I don't have to drive them to!) but hard to blanket recommend. So, besides that and just the general fact of school not being in session right now...some things they are liking lately:
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1) Scooby Doo DVDs from the library
Screen time has been a pain to manage every summer since Luke started school and maybe a little bit ever since he was old enough to watch screens. We've finally landed on a plan we are all happy with. They pick out Scooby Doo DVDs from the library (free). They feel like they get to do some of the picking. The DVDs tend to be about an hour long. I don't have to have arguments over "just one more episode!" like there is with anything streaming or policing what sort of content they are consuming OR the endless fights over not agreeing over what to watch. They have to have chores done and silent reading done and the house generally picked up AND we've read books together...THEN they get screen time in the late afternoon and it's over when the DVD is over (or before if we're on a time crunch for something). I get a little break, they know when it's happening so they (rarely) ask all day, and we all know what they will watch. WIN WIN WIN.
Look, the part of me that is aiming for zero-waste HATES these. However, the part of me that likes an easy treat to cool everyone off...loves these. And the boys love them. And I hate to admit how many we might consume in a day. I KNOW...the waste. I hate to even admit we eat these (a lot) BUT maybe it's still offset by all the other changes we've made? I don't know, popsicles might be saving our summer.
3) Water guns
Our neighbor likes to give the boys gifts (All. the. time. Too much, in my opinion) and one recent one was water guns...for the family. The stipulation being Matt & I get the big ones and the boys get the smaller ones. Some days last week when it was REALLY (100°) hot, we had full family, fully clothed, water gun battles in the backyard and it honestly was a lot of fun. It's nice they have matching guns (with theirs or when they borrow our set) so they are (somewhat) equally matched when playing together. And with the summer heat they can be a relief!
4) I Survived Graphic Novels
These have been Luke's current favorite books. We carefully picked out 8 books for him to take on our Maine trip and instead of reading all of those...he pretty much just reread one of these over and over and over again. I think we have all of them currently checked out from the library and they've kept him busy! And he's learned about some historical events too!
Sam got an early adoption day present when Matt picked up one of these for half off. Matt figured this might be the last summer Sam will be interested in pretending to mow so we might as well not wait until August to give it to him. Luke does about 75% of our mowing (that the aforementioned neighbor doesn't beat us to) and Sam always wants to "mow" too. We've been borrowing an old fashioned (I keep describing it as "like Mickey Mouse") from the neighbor (same one) so it's not a danger to have Sam "mowing" in the backyard the same time as Luke and Sam takes great pride in his work. He also requests he gets paid like Luke (Sam get a nickle or dime...Luke gets a few bucks). It's pretty hilarious how much he loves it.
If you have kids, what have THEY been loving lately?
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