Summer 20112 Bucket List

I am SO excited for summer!  This school year has been hard.  Anne has gone to half day kindergarten nearly every day.  So that has really put a damper on what we've been able to do.  Playdates in general were harder because I would have to be back in time for school or try and find a separate playdate for Anne for the same day.  We also weren't able to do nearly as many things-zoo, children's museum, etc because we'd either have to do them without Anne or we'd have to be back in time for school which meant we really couldn't go at all.  She had a couple of odd days off (teacher institutes, etc) that weren't centered around holidays, so on those days we took advantage of being able to go places.  And I think bigger than being (or not being) able to do stuff was just the fact that I missed her.  I really missed the laziness of sitting around the house, playing, going to the park or just watching TV. 

So I'm very excited for summer.  I can't wait to be able to spend all day every day however we want without much of a schedule to follow.  The kids are signed up for a few weeks of day camp-but it's half day and only 3 days a week, and they are scheduled for swim lessons for an entire month.  But the lessons are at the end of the day (evening) so we still have plenty of time to go places during the day if we want.  And there are a few things here and there (library programs) we are going to do but other than that we have the whole summer free! 

So this morning we made our bucket list.  We put 27 things on there!  I think we'll easily accomplish 90% of them.  Bring on the summer and let's see!

The Atwood Family Summer 2012 Bucket List

1.  Go to Pirate's Cove
2.  Go to the zoo (3 times)
3.  Go to the pool (10 times-this number may seem arbitrary but I figured it would wind up being once a week once you figure in the missed week here and there)
4.  Go to story time (4 times)
5.  Go to the splash park
6.  Go to the regular park (6 different ones-we actually have 6 different parks all within 1 mile of our house!)
7.  Go to the Arboretum
8.  Go to a movie in the park
9.  Go to a water park
10.  Go on the slip and slide
11.  Go in the backyard pool
12.  Grill outside (4 times)
14.  Sleep out back in the tent
15.  Have a sleepover with Andrina (our cousin)
16.  Go real camping with Daddy
17.  Watch fireworks
18.  Anne and Jamie go to daycamp
19.  Anne, Jamie and Libby have swim lessons
20.  Spend a week at the lake house with Meg and Dale
21.  Go to the beach (MI Dunes)
22.  Sand play day (through the park district)
23.  Walk at a forest preserve (3 times!)
24.  Family bike ride (3 times!)
25.  Family walks (10 times!)
26.  Do crafts
27.  Read 100 books

I am looking forward to all these but I think the most challenging one will be the reading 100 books.  But that's also one I'm looking forward to tackling!  All in all I'm very very excited to start marking things off our list!