Summer is fast approaching and although you may have planned activities, practices, and vacations, chances are, you might hear those two words from your daughter at at least one point this summer:
“I’m bored.”
So what can you do to make this summer one of bonding instead of boredom?
I love alliteration, so I here are the Creative C’s of Connecting:
Cooking
There is a story of a daughter who always watched her mother make a pot roast and every time, the mother would cut one end of the roast off before she put it into he pan. Well, when this daughter grew up, she was making a pot roast and her mother happened to be over for dinner. The daughter cut off one end like she always saw her mother do. Her mother asked her why she was doing that.
“Well, I always saw you cut it off,” the daughter answered.
The mother laughed, and said, “Honey, that is because my pan was too small for it to fit.”
Use the more relaxed time during the summer to not only cook with your daughter, but have her start to cook for you, teaching her all of your tricks. If you have a younger daughter, this might mean, allowing her to measure the ingredients or have her smear the peanut butter on the bread. For a tween or teen, this might mean baking cake pops, super snacks, or meal planning and actually cooking the meal herself. You will find that some of the best conversations will come from just being together in the kitchen.
Crafts
You only need to look at Pinterest for ten minutes to find more crafts than you can try in the length of a summer. And as much as I feel sometimes Pinterest can make a mom feel like she can never “do enough,” it can also be a great resource for creative crafts. Have your daughter find something that she is interested in and spend some time talking about doing it and then actually doing it with her. My daughter got interested in making clay beads this year and it has been such fun to share in looking at all the different kinds she can make, and even helping her start her own “business.” She is even going to get her own booth at a friend’s craft show this fall. Show an interest in what she is interested in and it will open up even more lines of communication.
Clothes
I would probably be remiss if I did not put shopping into this list, even though it might not seem the most creative idea. What can be creative is how you do the shopping. Try this shopping spree: Take your daughter to a resale shop and look for the craziest outfit you can pick out, the most inappropriate outfit, and then one that you really would buy. Use it as a chance to talk about what modesty really looks like and how you can still look cute without showing skin. Too much skin is never in! For younger girls, you might want to make a fun scavenger hunt in a store looking for silly socks, a red hat, a blue dress.
Clubs
Grab your daughter, a few of her friends and start your own book club. Find a book that can teach the character of God through fiction, like the Mandie Series. You can even enjoy the sweet prairie days with Little House on the Prairie. Or just do your own special “book club” and do a girl’s devotion with her. Carve out a little time for just you and her to grow closer to God and closer together.
Cuddling
Girls of any age will love this! Tell her to plan a party for special snuggling. This could mean with a good picture book and some stuffed animals or for a fun a movie night. The way to beat the boredom is in the planning. If your daughter is younger, tell her to draw a picture of what she needs for her special party. If your daughter is older, she can list what she will need, plan who will sit where, who will be invited (For example, are the younger brothers invited to this one?), and what she can prepare for the snacks.
Put all of these ideas and the many more you will come up with on slips of paper and put them into a jar. Whenever your daughter says, “I’m bored,” just tell her to pick a slip and start planning for some fun!
What other ideas would you put into the jar?
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