Let Cadbury know your shared joyful summer moments which cost nothing - £265 voucher and Merlin ticket to be won! NOW CLOSED

[JustineBMumsnet]

The school summer holidays are a great time to share lots of wonderful moments with your children, and though the cost of exciting days out can really add up, they’re not the only way to have fun.

Cadbury Dairy Milk Buttons would like you to share the joyful summer moments you’ve shared with your children which cost nothing.

This could be a water fight in the garden on a hot summer day, a trip to a local museum that you both really enjoyed or an impromptu picnic in the park. Have you found creative ways to have fun without the price tag? Whatever your joyful summer moments that cost nothing, share them with Cadbury below.

All those who post a comment below will be entered into a prize draw where one winner will receive a £265 Love2Shop voucher and a second winner will win a Merlin family ticket worth up to £200.

Thanks and good luck!

MNHQ

Standard Insight T&Cs Apply

Additional information for Merlin prize: the winner will need to advise on the attraction they would like to visit and they will be sent a set of open dated tickets to use in 2016. The exception is Madame Tussauds in London where it gets very busy. Therefore, the winner will need to advise on three potential dates for their visit and Merlin will book them in in advance for one of those dates.

We stay in a lovely Rural area with an amazing country view, we have a huge forest full of walks just a mile away, so my children and I ventured up in the woodland trail during the summer holidays and had an amazing day! We seen squirrels and even a wild cat it was surreal
We stopped at the lake to enjoy a picnic, Lovely days out need not cost a penny :)

Coincidentally, today was the first day of the Bournemouth Air Festival, including the free air show featuring the Red Arrows / Typhoon / The Blades, etc. That was great fun, as was the trip to the sunny beach afterwards - sandcastles and blue waves do not cost anything.

Of course, we're not always at the coastline. During the rest of the summer, we've had great joy in our visits to the park, in tending to our plants and watching the magic sunflowers outgrow our little ones in height, and, of course, the outdoor sports - cricket and football are winners in this summer of sport.

A visit to the Natural history museum followed by a home packed meal picnic in the park with toys and a ball for kick around

We head outside for our free fun! Our local park is great & we often race each other to get there! My LO embraces anything remotely competitive (good or keeping me a bit more active!) so it's a race to get there, an assault course round, hide & seek & if he takes a toy, the toy has a go on all the equipment too!
On a sunny day like those we have been lucky enough to have recently, the paddling pool comes out, along with all the bath toys & any other toys or household items he can sneak in!
Since he was a wee one, he has loved painting with water - a small bucket of water & a paintbrush & he'll make patterns on the patio for hours. I remember doing this when I was a kid & it was strangely satisfying!

This year is our first summer holiday with my DD being home schooled (that's going brilliantly, i love it, she loves it) so i wasn't entirely sure what to expect during the summer holidays as DD wanted to keep working through them :-S

However after much talk i managed to convince her to enjoy her holidays and just see what she could make of them by mixing the learning and the fun; we've gardened and learnt about how plants thrive- free activity, she's taken part in and finished the summer reading challenge- free activity, we've gone swimming in her little pool (and at the local centre- smallish fee)- free activity and we've had play dates with her best friends from her old school- free activity, not to mention all the great free local museums and art galleries.

But do you know what, the best and i mean the best free activity we have done all summer was walking. We went on holiday (definitely not free) and i promised my daughter that i would show her the local way of getting around- these includes right of passage ways and walking through fields. It was the most enjoyable part of our holiday and our summer, so relaxed and there was even a pit stop at this beautiful park. (see pics) Sheer bliss.

The Natural History Museum in Oxford,where, on a sunny day is a bright and open space with a reconstruction of a Tyrannosaurus Rex and interesting displays of artefacts, animals and rocks and minerals. The children have always loved this space and afterwards the open spaces of the University Parks nearby where we ate a picnic and played.

We go out on our bikes and let our children decide at each junction which way to go. We have had some great rides and explored the local area which has been fun.

We had a fab and totally free day with DGS2 at the Industrial Museum in Bradford. Sounds a bit heavy for a 2 year old, but he loved it, and so did we. He likes anything with wheels, so spent ages at the display of beautiful shiny old Jowetts (made in the city), and joy abounded when he found an old trolley bus and vintage double decker to be explored. There was a great display of interactive animal sculptures, though I could have happily sabotaged the metal dog that barked (very) loudly every time its tail was tweaked We were there on a Zoo Lab day, when he had the chance to handle a giant cockroach, bearded dragon and snake and to stroke a hedgehog. And we'd heard there wasn't a cafe, so took along a picnic, which we were lucky enough to be able to enjoy in the sun. We're very fortunate to have so many free things to do in this area.

Doing a butterfly count for conservation. We look up the ones we spotted to find out about them and draw pictures of them.

GREAT PRIZE!

We enjoy baking together - its a bit messy but fun and we can all enjoy the results (in the main)

After looking on line, we found a safe recipe for how to make slime out of PVA and Aldi Almat Bio laundry gel. My children were so thrilled and we spent a very exciting day making slime of all different colours -some with glitter too. A sticky but fabulous day!

I took my Son on my favourite childhood walk. We started off at my late Grandparents house and followed the path that I used to take with my Grandma. It brought back lots of happy memories for me which I shared with my son :)

My GRANDCHILDREN set up a swing rope on the cherry tree and swung into the large paddling pool,then pushed me in it, didnt seem funny at the time!!

I love letting my children write a list of their top things to do in the holidays. We try to fit most of them in. It tends to be things like, go to the park with the water jets, go for a bike ride, have some friends over. Some are more expensive, but I always fit in the free ones.

On one of the rare sunny days we've had begot the paddling pool out. My husband then had the genius idea of running the water from the hose down the slide to make a water slide - best thing ever as far as our daughter was concerned!

This summer holidays i have enjoyed taking my nephew to lots of places but the one that always wins with them is the Seaside! Playing on the beach, building sandcastles, paddling in the sea, donkey rides, eating ice cream. Walking along the pron, rides on the pier and playing on the arcades followed by a slap up fish and chip tea! Made for a fantastic day out and on the way home they were fast asleep lol

I took my 6 year old to a free music festival at the local park. He loves to play drums and guitar at home and had never seen live bands before. It was a gorgeous day and he loved it. We were singing and dancing to the music all afternoon. We had a lovely time enjoying the music.

Meeting up with family and building memories . My daughter loves spending time with her cousins and grandparents. Something that doesn't cost a penny and memories she can keep forever. That makes us both happy.

The kids love camping in the garden, makes them feel like they've gone on a mini holiday and takes them away from the tablets as the wifi doesn't reach!

Have been taking my little man on days out as much as I can afford. I think he really enjoyed going to the beach and splashing in the sea.

Just a warm sunny day in our own garden have been the most relaxing and enjoyable, we put the paddling pool up and filled the cool box up with a picnic and took it into the garden and both adults and children alike had a great family relaxing day

Playing cricket in the park with our son & his friends

We are lucky enough to live within 5 miles of the coast, plenty to do for free there! Rockpooling, sandcastle building, scavenger hunts, crabbing, collecting shells and pebbles for crafts at home.

You cannot beat packing up sandwiches & drinks, picnic blanket & going to park. Hopefully when the sun is out.