In the summer are you frazzled and tired of your kids at the end of every day? Are you counting the days until school starts? Summer can be a time to help spark your creativity and your child’s creativity as well.

Hold a family meeting where kids can choose an activity they are interested in. Older children can help younger children which can help siblings bond to each other and teach them respect for each other.

Some suggestions of what to do so children don’t get bored and you don’t pull your hair out:

1. Plan a picnic. If you don’t have a park nearby or you don’t have time to travel to a park have it in your backyard. Encourage children to plan the menu and help to shop for the necessary supplies. This is a great time to talk about nutrition, help them shop using a budget and teach them how to pack.

2. At the beginning of the summer plan to let each child make a scrapbook of everything they do this summer. Or get a journal to record their activities. This is a great time to help them learn how to declutter as they will learn to keep only the most important things, that keeping everything is not necessary or important. They can take photos for their scrapbook or draw pictures of each activity. Have a family night once a week where they can share their scrapbook with other family members.

3. Have someone decorate a jar and label it "Brag jar". When someone does something nice for someone else a family member can write down what the person did and put it in the brag jar. This will encourage your kids to do things for others. Make another jar with suggestions of things they can do for others. It sounds a lot better than "chore jar". Put fun things they can do for others in the jar as well as jobs.

4. Make a list of things children can do to earn money and put the amount of money they can earn for each job. Children always need money for this and that and it teaches them responsibility and accountability for money.

5. Plan the most outrageous "Staycation" (vacation at home) that your imagination can think of. Lonelyplanet.com/destinations/ has wonderful information about other countries where you can get ideas about your favorite place you want to travel to.

6. How about putting on a play? Have the children write the play, make the costumes, create the set and send out invitations.

7. Plan a couple of hours once a week to organize clutter. Help them go through their toys and down size. Take a look at their clothes in the drawers and in the closets and get rid of what they don’t wear or have grown out of. Donate them to a charity or give to other children in your home that can wear them.

8. Set up a reading program to encourage reading. With the child set a goal of so many books they will read and give a prize when they have reached their goal. They could give an oral book review of their favorite book to the family after they have read 10 books or so many pages depending on the age of the child.

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