It’s that time of year again. The kids are heading back to school, or maybe off to school for the very first time.

Rather than suggest a new activity this week, I’m going to say look at the things you meant to get done as a family over the summer. The fun stuff. Get going while there’s still time!

Free Fun Fridays are back!

Plan a family treasure hunt. The parents or one of the older kids can write clues or draw a map, and set things up. Everyone else gets to try to find the treasure.

If one of the kids is hiding the remote control, you might just get some desperate treasure hunters!

Kidding, folks, kidding. The house gnomes are really the ones who hid the remote. Kids, don’t hide the remote. Not only does it annoy parents, it makes it harder for you to watch TV!

Depending on ages and interest level, each clue can lead to a prize and a new clue or just a new clue. The early, easier to find prizes should be pretty basic.

Treasure hunts can be indoors or outdoors, although pirate-loving children may well want to be allowed to dig for the final treasure… or at least mine would.

I just realized that I’ve been doing this Free Fun Fridays thing for over a year now. Not quite 52 posts of it, as I wasn’t too regular at first, but still quite a number of posts.

This week’s suggestion I can’t believe I haven’t made before. Read together.

With younger kids, you can read to them. If they know the story from having it read so often, encourage them to fill in the lines by pausing at points you think they know.

Take turns reading with older kids. It can be sentence by sentence, paragraph by paragraph or page by page, depending on what you think will work for your child’s skills.

One of the fun things about taking a family walk is all the leaves and such you can find. Take advantage and make a collage when you get home.

You can think of different themes or just do a “stuff we found” collage. Maybe look for seeds, or different kinds of leaves.

This can be a great way to encourage the entire family to pay attention to what’s around them as you walk. Not to mention that younger children in particular love making crafts.

Cultural centers and festivals are available in most cities and can be quite a bit of fun. While it’s easy to spend money at some events, there’s generally things you can do for free as well.

You may get to listen to the music of a particular culture or see traditional dances. You could learn a traditional art or craft.

This can be a great chance to talk about your own family’s cultural heritage or introduce the kids to a new one.