DIY Water Slip and Slide

Labor Day is the sign of summer coming to a close and basically the last hurrah to celebrate the last few days of it!

What better way to end it than having a party with a DIY Slip and Slide?

For Aubrey's second birthday, that's exactly what we did - we built a DIY Slip and slide. Isn't she the cutest? I'm a bad mom, don't really have official 2 year pictures of her - and I'm a freakin' photographer! (Note to self: Doing it this weekend!)

To be transparent, Ryan and I had a huge argument about whether or not we needed one. I was the one who wanted it, Ryan didn't want to because he thought it was "excessive" (air quotes). As we were shopping for the party, Ryan was with me and gave me a dirty look whenever I would approach something remotely close to a slip and slide.

So, being a saavy wife,  I bought a plastic sheet that I said was for "painting". Needless to say, when I started setting it up he was furious. When he saw how much fun all the kids all had, I think he changed his tune while mumbling under his breath about the pending water bill. As it turned out, our water bill was the same as last month due to his previous watering of our garden...so he had no excuse not to love this water slide!

Our little party guests loved the water slide, especially since our huge hill provided that much more excitement! Some people may say that having this steep hill in our backyard is a "drawback" to our property (and I'll be honest we did too), but we've had so many memories on this hill from sledding to first tumbles down the hill - its really been an amazing blessing.

Anyway, here are the ingredients to an awesome water slide:

• Large plastic sheet ($25)
• Water sprinkler that will drip water ($5) - buy two of them if you have the option to run two hoses. I used this Plastic Ring Sprinkler and a Wide Angle Fan Spray (this one worked the best)
• Water hose
• Dish soap...lots of it
• Fabric and Sod Staples 

Open plastic sheeting. Put the fabric and sod staples in areas where the kids won't hit it. Soap it up. Water it up. Warn the kids. Provide disclaimers to participating parents about the fun to ensue. Remind about where the sod staples are. Have fun!

For those worried about their grass, we picked the plastic up the night of - and our grass was fine. Don't these kids look like they are having fun?

For more great kid activities, check out this link (click on Kid Activities) and follow me on Instagram for other cool ideas!