Hey, you- young people who are about to have three months of sunshine to call your own - what are your dreams for this summer? Do you want to perfect your baseball swing? Learn to draw? Lie in the grass and watch ants? Play with your friends?
Whatever you do, we at the Desert News hope you enjoy your vacation. (We envy you.) Here are some suggestions, in case you run out of fun ideas of your own. This isn't every thing there is to do. So keep reading the paper during the summer to find out about plays and concerts and fireworks and such.
SPORTS STUFF
1. Jump, dash and throw for prizes at the Hershey's Track and Field Day at East High on June 14. This FREE event, for kids 9 to 14, is co-sponsored by the chocolate company and the Salt Lake City Parks and Recreation Department. Register by calling 972-7800.
2. There's always next year, which is why the Jazz will be practicing this summer at Westminster College's Payne Gymnasium. You can watch them FREE for three days in mid-July. Four NBA teams will also be working out during the first week in August. Call 488-4122 for exact times.
3. There are more than a dozen public pools in the Salt Lake Valley, from the Northwest Pool, 1300 West Third North, to the South County Pool, 12765 S. 1125 West, in Riverton. For locations, hours and prices, call Salt Lake County Parks and Recreation, 468-2560.
4. Try the new Challenge Rope Course at Camp Kostopulos in Emigration Canyon. The program includes rope swings, beams, tires and poles and is designed to help both handicapped and non-handicapped individuals overcome fear and build self-confidence. Call 582-0700 for hours and reservations.
5. If you'd rather swing a golf club, sign up for the Salt Lake City Parks and Recreation's Junior Golf Tournament for ages 7 to 17. There are tournaments in June, July and August. Call 972-7834 for information about cost and to register.
6. The summer is full of sports camps, "clinics" and just plain lessons sponsored by colleges, parks departments and various sports figures (Mark Eaton, Thurl Bailey, etc.). There are also tennis teams, swim teams, track and field clubs, T-ball and coach-pitch. For more information, call Salt Lake City Parks and Recreation, 972-7800; Salt Lake County Recreation, 468-2560; the University of Utah Athletic Department, 581-8171; and the YMCA, 533-9622.
LEARN SOMETHING
1. Sign up for the FREE Salt Lake County Library's Summer Reading Club. Set your own reading goals; win stickers.
2. Try your hand at candlemaking and
other pioneer crafts at the Pioneer Trail State Park's summer youth workshop. The program, for children ages 6 to 12, runs from Aug. 9 to 12. To register, call the University of Utah's Division of Continuing Education, 581-6483.
3. At Hogle Zoo, you can learn about reptiles or birds of prey, about habitats or about how animals attack and defend themselves. Two-hour classes run for three days each during June and July. Cost varies from $12 to $25. Call 583-2400.
4. The Utah Museum of Natural History offers classes for grade school kids on everything from "Science Discovery with Dirt" to "Fun with Physics" to "Feathered Friends." If you are in fifth grade through high school you can participate in a Field Science Academy and take day hikes and overnight excursions into unique Utah spots. Tuition aid for low-income children is available. Call 581-6927.
5. Improve your self-image at a "Building Success Kids" class at the Self-Esteem Center. Call 466-9252 for more details.
6. Learn to be safe at home and away from home at Sandy's Safety City, for kids 5 to 8. Classes meet four days for two hours each day at Bicentennial Park, 8680 S. Fourth East. Cost is $15. Call 566-1561.
7. Go gazing on a Hansen Planetarium star party, FREE every other weekend. Children under 10 will enjoy "Zoom A Lit tle Zoom" sing-along star show about gravity, weekdays and Saturdays at 10 a.m. Cost is $2 per child. Or, to learn even more, 14-18 year-olds can volunteer at the Planetarium, 15 S. State. Call 538-2104.
8. At the Children's Museum, 840 N. Third West, the current traveling display is "Tops." Learn, painlessly, about rotational motion. Open Tuesday-Saturday, 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Admission, $2.
MUSIC, ARTS, DRAMA
1. Kids' Arts in the Park, for children age 5 to 12, starts June 20 and runs through Aug. 17. There will be a different activity, from face painting to magic shows, every Tuesday and Thursday morning, 10:30 to 11:30, at Rice Terrace in Liberty Park. Cost is $1 per class. For more information call 972-7800.
2. You'll find jugglers, roving storytellers and art projects at the Reading Wizards Renaissance Fair at Granger Park on July 29, from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Pick up FREE tickets for the fair at the Magna, West Valley, Kearns or West Jordan branch libraries.
3. Take a trip to the State Arboretum and photograph the flowers (all of them are identified) growing in among the trees (also identified). Later you can make your favorite snapshots into a calendar. The Arboretum, located in Red Butte Canyon behind the University of Utah, is open from 8:30 a.m. to dusk. FREE.
4. You don't have to have talent, just a yearning to create. Junior high and high school students can take a five-week workshop at Salt Lake Community College during which they'll explore various myths through music, dance, art, theatre and writing. Cost is $125. Public performance at the end of the workshop, July 14, is FREE. Call 967-4201.
5. Be a dancing dragon, be fooled by a magician and watch a puppet show - all at a library near you. Call the Salt Lake County Library, 943-4636, for exact places, dates and events. FREE
6. Take drawing lessons at the Visual Arts Institute, 487-7855, or Salt Lake Arts Center, 328-4201.
AROUND THE HOUSE AND NEIGHBORHOOD
1. Stage your own play, or organize your own neighborhood bike parade, pet show, arts festival or track and field day. Need newsprint to draw scenery or cover tables? You can get two FREE end rolls from the Newspaper Agency Corporation, 326 W. Seventh South. Call 237-2965.
2. Next time you rent a video camera to record a big occasion, take pictures of family members working, as well. When you look back at the tape with the people who were baking the cake or washing the car, praise the workers.
3. Gather flowers from your yard and make pretty arrangements to take to neighbors and friends.
4. Have a neighborhood toy trade. Everyone brings a toy or game they no longer want. Number the toys. Each child chooses a number and gets a new toy. Serve refreshments and play together.
5. Make an obstacle course. Kids can design it themselves ("Jump over the hose, do three sommersaults, then run around the tree . . . "). Add variations like doing the whole course wearing Dad's shoes or carrying an egg in a spoon.
6. Bored with paints and crayons? Try painting with water on the sidewalk. Or make several varieties of pudding, paint with pudding on plates and serve your masterpieces to the family for desert.
7. Memorize a long poem.
8. Make it your goal this summer: Grade schoolers, learn to fix a bicycle tire. Secondary students, learn to change a tire on a car.
9. Lay a trail. Use stones for markers in a field or park or draw chalk arrows on a sidewalk. Make your trail loop and circle. Invite younger children to follow it.
FIELD TRIPS
1. Go to the dump. 6030 W. 13th South. Admission is $1 per car, more if you are dumping something. You'll see many birds and much junk.
2. Take a bike ride through Research Park. You can visit Fort Douglas and its cemetery. Bike lanes stretch from the park along Sunnyside Avenue and down the west side of Eighth South. By the end of the summer the city will have painted lines and posted signs extending the bike lane to Second West, through Capitol Hill and west along Third North. Also this summer the 11th Avenue lane will be extended from L Street to Virgina Street.
3. Go fishing. Streams should be slow enough for safety by the end of June. The Jordan River (catfish, white bass, walleye, trout) is best north of 21st South and around Bluffdale. In Mill Creek, Big Cottonwood Creek (best near the K mart on 45th South and near the Cottonwood Mall) and Little Cottonwood Creek (good where it goes through Murray Park) you can catch trout.
4. Wheeler Historic Farm is FREE. (Though there's a charge for hayrides and house tours.) 6351 S. Ninth East. Farm chores begin at 5:30 p.m. The farm is offering a weeklong day camp throughout the summer for 8-12 year olds. Cost: $60. You can learn to make rope, milk a cow, play the harmonica, catch frogs in the swamp and write with a quill pen. Call 264-2241.
5. Throughout the summer small towns and large will hold celebrations with parades, fireworks, and other fun for kids. Bluffdale Town Day, for example, is June 24. Parade begins at 11:30 a.m. at 14400 S. Redwood Road. Later, kids can enter a gunnysack race, a frog race, try to climb a greased pole or catch a fish in their hands.
Murray, West Jordan and Riverton celebrate on July 4. Farmington Festival Days are July 13-15. Draper goes all out on July 24 with rides, games, a horse show and pet show for kids.
6. Ride the trolley between Trolley Square and downtown. One ride, 50(CT); day passes are $1. August marks the 100th anniversary of trolleys in Utah. There will be exhibits and festivities at Trolley Square. Call 521-9877. (A UTA summer youth pass costs $20, good during June, July and August.)
7. Take a walking tour of Salt Lake City. You can pick up a brochure at the Visitors Center near the Salt Palace. If your legs are short, you might want to attempt only one. How about Temple Square (open 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. daily), Beehive House (9:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.; Sundays 10 to 1) or maybe the Capitol (6 a.m. to 8 p.m., Mon.-Sat.)? On weekdays and Saturdays the LDS Church Office Building is open; you can ride the elevator to the 26th floor for a view from the tallest building in the state.
8. Magical Mystery Tours leave from West Jordan Park every other Tuesday, beginning June 20. Cost: $10. Children (ages 8-15) take a van to places like the Alpine Slide, 49th Street Galleria or Raging Waters. Call 468-2299. - Compiled by Susan Lyman-Whitney and Elaine Jarvik