Nature Scavenger Hunt

Confession time: I am not one of those moms who can’t wait for school to be out so she can spend all day, every day with her kids. I am more one of those moms who breaks out into hives trying to figure out what the heck I’m going to do with 3 boys between the ages of 2 and 8 all day, every day. Sending them outside to play is great, except we’re starting to get a lot more fighting than we’ve ever had before (and in fact, as I am writing this, Mason just came in screaming because D and Connor were wrestling and it scared him. Perfect.). And then there are rainy days. Don’t get me started on rainy days.

Don’t get me wrong. I love my kids. Adore them, actually. And the vast majority of the time, I love being around them more than anything in the world. But sometimes, just sometimes, they make me want to start drinking sweet tea vodka and lemonade at 10:30 a.m.

This is one of the reasons I do the summer fun list. When we’re having a rough day, I can always go over and find an idea on there of how to occupy them for a few hours.

The other day, we scratched two things off the list: Millbrook Marsh and “Go on a nature scavenger hunt.”

We did a nature scavenger hunt last summer and the boys absolutely loved it. They love being outside anyways, but making a walk through a nature center/wetland into a game made things even better.

All I did was type up a list of things for them to find, printed the lists out, stuck ’em on clipboards, and away we went.

Our list included the following:

1. Something with feathers 2. Leaf bigger than your hand 3. Fish 4. Flower 5. Bug 6. Butterfly 7. Spider web 8. Something fuzzy 9. Something smooth 10. Something rough 11. Something you think is beautiful 12. Something red 13. Something orange 14. Something yellow

15. Something green 16. Something blue 17. Something purple 18. Something brown 19. Something white 20. Something with fur 21. A stick 22. A chewed leaf 23. Something swimming in the water 24. Bird’s nest 25. Fallen log 26. Dead tree 27. Something growing on a tree 28. Something prickly

{If you would like to print out a copy, I created a free printable for you! Just click here to download the pdf.}

We had such a great time.

We found some things that were on the list:

And some things that weren’t:

David and Connor were both so happy that they got everything checked off {thank goodness for that man walking the dog right as we were getting ready to leave for our “something with fur” — where the heck were all the squirrels that day?}

But most importantly, for that hour and a half, everyone got along and worked together to help the other ones find what was on their list. And that made me happy.

 

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