Do you remember how excited you used to get when school was finally out for summer?! As soon as our oldest was in pre-K I got that same feverish feeling in the weeks leading up to summer break – I couldn’t WAIT for summer and all the memories we would make! Then summer came and went and the night before Kindergarten started, I kept thinking of all the things I had hoped we would do, but got lost in the day to day of summer haze. We definitely created memories, but I felt blah about that summer. Enter the Summer 2021 planner to help us have the BEST summer on record!
The next year I was determined to get it right. I printed a Summer Bucket list I found on Pinterest and committed to making the most of E-V-E-R-Y second. I planned our days to death. And as we got to the first day of 1st grade, I didn’t love the feeling of that summer either. I packed way too much in and it was over-structured and under funned!
I’ve done a lot of tweaking over the years, and I’m SO excited to share this Summer 2021 planner packet I’ve put together. It’s got just the right blend of loose, go with the flow summer vibes, while also not letting the laundry take over the entire house! I hope it’s a blessing for all of us & all those precious memories we’ll fill this summer with!! I hope you’ll share some of yours in the comments!
I’ll sprinkle the individual pages into this post. The complete Summer 2021 Planner packet will be an easy (FREE) PDF download at the end of this blog post if you want to skip down there!
Summer 2021 Planner – the Summer Routines
I’ll start with routines. Routines don’t sound very “fun, go with the flow, summer vibes”, but hear me out! If we can knock the must get done’s out of the way in the first hour of the day, we have the whole day ahead of us for making memories!! Warning – I’ve culled these down to our family must haves – a little goes a long way. I’m buying one of these three timers for the kids to be able to use to keep their routine to 1 hour so we don’t waist the first half of the day dragging it out. That only happens in our house? oh…. 😉 (Visual Timer; Glass Timer; Digital Timer).
We currently have morning routines that need only a little bit of tweaking to be summer ready. Evening routines – we have the basics down, but I’ve been dying to get the kids into the habit of tidying their toys before bed. I’ve made our summer adjustments and included some blank routine cards for you to make your own if you’d like! I cut out and laminate ours so the kids can check them off with a dry erase marker 🙂
Summer 2021 Planner – Summer Bucket List
Okay – now let’s get to the fun stuff!! We LOVE making our summer bucket list each year and I save them to remember all the things we checked off! In our house – everyone contributes to the summer bucket list! I love seeing everyone’s ideas and it truly makes the memories magical when we do something on their list! I’m giving an option that is divided up into the amount of time the item takes – around the house, 4 hours or less, all day, and overnights. This will help me since our days are broken up with our custody schedule, and I figure it will help any of us when we’re looking for something quick, vs. what to fill a day with! Most importantly – HAVE FUN!
Summer 2021 Planner – the Schedule
For those of you sweating how you’re going to create some structure but not too much in your days – this is for you! My plan is to fill out the following with what our big ideas are for the week, what our days look like that week based on our custody schedule (do we have time for a 4 hour item on Monday or is that a no go this week), and our Scripture Writing of the Week and Life Skill of the week (more on those below).
As far as each day goes, right now I don’t intend to wake the kids up at any certain time. Bedtime stays loosely the same, so they generally get up within an hour or so of their usual (my kids are 8, 6, & 3 rn). The first hour (using their timer to stay on task) is for getting our routines done. That lets us all be roughly done and ready at the same time to take on an around the house, 4 hour, or all day adventure! Overnight adventures I’m planning out on the master calendar. I’m posting these in our hallway so everyone can see the plans and know how much summer we still have to enjoy. Since they are somewhat visual, I’m hoping this will be a big help for everyone! This is sort of the culmination of the Summer 2021 Planner.
Personal Growth for the summer
Since we have this sweet time together, I don’t want to miss out on the opportunity to pour into my kiddos a little extra. So with a little planning, I can help impress Scripture into their hearts and equip them with life skills that I want to send them off to their future with. For my kids in particular, I am focusing on their identity in Christ this summer, as well as loosely on the Armour of God. Attached are the Scriptures we’re working on. I also created images for each Scripture for the kids to keep with them as they work to memorize it that week. I printed a packet for each kiddo and cut the Scripture cards out. As I mentioned before, we’re including journaling in our morning routine. This summer I’m having the kids start their journal time with writing out their Scripture of the week.
We are also working on Life Skills each week. Here is a list of ideas to get you started on what life skills you might want to work on with your kiddos!
And finally, gratitude! We’re mostly in the habit of starting our day with gratitude. BUT I love the idea of a fun summer printable for us to use to record allllll we were grateful for this summer!! Use the sunbeams to write what you’re grateful for!
Summer ready yet!?!
I hope these resources are a blessing and you create magic with your little ones this summer!! Tell me in the comments all you do! I can’t WAIT to hear about it and add ideas from you guys!!
Here is the link to the full PDF document – have FUN!
xoxo
Some of our summer Favorites
