[jstanawa]

My older 3 kids are 5, 12, and 14. For the last couple years we have been using spare time to volunteer at the local veterans home. It gives the kids a chance to learn to give back to our veterans. It gives the veterans a chance to have younger people for companionship. My kids have walked away with pride, a sense of being important to someone else, and it has given them history lessons from real people who have lived through the depression, WWII, Korean war, and the Vietnam war.

We also spend 1 day a week at our local park, where we eat lunch picnic that we brought from home. We spend at least 1 evening a week at the beach for sub sandwich dinner that we make in the afternoon. We also take 1 morning and go to the library where everyone picks out a book for the week (we also check out videos, cd's of music, and a cookbook to explore). Thursday is always our home down day where we don't do a single thing but sit in our jammies and basically do nothing.