This year’s summer schedule…

Well, that was quite the hiatus.  I have no reason to give for it except that I just wasn’t feeling like blogging.  Oh well.  But now its summer, and I am planning all sorts of things for my young ladies and for my garden and yard and I feel like sharing, including new summer art playdates starting next week.  First off, I am committing myself to a summer schedule of sorts by sharing it with you.  I know you’ll all keep me on track. 😉

Here is our schedule for summer mornings.  The times are really just for this first few weeks when we have swimming lessons and things to get to, but they have actually not been a problem as my children are very early risers.  The first two things are pretty self-explanatory, although I should point out that we do watch Curious George while eating breakfast and I get my shower in then.  The homework list is for Clara’s benefit only, although Nancy does do some “homework” in for form of alphabet, math, and tracing worksheets.  Clara has been working out of the Evan-Moor Skill Sharpener workbooks in spelling and writing, math, and reading.  This is her favorite part of her homework and I highly recommend these.  Then she writes in her journal (we have the classic primary composition book from Lakeshore Learning so she can draw a picture with her writing).  We’re working on two sentences per journal entry right now (and what constitutes a sentence).  Finally, she has to read three books to me aloud through shared reading.  She really like the Bob Books and Biscuit Books.  When all that is done, they both earn a piece of candy. Woo hoo!  We also are keeping a long-term chart that will last most of the summer and when that is full, they get to do something super exciting, like go to an amusement park (or whatever they pick).

Then, after all of that, they get to do a chore!  But this has actually been really painless.  The girls helped me build a fun chart in the shape of a house using “craft board” (wood that you can buy at the craft store when they don’t have exactly what you were looking for in the first place), acrylic paint, and clothespins.


Here is the finished product. I give each girl a chore each day to complete. We’ve been spending this week “learning” how to do them correctly, but I am hopeful that things will be more independent soon. When they have done each one correctly, they earn a quarter for their piggy bank. I figure that if I make them use their own money for treats, ice cream, and toys they want at the store, I’m not actually spending any MORE than usual and I’m getting help around the house from them!

So, we’re working on this schedule every morning. Its been four days, and while I am exhausted by it, it is happening and I feel good that by the time it is 9:00 in the morning, we have learned something, read something, cleaned up the house, and are ready for the day. Then we can go do something fun, like swimming and playing at the playground and being kids. Because I is summer after all.

The summer begins…

This is our first official day of summer.  Clara’s last day of preschool was last Wednesday, but we had Grandmoo here and then it was the weekend, so those days don’t count.  But today… today was the first day for me to fill.  As my girls (especially the little one) are not very fantastic about filling their own time, this time of year strikes fear into my heart.  This is especially true since I have cut the girl’s screen time down to one hour or less per day.  I decided that at least a little bit of a schedule is in order.  Here is our very flexible schedule for summer days:

• Breakfast
• Curious George (1/2 hour)
• Shower/get dressed
• Gardening/weeding/outside play time
• Morning activity
• Lunch
• Nap/Quiet time
• Afternoon activity (Could be just playing in the back yard
• Dinner
• Movie (1/2 hour)
• Bath
• Bedtime

So far today it has worked out quite well.  You’ll notice that I did not include times on our schedule so that I can manipulate things as I want.  For instance, our wake up time was officially a bright and early 5:30 and we were outside for gardening and play time by 8:00 this morning, so hopefully it won’t be that early every day.

Our morning activity today was a trip to Dollar Tree and swmimming lessons at the community center.  Woo hoo.  There will be more exciting things to come.  To prepare for this, the girls and I created this year’s summer fun list this weekend.  Remember last years?  Well, it turns out that pulling a random stick out of a jar was just too spontaneous for me.  So, this year we have a list.  That way we can discuss and there is no expectation that we will do whatever is pulled out of the jar.  But there are still tons of fun activities to choose from.

The girls painted a piece of cardboard from a cracker box with about a ton of glitter paint (have I mentioned our current love affair with glitter paint?) and then two days later, when it was dry, I used a Sharpie to write out the list we had brain stormed.  Will we get to all of them?  Probably not, but at least we have somewhere to start to fill in our schedule.