THE SUMMER NO ONE SAID,”I’M BORED”

This is a sponsored post written by me on behalf of Kiwi Crate.  I was compensated and received free product in exchange for my work, but all opinions are 100% my own.

Once upon a time, there was a beautiful, intelligent mother whose children were so intellectually engaged all summer long that they never once uttered the words, “I’m bored.”  There was no need.  Each day was filled with fascinating, educational activities that the mother designed and prepped herself.  The children expanded their knowledge of the world and enriched their creativity with each delightful activity.  There were no messes, no arguments, and no “I’m bored”s.  Ever.  The End.

And then she woke up.

This fairy tale is not real life, people.  As soon as those kidlets hit the sidewalk after the last day of school, they are looking for ideas of what to do next.  Because even if they have a room full of toys, a huge backyard, and more arts supplies than you can shake a stick at, in their minds there will be NOTHING to do.  Thankfully, there is a company who understands how to alleviate the “I’m bored”s this summer.  

Kiwi Crate is an award-winning, monthly subscription service that provides hands-on materials to inspire creative, educational fun for children ages 3-8.  With a subscription to Kiwi Crate, your kids will receive one box each month centered around themes like Music, Color, Robots, and Safari.  These crates deliver everything needed for unique activities that you and your kids can enjoy together.  And I really mean enjoy together!  Sometimes when I craft with my kids, I feel like I need a stiff drink afterwards, but Kiwi Crates really make the process fun and stress-free. Kiwi Crate sent us one of their crates from their new Summer Adventure Series.  The series will feature crates centered around fun Summer themes like Camping, the Beach, and the Amusement Park.  I am really drooling over the Camping crate! 

I get giddy when the mailman brings me happy mail, so you can only imagine how jazzed my kids were to see the Kiwi Crate arrive.  We opened it up to see what this crate’s theme would be:  Farm Fun!  The timing of this education crate was perfect because my daughter and I just accompanied my son and his class on their farm field trip last week.  I was able to tie in real-world experience to the projects we were doing.  It made my inner teacher nerd happy.

The crate came with a book that included a short comic featuring the kiwi bird mascot visiting a farm, as well as a few additional puzzles and activities.  Even if my kiddos hadn’t just been to a real farm, this would have been a good way to build up some background knowledge before we got started.

I was pleased to see that not only did the Kiwi Crate come with all the one-time use materials needed for the projects, it also included a nice pair of kid-sized scissors that we can use for other projects down the line.

See all the supplies for the two activities included in the farm crate!  There is enough DIYing that the kids have some free range in creating their project, but most of the items are prepped so that I didn’t have to help too much with the finger puppets.  Again, it was a lot less stressful than other crafts I have done with my kids.

Here are my kids’ grubby little fingers making the farm puppets.  This crate was put together in such a way that both my kids were able to participate with minimal fighting over who got to do what.  If you would like to eliminate the arguing altogether, you can order a “no-fight crate,” which includes additional materials, for a fee.

Didn’t these finger puppets turn out well?  My kids made them with very little interference from me.  My son read the directions to my daughter, they looked at the instructional illustrations inside the project booklet, and put them all together.  Adorable! It just hit me that the duck puppet looks an awful lot like Ducky Momo from Phineas and Ferb.

They immediately put the puppets on and started playing.  Apparently, the chicken is the dad and the pig is the mom.  Thanks for that, kids.

After we’d played with the puppets for a while, we started working on the second, more involved project.  Here the kids created their own mini farm, by planting grass and radish seeds.  My son was fascinated with how the dirt pellets expanded into soil.

Since I have such a black thumb, this is probably as close as my kids will ever get to farming here at home.  The crate also included an observation journal so we can track and document how the seeds grow over the next few days.  Gotta love an education tie in!

You can get in on the Summer Kiwi Crate fun by using the coupon code SUMMER25, which is good for 25% the first month of the service between May 26 and June 30.  If you wanted to be the world’s coolest grandparent or aunt, a Kiwi Crate gift subscription will absolutely earn you brownie points. A Kiwi Crate subscription may not completely eliminate “I’m bored” completely from your kids’ vocabulary this summer, but it will sure make a difference.  Every little bit helps.

This is a sponsored post written by me on behalf of Kiwi Crate.

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Thanks,  Jessica