The summer holidays are over, and they were brilliant

They have gone so quickly! I thought that I'd find it a struggle having both children at home, but although it hasn't always been easy, we've had a really fun summer. I was a little daunted at the prospect of six weeks with no school, but I've not struggled to keep us busy. It probably helped that we had a lovely week away in Snowdonia at the very end of the holidays, with just a couple of days to recover before Harry was back to school. I won't pretend that I didn't miss my two mornings a week that I usually have to myself though!

At the beginning of the summer holidays I put together a summer list of things that I wanted to do. Well, we didn't do nearly everything that I wanted to but that's fine, it was a long list and there is plenty of inspiration there for us over the next few months, or even for next summer!

I only managed one themed day in the end. Our Roman Day was a big success, but we just seemed to be so busy with things on most days. We also didn't have as many barbecues as we did last summer, although that was down to the weather, which was also the reason that Harry and I only managed one night in the tent. I really wanted Mia to join us in the tent overnight, but although she loved the idea of getting ready for bed in the tent, when it came to actually going to sleep she bailed out and ended up back in her own bed!

We seem to have been very busy with some fantastic days out. We used our Tesco points to visit Paradise Park, Woburn Safari Park and Hever Castle. We were invited to spend the day at Butlins, we had a fab time at Lollibop, and I even spent a day by myself crafting in London.

It has definitely been a summer of crafting, and in particular crafting with Hama beads mainly thanks to a fantastic craft package from Craft Merrily. I've already shared the Hama bead elephants that are currently marching across my mantlepiece, and we've all been spending a lot of time arranging Hama beads on pegboards. We've also been loom banding away, although I've still not got the hang of using an actual loom. I also came up with some summer crafts for the Twinkl blog - I think that my favourites were the cardboard box aquarium and the mermaid garden.

We completed the summer reading challenge at the library, and Harry worked on his Parragon Gold Stars workbook as well as doing lots of extra reading and writing practice. Harry took a photo for each letter of the alphabet, and we made a museum and a shop.

I'm a little sad to be waving Harry back off to school again (not to mention having to get us all up and ready in the mornings and the dreaded school run). I also know that it's not going to be long until we get the application form for Mia to start school, and I'm counting down my time as a stay at home Mum to a pre-schooler.

But there is also lots to look forward to over the next few weeks. I'm so excited about the MAD Blog Awards finals in London, I'm so thrilled to be a finalist and it looks like it will be an amazing party. We still have Tesco vouchers left over for some more days out, and in a couple of months time we are going away on a brilliant holiday.

How was your summer? Did you manage to do everything that you had planned?