summer break| pad patter 6.4.18

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DD broke her arm the end of June last year...so no swim lessons, no pool, no beach, NOTHING all last summer. Maybe that's part of why I'm so interested in these two-week-long lessons? We can pack what normally takes us 2 months into just 2 weeks lol.

As for your DD: is this the school's swim team? Because 5 days/week in the summer is intense! I wouldn't want to do it, either--or rather, I wouldn't want my kids to do it lol. They've yet to show an interest in any sport, so I've lucked out so far.

It’s the city swim team. We tried it last year but it was just too much of a time commitment for one thing.

 

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Our grandson has been out since last Thursday. I spent the whole first day with him and he was with his dad on Friday. He's not happy about it, but he started in a neighborhood day care program yesterday. It's a wonderful place - he started there when he was about 3 and even went to Pre-K there. For some reason, he doesn't want to go now. He says it's for babies. It isn't - they take a field trip almost every day. Monday, they went ice skating and they were doing something special today. He doesn't understand why his grandparents (us) can't just watch him all summer. He lives with us most of the time and we really don't feel up to having him 24/7 all summer.

I agree. Grandparents should be grandparents. Just having him occasionally makes the time together more special.

 

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I work so we have a set routine that will carry over into the summer. I have Mondays off so those will be the days we go somewhere for the day. Next Monday we're going strawberry picking! If we don't have big plans, it'll turn into chores & errands day. I work T-F. They go to my parents' on Tuesday and the babysitter Wednesday-Friday.

They have much more exciting plans than I do for the summer, actually. They have VBS next week, sports camp the week after, and spending a week at their grandparents' the week after that. We'll probably sign them up for swimming lessons in July, and then we might take an overnight trip someplace fun at the end of that month.

School starts mid-August so that's that!

Strawberry picking... yum! And you’re right, if there’s not a plan I end up doing chores and errands.

I'm done with work this Friday (preschool teacher), but my kids have 1 more week after that. Is it bad for me to admit that's my favorite week of the year, LOL? Though this year so many of the days are already claimed by things at the kids' schools and a dentist appointment that my "week off" has basically been reduced to 1 fun day. Oh, well!

We'll be away for a week in July visiting family and another week in August vacationing with family. Each of the kids has 1 or 2 weeks of camp or a program through the schools, but unfortunately they're not the same weeks. So we'll have about 2 weeks at the beginning of the summer that are totally open to do things together and another week like that the last week of summer. The weeks in between we'll have to work around drop offs and pick ups. That's easy on the weeks that someone has a full day activity but a pain on the weeks it's a half day.

I'll come up with some sort of flexible schedule, but I haven't sat down to think about it yet. Usually each week I shoot for 1 lazy at home day, 1-2 pool days, 1 out-of-the-house activity day (usually chosen by the kids), and 1-in-the-house activity day. (The in-the-house activity could be something fun like baking together or chores like cleaning out a room together.) Every few weeks we plan in a library trip, too.

Sorry your week off turned into just a day off. Hopefully you’ll get to enjoy it!

 

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So first, Phineas and Ferb is one of my favourite cartoons EVER. Naomi and I sometimes sing the theme song to embarrass Ruth. School here doesn't end until the last week of June (except for the French kids who get off a week earlier). But, this is the first year my two will be kicking it at our house for a significant amount of time without parents.

But, Naomi is 13 and has started to age out of day camps. They've got two weeks at Girl Guide camp, plus three weeks at my parents, and two weeks at home with Jesse and I - but again, because of work stuff, we couldn't get the same weeks off, and aren't going on vacation this summer.

When they're home alone, my kids have to keep up with their regular chores + Do 15 minutes of Khan Academy (Math) + 15 minutes of Duolingo (Hebrew) + 30 minutes of reading in French. We are also working on some summer bucket lists, for fun (or "edutainment") stuff the girls can do by themselves. But... I'm still trying to work on what the boundaries of where an 11 and 13 year-old can go and what they can do while their parents are working. They have bus passes (Naomi takes public transit to school every day) and bikes. So far, the only idea I've had to veto is them going to the beach on their own. (It's a 15 minute bike ride, and there's a lifeguard, but still, it feels a bit much for them without an adult.) But, I said yes to public swims at the YMCA.

Yay! Another Phineas & Ferb fan. My kids and I used to have all the songs from the show on CD and would sing them at the top of our lungs in the van when taking my sons team to soccer. At first it embarrassed them but soon the other players joined in and we all had fun singing!