Get Outside and Play! 6 Ideas to Enjoy Summer With the Kids.

Childhood is a magical and irreplaceable time for your kids, but it can be lots of fun for parents to let loose and laugh with their families. Playing with your kids helps create great memories as well as develop important social skills. Are you enjoying the long summer? Here's our family's top six ideas to play together while it's still warm outside.

Laughter is the best medicine,
preventative and otherwise. 

1) Are your kids lucky enough to have a playhouse? Go the fabric store and pick out fabric for curtains and ribbons for tie-backs. Use nails with large heads and let the kids help hang them.

Still waiting for your dream outbuilding? Any doorway, window, or opening can become playful when your kids hang fabric, stringed beads, weighted down ribbons (hot glue pretty glass 'rocks' to the ends or tie something on the ends like metal nuts or beads), or even paper chains from doorways.

2) Choose a shady area for a sand box. Spoons, garden implements, and plastic dinnerware can all be part of the fun. Don't forget the buried treasure!

3) Build or buy some kid-sized furniture. Giving kids a place to eat, sit for for tea-parties, or just hang out on a couch can spur creative make-believe and fun.

4) Teach your kids old-fashioned games, like "Off the Ground Tag." You can use cardboard boxes, blankets, or anything to make an area to play. If you step on the ground, you're it! "Freeze Tag" and "Ghost in the Graveyard" are two more fun choices.

5) Sleep outside (or in the playhouse) on a hot summer night.

6) Hang up a 'zip line' for transporting things from the play set, deck, or designated area on the ground.  Send secret messages to each other.