If the vastly approaching school holidays are making you panic (what am I going to do with the kids for two-whole-weeks?! Two weeks!!), then fret no more: we’ve got ’em covered!

As kids if there was one thing we lived for every school term, it was the school holidays; to hear that school bell ring for the very last time for the next few weeks-it was the sound of freedom.

Now that we’re parents, however, that last ring of the school bell sounds nothing like freedom. It sounds like two weeks of arguments over television remotes, who’s next on the Wii, and the dreaded: “I’m bored!”

These school holidays keep the kids amused, and avoid the panic with these fun activities.

Fly a kite – remember how much fun those kids had in Mary Poppins? That’s because it is fun! Best of all, it’s simple-you pack a picnic, your kite and you find you a spot at the top of a hill on a windy day. Also make sure you teach the kids the obligatory kite-flying song: let’s go fly a kite/up to the highest height/let’s go fly a kite/and send it soaring. If you decide to make your own, don’t forget that all you need is tuppence for paper and strings, and you can have your own set of wings!

Sleep under the stars – the only thing better than having a sleep over is sleeping out under the stars! Get all the kids around, lay a tarp on the grass in your garden and a sleeping bag marks the spot! It’s the best of both worlds: the kids have all their mates over, and you don’t have to deal with mess. Plus, it’s extra fun if the parents don’t join in-so you can still curl up in your bed inside the house. Just try and tell me that isn’t a win-win-win!

Toast marshmallows – this is great fun and can be incorporated into the sleeping-under-the-stars-evening, with parental supervision, of course. This is a simple one, again, but surprisingly few kids these days get to do it that often, so it’s guaranteed to be a hit. Plus, it’ll keep you toasty on a cooler evening.

Revolving dinner night – organise with your neighbours to have a revolving dinner night where each family prepares a different course of food-entrée, main, dessert, etc-and you revolve between houses for each course. If you have a quiet street, you could also include a few games of street cricket, basketball or footy in the early part of the evening.

Have a street party – and invite your friends and family who don’t live in the street, too. Do the limbo (while listening to Chubby Checker’s Limbo Rock, of course!), dance to the Nutbush, the Macarena (or whatever the kids are listening to these days!) and have a big cook-up on the barbie!

Build a treehouse – okay, so it’s a little work, but it’s the holiday activity that keeps on giving, because once the kids move in, they’ll be up there for hours, and all the time! If you don’t want to build a treehouse, teach them to climb a tree-when I was a kid, my neighbour and I stayed in a tree nearly all day, partly because we were too scared to climb down, but mainly because it was fun!

Don’t forget our golden rule of school holidays: keep it simple!