Having fun on a budget

So one of my (and my husband's) goals as parents is to find something very active and fun to do with Myles each weekend. Typically, whatever we do needs to be on a budget as well, since we don't have money coming out of our ears and have seen our fair share of "unexpected" expenses over the past 2 years. Specifically, we do our best to stay under $20 in this outing.With the Central Florida Fair in town for 10 days, we desperately wanted to go. But, as you probably know, fairs are not for the budget conscious. I checked their site Friday night and on top of $10 admissions for my husband and I (free for Myles), we would have each needed to purchase $20 wristbands to ride all of the rides. To me, this is the only way to go at a fair, since many rides cost 3-4 tickets, valued at $1 each!!! So for the three of us to enjoy a day at the fair, we were looking at $80...WAY out of our budget!

Enter my good friend, Jen, who always seems to know of the fun events around town. As it turns out, her daughter's pre-school was holding a festival, complete with two bounce houses, a cute kiddie train ride, lots and lots of great developmental activities like water tables, sand tables, bean bag toss, and more and entertainment by local kid favorite, Mister Richard. It was the perfect event for us!

Myles had an absolute blast, although he went nuts in the bounce house. You see, the kids entered the bounce house on one side, jumped a little, then climbed an inflatable wall (similar to a rock climbing wall) and slid down the other side. Well, of course, the bigger kids (4-6 years old) weren't sliding...they were jumping off the wall. And of course, my sweet little 25 month-old had to follow suit. He jumped and jumped, both off the wall side and off the slide side. I finally lured him off, red faced and covered with sweat after 20 minutes or so, by offering him some juice and popcorn.

I think the thing I liked best about this event was the developmental toys they had strewn around the grounds. Myles spent a lot of time at the sand table, where they had an assortment of small cars and trucks to ride through the sand. He also cooled off by splashing A LOT at the water table.

We spent about 2.5 hours total at the event and Myles crashed on the way home. Total cost was only $18, which bought us BBQ lunches and a wristband for Myles, getting him unlimited train rides, turns in the bounce house, and unlimited snow cones and popcorn. It was $18 well spent...and honestly, I am sure he had just as good a time there as he would have at the $80 fair!