How We Kick Off Summer Break

Today I’m sharing our fun first day of summer break tradition…string mazes!  I posted this last year, but after school was out, so this year you can plan ahead and be ready (assuming your kids are still in school, as mine are).

To kick off summer vacation, we made a string maze for them to follow to get to their summer surprise packages.
They each had a different color string (red, white, or blue) tied to a popsicle stick with their name on it. They had to wind them up to get to their gifts.

My GI Joe did the strings for the boys, and they were quite difficult in places…but the hooligans were remarkably patient.

Except for Princess Thundercloud, who frequently hurled hers to the ground and “Hmmph”-ed loudly. The boys were very willing to help her, which I thought was pretty sweet. Again, it’s the first day of summer…that will change, I’m sure.

He definitely had the toughest one to follow. He was feet from the prize and could see it from here, but kept winding.

The first to finish, he went off to help his siblings and waited to open his present. Amazing!

Their loot included water pumpers for the lake, educational card games, lots of books and a couple of workbooks, art supplies, a couple of toys, and a candy bracelet (left from Halloween, but they didn’t care). Oh, and they each got a whole pack of gum. I’m pretty sure my kids would walk to town and back if they were promised gum. And “town” is 11 miles away.

Click here to download the printable coupons.

One thing I included that they seemed to think super cool were these coupons for each of them. This way, they can have time alone with one of us, and know that the others will have the same chance. That doesn’t mean they won’t squabble about it while we’re doing it, but they thought the idea was great!

This little project took us about 10 minutes to string, then about an hour for the hooligans to follow their strings, wind them up, and peruse their treasures. As usual, GI Joe had his doubts, but it proved a fun way to kick off vacation!