Road Trip Bingo: A Truck-Spotting Game for the Whole Family

On a recent cross-country road trip, my son and I passed the time with one of our favorite games: spotting Swift Transportation trucks. The rule is simple—whoever sees one first gets to punch the other in the arm (gently, of course). It’s surprisingly entertaining and definitely helps the miles go by faster. And believe me, there are a lot of Swift trucks out there.

While scanning the highways, I had a fun idea: Truck Bingo. Instead of calling out numbers and letters, players watch the road for trucks that match the ones on their bingo cards. It’s a great way to keep kids engaged during long stretches of driving.

Want to take it up a notch? Try playing blackout bingo, where the goal is to mark off every square. Or keep a running tally on each type of truck you spot—see which one dominates the highway.

You can print the cards on regular paper for one-time use, but I recommend laminating them and using dry-erase markers so you can reuse them for future trips. Add your own fun twist: maybe the first person to get blackout picks the music, or chooses the next lunch stop.

I’ve created five unique Truck Bingo cards that you’re welcome to use for your own road trip adventures. Each card features a different truck brand or company logo at the top and in the center “free space.” You can keep it simple and use that square as a traditional free space—or make it more challenging by requiring players to spot five of that specific truck before they can mark it off. It’s a fun way to add variety and competition to your drive!

Be creative—and let the miles roll by with a little friendly competition!

Shadow Puppet Theater

My favorite summer activity we do each year is our Shadow Puppet Theater Performance. We invite our family over to watch an original show written and performed by my kids. We've been doing this for 7 YEARS! 

It's very simple to make your own Shadow Puppet Theater! I bought a sheet for a couple dollars at Goodwill. All they had there at the time was a peach color. I would have preferred white; however the pale pastel color peach works just fine too. You can still see through it perfectly when you shine a light behind it.  

I made sure to sew a small pocket, with each end open, at the top of the sheet so we could slip a PVC pipe through it to hang. We now own a set of Fort Magic which works GREAT to build our theater on. We've been using our Fort Magic set for several years. 

To get the theater look, I used some painters tape around the edges of our sheet, and painted it with house paint I had on hand. I made sure to do several coats so you can't see through it when the light shines behind.

Through the years our transparency puppet collection has grown. Each year we do a different performance, and typically will chose a new character to make. Sometimes I have printed the characters on transparencies, but most of the time I have printed a coloring picture of the character out, and then I transfer it to the transparency by tracing over it with a permanent marker. 

I've tried using super glue to attach the transparencies to small dowel rods, but they often fall apart and break off during the show. Now I simply use a couple pieces of clear tape to get them to stick. If it's good tape, you won't even be able to see it!

We always make a day of summer fun with our theater performance. We write the story ourselves, make the characters, we practice repeatedly until it's perfect. And we invite family to watch the show in the evening. We also like to provide some yummy snacks for everyone. The boys will often take drink orders before the show, and will bring a treat to everyone during the intermission. The kids love this part of serving!

This night is always a favorite for all. It's so fun to watch the kids act out the show through shadow puppets and I love the different voices they do for each character. They always make me laugh. I enjoy it just as much as a night out at an expensive theater.

To make things funny, this year we decided to do our play based on the game Mash. We wanted our main character to be my husband since he wouldn't get to participate in the planning. The kids thought he would make a great main character. All of us chose one suggestion for each category of the Mash game. If our suggestion ended up being chosen, that meant we had to write that part of the story. It was so much fun! This play ended up being a collaboration of all four of us writing different parts to Titus' Grand Life. It was silly and memorable. I know the kids will remember this night for quite a while!

Summer Secret Service

I'm always looking for ways to serve other people. Acts of service is my love language, so believe me when I say, I LOVE to help people. This summer I wanted to do our normal summer fun, but I also wanted to go a little further and do some acts of kindness for each other.

This summer we have made a pact to do Summer Secret Service. We call ourselves the S.S.S. On the first day of summer vacation we drew names in our family. We also included my mom who spends a lot of time with us.

It's a SECRET who has who. So far, the kids have done pretty good at keeping it a secret. It's not so important to keep who has who a secret, as it is to keep the act itself a secret. It's fun to walk into your room and see that someone made your bed for you. Or it's REALLY neat to think you have to do the dinner dishes and find out someone secretly did it while you were busy elsewhere.

To make it extra special, my son designed a logo for us. I have such talented kids! I love what he came up with. It perfectly captures the love behind the acts of kindness. We printed our logo on labels that we can use for the things we make, and I ordered some business cards from Vistaprint. For example, if you clean the room for someone, you can slip a business card onto the bed or desk to show that the S.S.S. has been there.

We also plan on doing some acts of kindness for people outside of our family. This will be a great chance to use our business card. We can let them know they have been visited by the S.S.S.

I received this very sweet note from my S.S.S. I have spent several days helping a friend through a very trying time in her life. In fact, as I was writing this blog post a couple days ago, I received an important phone call from her. I put everything in my life on hold. I tried to be practical in the love I showed her. I went with her to the hospital. I helped clean her house, and packed some boxes for an upcoming move. I was emotionally exhausted and physically spent. It was a great source of encouragement to find this note waiting for me in my own home. Daisies are a source of comfort for me. To me they are a happy flower. This simple note made me tear up. It was a reminder that God is proud of me. That's enough to keep me going.  

*UPDATE* We had our big reveal, and I found out this letter to me was lurking in my house for over two weeks! I love how God has such impeccable timing. I found it the exact day that I needed to find it!

Everyone needs to feel a little extra love and care. This is a chance we have this summer to give a little, and even get a little. It adds the perfect special touch to our summer fun. I look forward to many more special acts of kindness this summer! The gears in my head have been turning in ways that I can give to my own S.S.S. It's exciting to be a part of something like this.

*UPDATE* Our Summer Secret Service was such a big success, we decided we wanted to continue the special acts of kindness. We have started a new round of good deeds.... the SCHOOL SECRET SERVICE. New names have been drawn, and new acts of kindness are being performed. We are keeping it a secret for the entire school year, and plan to do at least one good deed for each other per month... hopefully more.

Feel free to use our logo and ideas anyway you see fit! 

Let's all join together and do kind things for each other!

Backyard Safari

Ever think about taking your kids on a safari, but don't have the means to get there? Why not host your own backyard safari? You could make it a party and invite your friends. It's easy, it's cheap, and it gives your kids a chance to go on an exciting adventure, without even leaving your home.

During my week alone with Zech, we chose to explore the wild side. We went on a hunt for animals in the rainforest in our own backyard. He loved this activity.

For $8.99 at Hobby Lobby you can purchase your own set of Rainforest animals! They always have %40 off coupons, and if you coupon, you can get your animals for only $5.39 plus tax. If you aren't too into the rainforest idea, they have tons of other animal toobs to choose from. There are reptiles, dinosaurs, ocean animals, horses, farm animals, sharks, and much more.

After I picked out my animal toob, I put together a worksheet of all the animals we would be hunting for. I Googled different coloring book pictures of each animal. Once Zech found the animal, he could color it on his sheet, and it helped him keep track of the other animals he still needed to find.

He was so excited to go on this hunt. The hard part for him was waiting inside while I hid all the animals in the backyard for him to find. I tried to put them in their natural habitats, but you can imagine how that might get a little tricky when you don't live in the rainforest. We went for as close as possible.

I handed him a magnifying glass and he went to work. (These animals are really small when looking for them in the big backyard!) I tried to find this old safari hat we had in the basement, but it seemed to have disappeared. He didn't mind.

We hunted for... an Alligator

Anteater

Iguana

Jaguar

Parrot

Poison Arrow Frog

Red Eye Tree Frog

Snake

Spider Monkey

Tapir

Toucan

It was such an easy activity to put together, and it gave the greatest satisfaction to Zech. He begged me to hide the animals again. He has also taken to putting together "safaris" for me in the computer room. I have found all these animals time and time again. It never gets old for him.

I Spy

For ten days Gabriel was in New York with his grandma, and Ariel is currently at youth camp. The house has been eerily silent. While I've missed both of my children, I completely enjoyed that extra time alone with Zech. I know it will soon be upon us when he begins kindergarten, and my life will change drastically. For twelve years I have stayed at home with my kids. I'm excited and scared about this next step of my life.

Zechariah is your typical little kid who loves playing I Spy. We have look and find books, and "I Spy" puzzles and games. We have some conversation stones we use at dinner and his favorite are the stones with colors on them.

No matter where we are he will say, "Mommy, I spy with my little eye something blue... green... yellow... white..." The game never stops for him. In fact, he's been talking about having an I Spy birthday party for some time now.

This week we had an I Spy day together. We played I Spy for hours. That is an act of love for me. I can only handle so much before I get tired. My brain can't take it.

For some added enjoyment we made our own I Spy picture to look at. It was so much fun to go around the house gathering items and toys to put in the photo. We found some really random items that were special to Zech.

I have a white foam poster board that I like to use for pictures. We put all our things on top of it as close as possible and snapped a photo. We strategically placed a few buttons and other small objects in "hidden" places. It was so easy and has already provided hours of fun for Zech.

I know we will be making several I Spy pictures in the future. We can do theme I Spy. Trains. Cars. Craft Supplies. Food. The ideas are endless!

Since becoming a Compassion and World Vision sponsor I am always on the lookout for new and fun paper gift items to send to our sponsored kids. I think this would be fun for them! We could laminate the two photos onto a piece of construction paper. This could become a whole series of I Spy pictures and we could mail them with our letters each month!

Through the Lens: Summer Edition

We had a wonderful summer! There are so many things I wish I could go into detail about, however, time doesn't stand still. The more time that passes, the more things we do. I can't keep up! I've saved a few of the more special days to share with you later. This will be kept really simple, and I will use as few words as possible. After all, they say a picture is worth a thousand words!

Macaroni Fun

Dance Praise Competition

Coded Treasure Hunt

Use What You Find! : Salvation Army

Soccer at our Elementary School!

Chocolate Day

Penguin Day

Nature Scavenger Hunt

Hawaiian Ice

Paddle Boats

Safari Golf

4th of July

Swimming

Kite Flying

Science Day

Jesus Bingo

Art Day

Sewing Day

Emporia Zoo

Health Food / Exercise Day

Last Day of Summer Vacation

This is just a small sample of all the fun times we had the past few months!