But first — are you free tomorrow? I’d love for you to join me, Kayla Craig, and Elizabeth Berget for a conversation on motherhood, friendship, faith, writing and more! ❤️ We’re gathering on Zoom at 1pm PST / 3pm CST / 4pm EST.
The murmurs begin every April, an upside down version of the iconic Game of Thrones catchphrase.
Summer is coming.
Summer is coming.
Summer is coming!
For the past eight weeks, a collective low-hum panic has consumed conversations with friends. What are we doing? How are we structuring our days? Why is summer camp so expensive? What are we making for dinner? How are we keeping the children off screens?
And the age-old question: how the heck are we going to work?
Most of my friends (all of my friends?) work outside the home in some capacity. I’ve got friends who are doctors and VPs, holding down bread-winning jobs with fancy perks and downtown parking spaces. I’ve got other friends who work 40 hours a week and split their time working from home and working from an office. And then I’ve got a lot of friends like me, who at any given time are working 3-4 different part-time jobs, cobbling together hours and freelance gigs and publishing projects and various opportunities that somehow miraculously combine into one hodgepodge creative career that makes it possible for us to afford very expensive things like gas and chocolate chips.
Needless to say: a lot of us worry at the beginning of summer because during the school year, we have approximately six hours of childcare Monday-Friday1. During the summer, however, most of us have … slim to none.
<< Insert cliche rant about the unaffordability of summer camps here >>
Like most mothers, I have already spent many hours plotting systems and schedules and Lists Of Things The Children Must Do Before Enjoying Video Games. It is the first week of June and I am appropriately optimistic, but check in with me come August to see how this actually pans out.
Without further ado, I present: One Mom's Optimistic Plan For Summer Sanity, aka how I am structuring (I use this term lightly) our summer for optimal independence and minimal whining:
Am I really going to bring attention to the unaffordability of summer camps in the exact same post where I gush over a very expensive wall calendar? Yes. I suppose I contain multitudes. I cannot believe how much money I shilled out for this, but after hearing half a dozen IRL friends rave about it, I was officially influenced.
For context — last summer, I wrote daily to-do lists, chores, and schedules on our kitchen white board. This system worked fine, but it also meant on any given day, I was operating as my entire family’s data center. So many schedules. So many camp dates. What’s for lunch? What’s for dinner? What do we need to do before we can play video games? When are the library books due? When are we going on that trip again?
I do not need to tell you how exhausting it is to answer 27 questions before 10am.
So yeah, I spent A LOT OF MONEY on a calendar that mounts to the wall. And now when my kids ask me questions about chores and schedules, I do not answer. I say: “Go check Skylight!”
My favorite part is the habits / tasks / chores / stars / rewards setup. We’re still figuring out the best way to utilize this feature, but for now, we are tracking two things: habits earn video game time, and chores earn cash or other prizes2. I love the “up for grabs” box because I have one child who is always happy to do extra work around the house, and he should absolutely be rewarded for that. Mom and Dad earn stars, too, for things like grocery shopping, cooking, washing dishes, etc. (I also get stars for writing and going to yoga, yay me!)
It’s no secret that I detest food blogs with 400 pop-up ads, so imagine my delight when I realized I can simply copy/paste any recipe link (even from Instagram!!!) and the whole recipe populates into Skylight. You can even add every item to your grocery shopping list with the click of a button. Is this thing going to turn me into a (pause for dramatic effect) meal planner? Time will tell!
Big sigh. I have done a reading challenge for my kids every summer, but last year I realized I had made things too complicated. There were too many levels. Too many prerequisites. Too many rewards I got behind on fulfilling. This year, we are stripping things down and simplifying: if you read 8 books, you get a solo sleepover at Grandma’s house (which is basically a “yes day” sponsored by my mom—10/10 recommend).
There are some stipulations to what books count for the reading challenge. Presley’s rule (age 7) = no graphic novels (she can read those on her own time, of course, but they don’t count for the reading challenge). For the boys (11 and 14), I broke it down like this:
-2 Kaleidoscope books
-1 book from an author you’ve never read before
-1 book recommendation from a friend
-1 book that is the first of a series
-2 books from curated lists via Reading Middle Grade3
-The Amazing Generation
The boys are preparing their lists at the start of summer so I can either purchase the books or get them from the library, and each kid will also need to fill out a basic book report form for their book to count. Carson (age 11) is designing this in Canva for all three kids to use!
A new offering! At first, my plan was to do this with disposable cameras, but after I crunched the math, it made more financial sense to go with Camp Snap. I’ve been curious about these cameras for a while, and have heard enough positive reviews from online friends to give them a go. I ordered three—one for each kid—in different colors so they know whose is whose.
The goal: document our summer! On August 8th, the kids will each submit their top 20 photos in a gallery that will be judged based on creativity, light, variety, composition, effort, and storytelling.4
The kids are VERY excited about the cash prizes, and I am VERY excited to (hopefully) instill a love and appreciation of photography in them. This is what we call a win-win.
This is honestly for me more than my kids, a simple reminder to chase joy and pursue adventures. We are tracking the summer bucket list in Skylight, here’s a portion of it:
I think if we manage to do EVERYTHING on the list, we should earn a family prize. Root Beer Float party? TBD.
Last year, in a fit of PMS rage and general overwhelm at All The Stuff in my house, I made my kids get rid of 5 items a day, every day of the summer. If you don’t know how that’s possible, I’d like to remind you that Happy Meal Toys are still a thing that exist in the world, and my children would never throw away socks with holes in them unless explicitly commanded to.
However, I have been told that five items is “WAY TOO MUCH, MOM!!!!!” — so this summer, I settled on one. One item a day, every day, into the donation bags in the garage. Could be a toy you no longer play with. A shirt that is too small. A stuffy you are not attached to anymore. I do not care what it is. All I care is that items not being used leave my house before Christmas, please and thank you.
…. And that’s it! TBD on whether or not any of this is successful. TBD on whether or not everything goes off the rails mid-July. TBD on whether or not I still love the Skylight calendar in three months. I will surely report back.
How are YOU structuring your summer? Give me your hacks, your tips, your charts, your cold pasta salad recipes! I am here for all of it!
P.s. Other posts you might like: Summer MVPs and Staying Open To The World (a creative posture for your summer)
Except for spring break, thanksgiving break, winter break, ski week, four-day weekends, teacher work days, etc — there are actually a lot of school days the children are NOT in school, is what I’m trying to say.
Habits = reading, playing outside, creating art, etc // Chores = empty dishwasher, laundry, vacuuming the house, etc
Obviously I will also consider age and ability, i.e. I have higher expectations for my 14 year-old than my 7 year-old.
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