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Preventing Summer Burnout

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August is here.

We’re more than halfway through summer.

How are you holding up?

At this point, many parents are counting down the days until school starts, especially if their kids are suffering from a severe case of the summer blues.

If summer camp is winding down, you’re broke from splurging on an extended Fourth of July family vacation, or you simply need a quick, easy and affordable way to keep your kids entertained and your sanity preserved, consider taking a trip… to the Dollar Store.

A quick ride the Dollar Store or a spin around the dollar bins at discount retailers, such as Target or Wal-Mart will help you stock up on supplies you’ll need to buy yourself a break from whining, complaining and fighting.

The trick is to set a budget, for example, $10, and group your goodies in a bucket or basket. You could make individual buckets for each child or create a family fun basket filled with versatile dollar items, such as rubber stamps, puzzles, color books, sticker books, crayons, colored pencils, bubbles, paint, packs of paper, notebooks, sidewalk chalk, glow sticks, silly string, squirt toys, hula hoop, wrapping paper or a roll of brown paper.

Try to select a variety of items that can be used indoors and out. For instance, the brown paper can be rolled out and hung up on a backyard fence or on the wall of your garage. Kids can then use chalk, paint, crayons or colored pencils to decorate the paper. Another idea is to simply give the kids a pair of safety scissors, some tape and the roll of gift paper, let them wrap the other items, and open them. It’s akin to giving toddlers a box of Kleenex and letting them pull out each tissue one by one.

Another option is to select a plain bag or backpack to store the dollar items in rather than a bucket, and then have your kids embellish it with fabric paint. Your pint-sized Picassos can personalize their bags by writing their names on it or drawing a favorite picture.

Related Articles:

Summer Fun for Kids in the Great Outdoors

Super Summer Sanity Savers for Parents

Affordable Ways to Keep Kids Busy This Summer

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About Michele Cheplic

Michele Cheplic was born and raised in Hilo, Hawaii, but now lives in Wisconsin. Michele graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison with a degree in Journalism. She spent the next ten years as a television anchor and reporter at various stations throughout the country (from the CBS affiliate in Honolulu to the NBC affiliate in Green Bay). She has won numerous honors including an Emmy Award and multiple Edward R. Murrow awards honoring outstanding achievements in broadcast journalism. In addition, she has received awards from the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association for her reports on air travel and the Wisconsin Education Association Council for her stories on education. Michele has since left television to concentrate on being a mom and freelance writer.