Summer Bucket List 2015 - How We Did

Well, even if school was our end of summer, the official end of summer came on Monday with Labor Day. As much as we wanted to deny it, summer has come and gone. Boo.

As our official goodbye, I thought it would be nice to go back to our bucket list and see how we did. You know, for a lazy summer of only doing small trips/things here and there, we managed to do 30 things from our list! How amazing is that?! I honestly think that this was the most productive summer we've had yet. :)

Without further ado, here is our list with notes on what we did.

Summer Bucket List 2015

*Shawn wants to pick fruit (from our own garden!), see animals, and eat at a restaurant (we managed to go out a few times even)

*Jason wants to learn to write in handwriting, go to Toys R Us again (He didn't get TRU, but he did get Target toy aisle visits instead), and buy cars (now to create the perfect display for the cars he chose)

*Jack wants to play

Plant a garden (So. Much. Fun!)

Santa Paula agricultural museum

Sub Zero ice cream made with nitrogen

Lemonade stand

Have a water balloon fight (This was pretty funny to watch. Note to self: Work with the boys on their aim. lol)

Make a family tree (We started working on our family tree and had lots of talks about relatives and their stories.)

Do experiments (This was the summer for science, especially for Shawn!)

Make Popsicles (Fun, but not the hit that I thought they'd be. Bummer)

Have a scavenger hunt
Raise butterflies and let them go (We LOVED this and did it twice. Now we are raising Monarch caterpillars outside.)

Visit a Firehouse

Paint something (Jack loves to paint. He managed to paint a number of water color pictures this summer)

Donate something to the needy (Many of our baby things have now gone on to other homes)

Record ourselves reading our favorite book

Swim (our wading pool was a HUGE success this year!)

Go to the beach

Make butter in a jar

Go on a boat

Go on a picnic

Do some crafts (The big one we did was for Father's Day. We managed to some small crafts here and there, too. I am going to be so sad when they don't want to do crafts any more.)

Create a family tradition (Mom's theater is our new family tradition--they have asked for more "movie" days since then.)

Watch a movie at the movie theater

Have a sleepover in the living room
Go camping
Play in the backyard (So much playing in the backyard this year!)
See an animal we've never seen (We definitely saw lots of fun animals at the Aquarium of the Pacific)
Do a random-act-of-kindness

Go to the park
Go to a museum (The Discovery Cube museum was a hit, too!)
Go on a nature hike
Lie in the backyard and look at the stars

See fireworks (Love watching the fireworks out on our front yard)

Go to the zoo (We did this just before school let out)
Go see the jets at the airport
Visit friends (We didn't do this as much as we may have liked, but we did see friends.)

Go to the fair (Fair food was a hit this year!)

Take the train
Take family pictures (Yay!)

Go to the zoo at the local college
Go to an aquarium (We had a great, although hot, time at Aquarium of the Pacific.)
Go to a water/amusement park (Knott's Berry Farm!)
Cook something for a meal with mommy and daddy
Create a back yard slip and slide
Learn to skip rocks
Read a chapter book together (We read one of those choose your own ending books because I thought it would be really fun. lol. They didn't see it as as much fun as I thought they would.)
Do a special project with mommy and daddy (We made our planters for the garden as our special project.)
Catch a frog