Summer Inspiration and Fun

Summer has officially started! :)  Yesterday the kids went swimming, bike riding, got to watch a movie, had friends over, ate water melon, built with Legos, built a train track, and worked on our 750 piece puzzle.  Oh my, what are we going to do today?!  Good thing we wrote out a summer list of things to do!  Also, Pinterest has come to the rescue with more ideas.
 We will be going to Chicago this summer, so I want the kids to learn more about the city.  Over the weekend I bought a large wall map of the United States.  Along with checking out our new map, learning about Chicago also means at least one trip to the library for some books, maybe create our own maps of where we want to go while in Chicago, create a cityscape, learn about some places to visit while in Chicago.  I also downloaded the Stack the States (Lite) iPad app.  {It's a great little game to help learn about the states.}
I want to make mobiles with the kids...inspired by Alexander Calder.  Did you know that today, May 29th, is national paper clip day?  I think we're going to have to break out the paper clips and see what we can create--bookmarks, mobiles, chains, 3D sculptures.
{Speaking of Chicago, here's a conversation between Jaime and Penelope yesterday:
P: I wanna go on a walk, Daddy
J: Ok, where do you want to go?
P: To a city
J: A city, what city?
P: Chicago
J: Chicago?! How about the arboretum?
P: Okay!
And to the arboretum they went :) }

Create, have fun, play, and learn...it's summer!  Don't forget the building challenge, Hello Summer.