It is SUMMER TIME!! OK, maybe we are already several weeks in and the excitement of the season is already starting to wear!  At least, it is starting to around my house!  It’s hot, mommy’s been sick, and after a flurry of activities all day in school, a little boredom is starting to set in with not much scheduled at home.

Luckily, I have kept the kids fairly busy with at least one craft a day, or every other day.  We have created Stained Glass Butterflies, Butterfly Tissue boxes and more.  And we are having a blast coming up with new and exciting ideas to turn into reality!  The problem I am having is that I have no place to keep all of the stuff we need for crafts.  Colors, markers, Elmer’s glue, scissors and more.  The girls end up with a variety of things in their rooms and on the next craft day – it never fails – we can not find everything we need for our next project.  It is really frustrating plus a little expensive because I just buy new stuff instead of trying to hunt down the old!  In addition, I often come up with ideas for crafts and then forget them before I implement them. So I need somewhere to keep ideas and a fast and easy way to jot them down, too!

So, last week, fed up with the cycle of replacing, I took the girls and headed to Office Depot.  Not only was I on a hunt for a box to keep supplies and ideas in, I really needed to update their Good Girl Goodie chart!  Basically, my girls have a chart with rules and chores on it.  If I catch them being good or doing something on the chart, they get a sticker.  Every 5 stickers gets them an activity or toy out of the Good Girl Goodie box!  It works pretty well in our household so I want to keep it going.  But the chart is full and looking worn so I want to do a new one.

Rather, I want THEM to do another one!

I had two tasks at Office Depot.  A Summer Craft Box to help organize and to help avoid summer boredom with new ideas inside, and a new sticker chart.  I knew Office Depot would be a great place to go as they have a variety of all things office and organizational and fun!  So, the girls and I had a ton of fun poking in and out of the sticker aisle, the paper aisle, the box section and even the office supplies area.  I lazily strolled – and by lazily I mean somewhat quickly walking before a child knocked an expensive computer off its display case – checking out all that was new and great.  I noted that they were having their Seating Sale and wished that a new office chair for myself was in the budget.  Maybe next time!  And I was thrilled to find ink that I needed for my printer right in the middle of the store!

See my entire shop and the  two crafts below:

 
As we got over to the arts and crafts section I noticed that Office Depot even has educational activity books for ages pre school through 6th grade!  I LOVE this!  The girls can keep the skills they learned in school last year fresh with fun activities!  I grabbed the preschool and K to 1st Bridge book and another toddler colors book for Megan!

And now to focus.  Hard to do in this store, I admit!

I searched the box area and the girls and I found a decent sized box with a lid.  It is plenty large for the craft things without taking up a big space in the house.  But it would needed decorating.  Something simple and easy that we could do.  Especially since we were leaving to spend the weekend in a hotel. Yes, we even craft at a hotel!

We found some really cute post it notes that I thought would work to not only decorate the box, but hold the rules and chores on the Good Girl Goodie Chart.  We picked up Elmer’s Glue Sticks to adhere them to the surface!  Let’s face it, Elmer’s is always easy to use, dependable and of the highest quality.  We always have it in our house!

We found colors and markers and water colors and tape and more for the inside of our box too.  And, I picked up some Elmer’s School Glue and Elmer’s Spray Glue Adhesive for our future crafts!  And then we go a poster board and some fun precut poster cutouts to help us give our chart a little WOW factor!

I checked out easily and was thrilled that we found everything we needed in one trip!

This evening in the hotel room, with three bouncing off the walls kids, I pulled out our craft stuff and diverted their attentions from walking on the ceilings.  We has so much fun gluing stars and butterflies on the box.  And then we sat down and brainstormed ideas for future crafts!   We came up with ideas like Bejeweling Hats, Color a Picture in My Sister’s Coloring Book, and Create Cards for our Grandparents! I wrote them on colorful index cards and placed the in the box with the supplies!  When summer boredom sets in, I’ll just open the box, have them pull out a card, and that is what we’ll do!  And because we now have our craft box,we will have everything on hand that we need to actually complete it!

Next we got to work on the sticker chart!  The girls each chose a precut poster board shape and decorated it.  Using mostly markers and a sticker or two, they wrote their names and Sarah even drew herself!   I then handed them each a  Elmer’s Glue sticks to stick them to the board!  We used the glue sticks again to adhere the rules and chores we discussed.  This was a SUPER easy project but it will keep my household sane for at least another month and because the girls told me the rules themselves, it helps them remember them later, thus having a greater chance of being caught being good!

If you are already wondering what you will do with your kids this summer, try creating a Summer Craft Box too!  The brainstorming session you’ll have will come in handy along with having all of the tools in one spot!   And don’t forget the Elmer’s Glue for your box!  Because with almost every craft, you need some reliable, high quality glue!

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