10 Fun and Frugal Summer Activities to do With Kids!

You wouldn’t know it based on the cool and rainy weather we’ve been having in southwest British Columbia, but summer is almost here! I’ve been brainstorming some budget-friendly summer activities to do with my kids and thought I’d share them with you as the end of school is just around the corner!

See these past posts for other fun seasonal activities:

10 Fun and Frugal Fall Activities To Do With Kids

10 Activities to Do At Home With Kids This Christmas

10 Fun and Frugal Spring Activities To Do With Kids

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Fun Summer Activities

1. Visit a local waterpark or outdoor pool on a hot day: In my home city of Surrey there are many free waterparks and several outdoor public pools that also don’t require payment of an entry fee. Check out your local recreation guide for free or inexpensive options provided by your city or town.

2. What is summer without a few picnics? Picnics don’t have to take a long time to prepare for, and they don’t even need to be far from home! Choose a beach, park or even your own yard, spread out a blanket or a towel and enjoy a special meal. See this post for instructions to make fun egg carton picnics for kids.

3. Working in the garden: I often have my kids help dig in plants, (my son loves to use his toy digger and dump truck for this) sow seeds, and just generally get really dirty! They love to make mud puddles, make grass “soup” and look for bugs. We received a great bug kit recently and the kids love investigating all of the insect life in our yard! The finish off the day with some fun bug crafts.

4. Bikes, scooters, and rollerblades: Summer is a great time to be on wheels! There are many places to get a hold of bikes, scooters, and rollerblades, such as secondhand sporting goods stores, websites such as Craigslist or Marketplace, freecycling websites or see if any family or friends have some hand-me-downs they’d be willing to share.

5. Summer is a great time to spend some time volunteering: Consider doing your own shoreline cleanup, volunteering at an animal shelter, library or food bank.

6. Cultivate entrepreneurship: Help your kids set up a lemonade stand or have a garage sale! These activities have so much scope for learning, from making signs, calculating change, working with customers and should even result in some spending money.

7. Backyard campout: We did this last year with our kids and they loved it! We set up our tent, roasted marshmallows over the propane firepit, and cozied up for a night under the stars…until we got cold and decided we would do another campout with better sleeping bags next time!

8. Go for a hike: There are so many beautiful spots to explore – pack some snacks and hit the trails!

9. Find deals on local attractions plan a special trip: recently a local restaurant here gave out coupons for a child’s admission to Science World, so that is definitely on our list this summer! Keep an eye out in local papers or community groups, or subscribe to your favourite attractions to find out when they’re offering specials on entry. Another option offered by many local attractions here is to purchase an annual membership for almost the same price as one entry fee — and you can then use the pass all year long!

10. Get creative: Decorate your local park or create an activity walk using sidewalk chalk!

I hope you enjoy trying out some of these ideas! What plans have you made for the summer?

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