Show Some Summer Mailbox Love
Goodbye homework battles. Summer Break is finally here! No more early morning mad dashes. Week long projects that require 6 visits to Michaels for poster board and Styrofoam? Nope. Hallelujah. Now comes the challenge of planning meaningful summer projects.
We thought we’d share a couple of our favorite meaningful summer projects to help spark your creativity. Everyday Storyteller, Maegan Bieshline had an amazing experience teaching her daughter to express appreciation and gratitude through good old-fashioned handwritten ‘thank you’ notes. You can read about her experience here. Summer is the perfect time for kids to send a genuine ‘thank you’ to coaches, grandparents, aunts and uncles, and special people in their lives that make them feel valued. Send a little summer mailbox love.
Our Creative Director, Jessica’s daughters record weekly highlights in their journals. She says, “ I want them to remember their stories. They always ask us to tell them stories from when we were kids. I tell them, if they write in their journals, they’ll have an entire book of material to pull from when their kids ask about their stories. Maybe they won’t have to recycle the same 5 stories we do because we can’t remember the others.” For kids, telling their own stories not only reinforces their writing skills, but it provides their own perspective and view of events that is charming, unique, and sincere.
We know that keeping a gratitude journal is an important part of wholehearted living for adults, but it’s also a lifelong skill to teach our children early. The earlier we begin a practice, the more integrated it becomes in our routine as we grow. Summer is the perfect time for children to practice gratitude while they practice their writing skills.
What are some of the creative things you’re doing with your children this summer? We’d love your ideas! Leave them below to be entered into our drawing for a free summer documenting package that includes cards, a journal, a poster, and other creative projects for you and you summer crew!
To see more of Maegan’s creativity, you can find her here.
This looks so cute and is a nice idea
One of the things that my little guy(almost 1 year) is obsessed with is sticks. So, we go outside and go on stick hunts. He will gather them all up in his chubby little hands and then will crawl around to find some more. I guess if your child isn’t obsessed with sticks, whatever they ARE interested in, go on a hunt for it OUTSIDE. If that means going to hide barbies, or bears, or GI Joes outside, so be it. Do anything to let your little one go and EXPLORE outside. It is so fun!
My five year old fills notebooks and journals faster than I can buy them. They give me such joy to look through; I can only imagine how thankful she will be to have them when she is older.
I just bought her a new journal for our long airplane trip across the pacific as we make another move with the military. Her summer will start there, on a plane, with a new journal and pages waiting to be filled with new adventures.
Looking at this blog post inspired me to order a journal for my 7 year old son. He loves the books, “Diary of a Wimpy Kid” Now I can have him make his own journal and it will be a perfect way for him to practice his handwriting over the summer. Thanks Paper Coterie.
My boys and I are going to make summer journals and we include photos (I print them on copy paper) and pictures/words cut from magazines too. We have fun cutting from the magazines and gluing them in by our journaling.
My daughters love to have pen pals. We are moving to a new school district and I am encouraging them to keep in touch eith good old fashioned snail mail.
My daughter also likes to keep a journal which I encourage. My Grammy is 84back and writes in one everyday.
I’m using 3×4 journaling cards and my Instagram photos to create a mini-scrapbook of funny things they say and do. I also have a few pockets for larger drawings and notes that my daughter makes me and a calendar to mark down dates of the “firsts” my son has this summer. I’m a teacher and don’t get as much time to scrapbook and document our lives in the school year…so summer is really my time to shine in that area!
Thanks for the chance to win!!!!
unfortunately i have to work, but we will be spending our weekends: blowing bubbles, watching minor league baseball, in the plastic pool, throwing rocks, tromping through the woods, and taking pictures every step of the way!!
A summer journal is a great idea! We have craft projects I stockpile during the year – sand art, paint sets, and my son’s favorite, permanent markers! :/
We love to do projects in the summer. The summer long ones are the best, like journaling, making houses out of cardboard and furniture too, tents for reading in… and we love to cook in the kitchen. Beautiful summer hours!!
This has inspired me to start today with a journal for my 6 year old. This will be a fun project that we can do together and will help us remember all the summer fun we’ve had. We just had relatives from another state visit and went to an amusement park, had a huge birthday party and we plan to go to many baseball games and hit the local pool. We will have no trouble filling up a journal! I love spending the summers with my babies!!
My kids are 6 and 4. Their first project is going to be their special Daddy book I made for them here. A journal is a great idea, though. Both of them can at least draw pictures and my 6 yo son can begin to write things. I think I have two Paper Coterie journals just waiting for precious hands and hearts to fill them!! Thanks for the push!
I was planning on painting some canvases with them for around the house. Now we will also do summer journals. What an awesome idea!!
I love the idea of a journal, but I don’t think my son would! (He is only 5 and he cannot write yet and he doesn’t really enjoy drawing very much.) I have been trying to find fun crafts for him to do this summer. I was also going to make a cd of all his favorite songs so we can dance to them (either outside or inside on a rainy day)
This is just what I buy your books for when I need a gift for new mothers!! Love the idea of the Documenting Dailies!!
I plan on doing one big fun outdoor activity a week, keeping it simple for the rest of the week, do we’re going to be documenting our summer and coming up with an ideas book as well, I want to encourage my kids to dream a little, explore possibilities, and document out summer fun! By doing this they’re still actively using their minds instead of zonking out in front of tv or computer! I’m thinking documenting dailies would be fun for them!!!
We make photo books to keep our memories in. We also make scrapbook pages to keep in a notebook. Sometimes, we create a trip journal. We also make a craft or two.
Everyweek we are baking something new, my daughter also started a song journal for all her fun made up songs she sings.
My 4-year-old loves to draw! So every day, she draws a picture, colors it in, and then hangs it on the wall in our bonus room. I’m hoping by the end of summer we have a whole gallery of her work hanging on the wall!
My girls are fairly young (21/2 & 9 mo) but I’m constantly on the look out for creative things for them to do, especially since their grandparents are out of state. Sending mail is one of our favorite things! Especially when they’re covered in stickers. I also do Project Life as one of my creative outlets – it helps when Mama is feeling creative to get the kids to feel that way too!
Our Summer is filled with projects! we’re making the Daddy book we got from here. Every Friday night, our family has a “party”. We go all out, the kids make the decorations. I’m inspired to start a journal of these parties and write down each family members’ favorite moment from the party. We also do one special craft every week.
Doing little arts & crafts at home {This kit would be perfect for those times} as well as visiting all local Art Festivals to spark creativity.
Love summer time with my kids! We try to plan some fun outside activities but also some fun crafts for inside when it’s too hot! We just started the treasure chest – where they get to pick one craft project from a treasure chest for good behavior!!! Love the idea of teh journal!
We are hanging on to tickets, flyers, etc from the things we do and using a composition notebook to make a journal. June has already started flying by so we want to capture as many summer memories as we can!
My parents are building a summer home and have asked the kids to decorate the plates and mugs they will have there. We’ll be spending lots of time at the pottery painting place.
My daughter LOVES to paint so I pick up items on clearance that she can paint and stock up for summer! Luckily all of our family has summer birthdays so those painted treasures can go for birthday presents.
Summer with two boys always involves outdoor activities. Our favorite is collecting nature items on a hike and bringing them back home to make things like wreaths out of paper plates, gluing things into collages or making little homes for the bugs outside
We bought a journal but instead turned it into a “memorable quotes” book. Our girls are growing up way too fast and we wanted to keep a record of all the funny and/or meaningful things they say. So we keep the journal in an easily accessed place and jot down their little quotes so we can look back and remember them when they were little (any maybe embarrass them on their wedding days with a few quotes).
We have been collecting our toilet and paper towel rolls. When we have enough we are going to make a castle and some people with the rolls. It is going to be so much fun!! My kids are 3 and 5.
My girls are still young but I have been keeping a picture journal of each of them since they were born. This Summer my oldest will be able to help me with hers and even her sister’s. Since we have more time now, I will do a daily picture instead of a weekly picture and then together, we’ll write about what happened, where we went, etc.
My kids and I keep a log of the books we have read and what we think of them. It is fun to look back and see when we read some of our favorites. I’m going to start including some photos into our reading journal as well.
We started the summer by completing the All About Dad book in time for Father’s Day. On the last day of school, my soon to be 2nd grader signed up for his very own library card (he’s so proud!). He’s been reading up a storm ever since! Because he loves to journal, we’re keeping a summer book list – along with his favorite details and memories of each book he reads, including drawings when he’s inspired. It’s a fun way to encourage reading all summer long!
I was great organizing pictures and summer projects for my older son who is 8, but not for the little ones. The photo postcards will be a great start to our summer since school goodbyes are still fresh. They will also be a nice “Hello across the miles” to family & friends who live far away (and a reminder to come visit us!)
That is a great idea to have a gratitude journal for kids.
This is the last week of school for my kids and we are going to be making our summer bucket list. We are writing down all the things we would like to do. I’m going to let them decorate a bucket then each day draw from the bucket and hope to get them all done before school starts back up.
This summer we are focusing on acts of kindness – giving my three boys opportunities to think of others. It would be so great to keep track of our “adventures” this summer with the prize pack!
My younger sister loves to draw and I’ve been wanting to buy a blank unlined journal for her and encourage her to draw something everyday this summer.
Thanks for the inspiration! I adore snail mail.
It’s not very creative but since my daughter is starting preschool we are doing workbooks to help her write her letters and learn to read.
How great!
We are doing reading journals!
My oldest grand daughter has expressed a desire to start scrapbooking and this is such a great way to journal her life and experiences…so we are going to start this summer:)
My sweet boy is only turning one this summer, so most of our creative things involve me doing them for him, not so much with him.
But our theme this summer is “less is more”. We are working on a few meaningful projects (a quilt, his babybook, a darling first birthday party, and kid-friendly photo albums)….can you teach quality versus quantity to a 1 year old?
We started daily journals drawing a picture of something that happened that day and writing a description.
My daughter wants to keep a summer scrapbook
This summer I am spending lots of time with my boy teaching him to be grateful! It will be fun and especially fun if we won this little package! thanks!
My kindergartner loves crafts. One of her favorite thing to do is making cards for people. She also makes her own paper dolls and makes like clothes for them. We’ve also been on a nature craft kick… pet rocks, leaf prints, etc.
My boys and I are taking weekly adventures and taking lots of pictures. We are discovering new places in and around our community – many of them low cost/free since we’re on a limited budget.
This summer we have started a family summer camp – every weekday morning from 10-noon the kids do reading, math, and answer a daily question in their writing journals and a daily job! We have been doing it for a week now and everyone is still positive about camp – so I’m excited!! Winning the summer documenting package would be totally helpful with our Summer Camp goals – so thank you for the chance to win!!
This us going to be a special summer for us. We are going to be in a major outdoor production as a family for our church. (the Hill Cumorah Pageant)
There will be so many memories!! I want me and my kids to remember as much as we can. So, journaling/memory book entries will be key. My brother is also getting married.
Lots of great times head!
This is our last summer with all four girls at home! My oldest will begin Kindergarten this fall so we decided to make this summer one to remember. We are leaving today for our first ever trip to San Antonio! Sea World, Zoo, Children’s Museum and the Riverwalk are some of our hotspots. I’m almost just as excited for the road trip!
I’ve also planned for their aunt to stay a few weeks with us, swimming playdates with their friends, family and church BBQ’s are on the calendar and some lazy days too. Catch a few summer movies, make a few movies of our own…picnic lunches outside and maybe cook up some new recipes. I just want this to be one of the best summers in their memories growing up. =)
Our family loves to travel so we’re incorporating maps into our travel journals along with the other fun things we find along our way!
We have made a Summer Bucket List ~ and have already checked 4 things off of the list! We have plans to complete the list by the end of August
Since my children are only 3 and 1, I am just starting to instill an attitude of gratitude with my older one. I encourage him to give thanks to Jesus, at least for one thing, at bed time. It encourages him to remember the day and talk about his highlight for the day. We’re also growing a vegetable garden, which teaches him to be thankful for the food on the table, and how God helps things grow. He seems to eat more vegetables this way, too.
We made up a summer bucket list and it has lots of crafts, like salt dough, rock painting, tye dye, finger print art, pirate newspaper swords and much more! We’ve already made garden steppingstones, done some face painting and made marshmallow toothpick structures! And between our trips to fun places like six flaggs, the Oregon coast and even local berry farms for lots of berry picking, it’s shaping up to be a terrific summer!
We love making books that record special events in our lives. Whether it is a vacation or father’s day. Our next mission is a family cookbook…
We’re working hard on reading with our son and learning the alphabet and numbers with our daughter. To make it even more fun and exciting we’re tying it into mini-adventures, like an alphabet walk trying to find one thing for every letter while we stroll a trail behind our house. Reading books that relate to places we visit. We of course have our summer dream list (all the things we want to do this summer…it’s lengthy). First up – a trip to Yellowstone for a week! I’m already plotting games for the car (we’re firmly no-screens in the car people) and scavenger hunts for while we’re there. It’s going to be a week of adventure and fun with a side of learning and relaxing. Also – much post card sending!
we are doing nature journals through out the summer…. drawing, painting things around us this summer. Our garden and flower beds as well…we did a rainbow the other day ! Beautiful to see and capture on paper too. Love looking @ all my kids journals as they love to write, scribble and draw in them! thanks for the oppertunity for the giveaway! love it
My boys are first going to do the Daddy journal I got on here – thx so much for running them 60% off too!!! And then I want my oldest to start keeping a nature journal and drawing what he sees in the outside world around him. We are really workng on getting outside of our own little world and exploring all that God has created. Thank you for runnning the sales on the journals. I just got one I created for me in the mail and the prining of the cover is beautiful!
We will be working on science experiments and crafts I find on pinterest!
We take pictures all summer long, and keep track of fun projects in a binder for each child. Then, at the end of summer, we make a poster of pictures from that summer to hang up for the winter, and we also make a picture book.
I love to “send” cards of encouragement to the children in our group at camp. It’s a spirit-lifter, and they love getting “mail” in the middle of the week in front of the group. It makes everyone feel special!
My daughter loves to write and draw (7) and I am planning to start gratitude journals for all of my kids (also 5 and 2) and my own as well after reading Ann Voskamp’s “1000 Gifts”
To prevent summer brain drain we craft and journal around history, literature, and math. We have “mom school” though very laid back. Target, Dollar Tree, and others have some great workbooks. Of course we keep up
with reading. Local libraries as well as Barnes and Noble and BAM have free incentive programs. We decorate for the 4th, dress up in period “costumes” (homemade and they look it)because and attend local reenactments, send notes to the troops…kids really love it!
My daughter, age 8, loves to create agendas for our weekly family meetings. Now she can take “minutes” in her journal so no one forgets their “jobs” for the week or the rewards we have identified to celebrate the accomplishments! Thanks for the inspiration!
yay for summer. my kids love to write on any blank surface. journals are great for those days in the car running errands or long road trips. my girls are 12 and 10
My four- and two-yr-old are very into coloring right now, so we are experimenting with crayons, markers, colored pencils and all kinds of paper. If my husband or I leave any paper out, it’s sure to be scribbled on!
My three kids (ages 6, 6 and
want to learn to cook this summer and help out making breakfasts and lunches. I’d love to take photos of them and have them write out their favorite recipes and foods to collect in a special scrapbook.
I don’t have any children of my own, but I love spending time with my young niece and nephew making cards out of stickers and stamps.
My older children started a ‘funny saying’ book for all those hilarious things that make their way out of peoples mouths. We record the sentence, then the details from the moment which made it so silly. We now have a whole book of one liners that get us laughing all over again.
Taking a 3 week road trip with my 2 kids (6 &
this summer. Hoping to have them create trip journals with their writing + Instax pictures!
We made a summer bucket list full of ordinary and some not o ordinary things to do this summer!
our family is in love with the outdoors. My children have recently become obsessed with scavenger hunts. every weekend we will be hitting a new park which my usband & I will research ahead of time & come up with a scavenger hunt for our 3 kids to enjoy
Oh, we’re starting journals and gratitude lists this summer. We spend lots of time outside doing any number of things but I think I’ll add some scavenger hunt fun to that as well. Such fun ideas!!! Thanks!!
Our daughter is getting ready for kindergarten this fall!! So we are enjoying every precious moment this summer! We are spending lots of time practcing letters and reading and writing, and of course taking lots of pictures! These summer projects will be perfect for her!!
would love to win this. love your site and products.
We have been doing a lot of painting outside so far this summer. And of course, there’s reading, bike riding, swimming, writing stories, catching fireflies, etc.
Jodi
My kids like to make collages out of catalogs and National Geographic magazines. My son would like to make a journal like the one he had at school. I would also like to have them sit down one day a week to write and send letters to friends and family.
I love surprises!!
We love to go to the beach. Draw in the sand, collect shells and rocks for decorating things…photo frames, books, candle holders! Possibilities are endless.
I nanny and something like this would be perfect to do with the kids this summer!
Sammy will turn two soon but already he loves to color I would love to start a journal for him! We live far from my family so this kit would also help us keep In touch!
Great idea! As far as creativity with the kids this summer…I don’t know yet – school is still in for another week, so we need to get through this before we can think ahead.
This year “memory book” (Something from March 2011 to March 2012), consisting of photos and post-it like notes on pretty paper about as many happy moments as we can recall
We spend our summers at the library reading–maybe not too creative, but it takes us places! We also work on sewing projects–crafts or clothes.
I am a great one for documenting which I learned from my father, who thankfully, took lots of black and white pictures over the years so that I would know what I looked like as a second grader in a Brownie uniform, as a 7th grader with a mini skirt and boufant hairdo as well as what my brother looked like before he left for Vietnam.
I make scrapbooks for my grandchildren now. Their parents are also great picture takers but sadly, they remain in the camera. I print them out and write little stories in the books and sometimes, if I am lucky enough to be visiting them (their parents are all in the military and live far from me), we work on some pages or a book together. Not only do they have a book to remember themselves by, but the project, itself, is a momento of a rare opportunity to be together.
I just had a couple of friends over for my daughter’s birthday and we made duct tape purses and roses. All the girls had a blast and of course we took pictures. We have pictures of different crafts and games these girls have done together for the last 11 years. Will be fun to make them a little scrapbook in 7 more years of 18 years of pictures of their friendship.
something creative… I have lessons for all of them- swimming, soccer, dance. I have quiet time planned, school workbooks so as not to lose what we already know, play dates planned, and lots of adventures and fieldtrips… but creative- pick me, it seems that I need some help!!!!
We have just moved to a new city (and state) and have made our Summer Manifesto of everything we want to try in our new place–so lots of fun exploring and discovering
As a former 1st grade teacher, I’m devoting each week this summer to a different theme for my 4 little ones. This week it’s pirates and (among other things) we’re dressing up as pirates and having sword fights and learning pirate vocabulary. The kids love it, and I enjoy watching them use their imagination!
Since my memory isn’t what it used to be. I thought I would start a journal to document all the cute things my little kiddos say. Then we can all get a good laugh out of it later on.
they are interested in bug collecting at the moment…and gardening. and lots of mud pies/cookies/crumbles! very artful filled with flowers and petals and seed heads and whatnot. They love to paint. we just made each child a ‘field notebook’ to write down observations while on walks.
One of the most fun things (and out of the ordinary) we’ve done is to have our own art show. The kids do a variety of art projects (water color, crayons, etc.) and then we hang them all up and host our own art show! We’ve done it complete with snacks and drinks and the kids each present their own work. Then the attendees (mommy and daddy, grandma and grandpa) are free to look at the art work at their leisure. The artists are, of course, available for questions or to describe their work!
I have three little ones, but my oldest startes kindergarten in the fall so this summer we are trying all we can to make it a memoriable one! We have a summer bucket list and a joournal would be just the thing to keep all our memories in!!!
I’m making an effort to get out of the house with my kids… And my camera! They grow up so fast.
Every summer we have a family reunion and my kids and their cousins open an “art shop” displaying the crafts they make that week at the family reunion. It is fun to see their creativity as they draw, knit, make jewelry, tie dye shirts or whatever they find to do. Even if their only customers are Grandma, Aunts and Uncles they have fun and head to the candy store/malt shop at the resort with their change. This year my daughter will ad “face painting” to art shop which should make for some great photos and great photo gifts to make at Paper Coterie!
With all the outdoor fun and activities this summer, I would love to give my 8 y.o. a journal just for recording her own memories and good times of summer vacation. What a great project idea – thanks!
Last year my kids (5 and 10) decided to start their own newspaper. We got a big roll of white paper from Ikea, and every day they wrote stories and drew pictures of the things they were doing for fun. They even included “ads” for places they love to go, like the family fun center. I’m hoping they do it again this summer!
Thanks to our neighbor’s kitchen remodel, we have a giant cardboard fort in the yard that the kids rearrange daily… the boxes might not survive the summer, but the grass is still alive!
The journaling idea is a great one !!!!!
we are moving this summer, so i feel like we won’t have much time for creative pursuits. I would love, though, for the kids to journal about their thoughts on moving…including photos of friends and favorite places that we are leaving behind.
Please tell us where the beautifully shaped pictures come from. I would love to be able to use that shape on some of my paper projects.
We are throwing a first birthday party! And I am making a sweet little dress from a ladies’ linen shirt and a little cupcake applique from a tiny little outfit she’s outgrown.
Well, my children are still to young to write, but one thing I am doing with my youngest is taking her picture every week for her first year. Then, I’ll create a book using one image from every week
Crafts, crafts and more crafts! Painting, drawing, building gardening – the list goes on
My girls love to go on treasure hunts outside. We have a small bucket with their names on them so they can grab and collect and we go for walks, take trips to the beach , or venture to new places. when we come home we go through the bucket and add things to their garden or create something new with it.
As my husband and I look forward to soon starting a family through adoption I am making mental lists of all the arts and crafts that I dream about teaching my child. From graphic design to paper crafts to crochet and cross stitching. As well as being creative in the kitchen through cooking, baking and plating dishes. It’s making sure to be creative everyday that I want to instill in my future child. That’s what make us happy.
My daughter are talking about doing a journal /dairy book with her favorite stuffed animal. Taking photos and writing about where they went together. For example , we will visit a friend that was adoPted from same orphanage in China or planting corn in the garden in the yard.
We had a fun time making daddy’s jOurnal!
We will take nature walks and make collages out of the things we find.
My 4, 3 and 1 year old will be having “mommy” school twice a week and every Wednesday we will go on an adventure (to get the heck out of the house)!!
We’re currently getting ready for a road trip across CA. I’m packing each of my kids little memory books for writing what we see, stickers to decorate them and colored pencils to draw pictures of their favorite sites. It’s going to be a great trip and they will always have their books to look back and remember!
I am doing a SMASH journal with my son via an online class at Big Picture Classes. This will help him with his writing while he is having fun being creative and doing art work as well.
We are participating in a “sticker” chain mail, so that hopefully when all is said & done my 7 year daughter will have received 36 packets of stickers for free by mail. Sounds interesting.
Going to a paint your own pottery place and planing to make some “palm” trees and feet in the sand for grandma’s beach themed living room. Can’t wait to play with paints.
Let the kids interview family– to record old stories that they’ve never heard. Let them make a travel journal or a weekly journal that they must write at least 1 story in per week but they MUST illustrate it as well. I could go on and on. I write down funny comments that my kids make or record a bit of their mischief.
My daughter is just turning 1, and I tend to be a big planner. But so far, with all of my grand ideas, she is happy with just the first part. Beach day, she was happy with just discovering what this sand thing was all about, grabbing it, eating it, crawling on it. So this summer we are just going to do one simple thing a day with no big plans. If it lasts all day, that’s great. If not, I’m sure I can plan something else for us to do!
My kids are already journalers for school and we have one master calendar and then they write down in their own words and book the events and likes and dislikes. I keep a family scrapbook for the year with the calendar and pictures from those events big and everyday. We are doing a communication class, botany class, lots of swimming, writing letters so we don’t forget how to do it, making videos and learning new foods to make together, cake decorating and hosting guests.
I just began a “Mommy and Me” journal with my two-year-old daughter, Jovie. Within the journal, I am writing letters to her as well as writing down what “adventures” we go on and the hilarious things that just come out candidly. I’ve always been big into scrapbooks, but with the hustle and bustle of life I have embraced journaling because of its convenience to jot down memories and notes anytime and anywhere.