These last couple of summer months have provided us with beautiful and warm, if not hot weather, and has really allowed our group and it's members to enjoy the outdoors with our tots. July focused on everything "Under the Sea", whereas August was all about " Camping and the great outdoors!".
One of July's bigger events, featured a backyard "beach party" theme playdate. So, technically it was not a real beach, but with a good sized backyard, kiddie pools, and some imagination, I think the participants had a great time. The event featured a potluck lunch, in which members used their creativity to come up with some fabulous beach- themed meals and snacks. Such food included crab croissants sandwiches (chicken sandwiches, with cream cheese and black olives for the eyes, and red peppers for claws), flip flop pea butter sandwiches (on graham crackers), octopus hot dogs (on a bed of brown sugar to look like sand, and starfish sprinkles), and much more! The kids played in the pools and enjoyed popping mini water balloons in their hands, loved the squeals as the balloons popped! Besides the various little playdates among members, there was also a " Paint and Splash" component to this summer theme. Basically what Paint and Splash entailed was an art project, simple enough for even the tiniest of members, and this would take place at a splash park, a perfect way to wash and cool off during what seemed to be a never- ending heat wave. The first Paint and Splash, we painted precut and yarned seahorses with little homemade sponges, then the adults would assist in glueing on googley eyes, oh so cute! The second event project involved painting fishes on a long roll of art paper. Here, again we used sponges, that I cut into the shape of fishes, add a bunch of different colors of paint, and voila! The third event, we painted with Kool-aid colored iced cubes, a big hit for painting, and eating....a lot of the kids ended up eating their medium once they were done painting.
August was also the last month of the Paint and Splash component, as I had to go back to work. But before my return to the workforce, we gathered one more time to paint with things we would find in nature, or while camping,if you will. We used branches, leaves, and pinecones. One of the other admins of the group held a couple of potluck BBQs, camping style. Now, we were hoping to gather for a day at the lake at the end of August, but due to natural circumstances of the water's state,sadly we could not.
I can't wait for these upcoming months, I much prefer the fall and winter. Bring on fall Potlucks, our fall mini sessions for our members' families with an outstanding photographer, food swaps, monthly games nights, trips to the corn maze, a farm, fort Edmonton park, Halloween parties, everything snow, and our big Christmas party,which has been organized by quite a number of generous and creative members.
Here are the links for some of the ideas we used for the months of July and August, enjoy!
Fish painting
http://www.teachpreschool.org/2012/06/sponge-painted-fish/
Hot dog octopuses
Crab croissants
http://www.chickabug.com/blog/2011/07/beach-party-food-ideas.html
Sea horse painting (we did not use shaving cream though to keep it little people friendly)
http://www.iheartcraftythings.com/2011/08/story-time-mister-seahorse-with.html