July 4, 2014

Mid Summer Madness


 

Summer means so many fun experiences that there's little time to write about them.  It also means spending 100% of my waking hours taking care of, watching over, cleaning up, laughing with, chasing after and driving around two very active boys.  These first few photos are from a wonderful lakefront festival that has been a Wisconsin tradition for decades.  In my opinion, other cities may imitate Summerfest but they never manage to duplicate it.



I thought the boys would be terrified to ride the SkyGlider
 but they thoroughly enjoyed it!  Three times!
We have been doing one big activity (that takes us out of town) each week and then staying closer to home the rest of the days.  Often, the boys will request to stay home. (Like yesterday when I offered to drive to a huge playground on a beautiful 75 degree day.)  They like to swing in the backyard, get snacks and popsicles from the kitchen, jump on the sofa and watch cartoons.  Go figure.  Thankfully we do have a few structured activities scheduled so I don't think we'll turn into couch potatoes anytime soon.

archery lessons

guided hikes at the nature preserve
Soccer game and Liam's first goal!

I continue to struggle with balance this summer--household chores/repairs, me time (or complete lack of it), healthy food, limited screen time and keeping to a reasonable budget.  Less structure (ie, no school days) means this elusive balance is even more difficult to achieve.  I know I need to live in the moment but then who is going to be responsible for keeping this family "ship" on course?  Not to mention, who is going to do the grocery shopping?

Well, I'll worry about that tomorrow--for now, we're off to a 4th of July parade and a day filled with hot dogs and ice cream.  How's that for living in the moment?





2 comments:

  1. It looks like you're having a fun summer!

    It's so funny - the stage you're in with your boys now sounds so idyllic to me, and yet your reality is that you still have struggles, even with the good things. A timely reminder to enjoy the good things with every stage.

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  2. I love how you want to fill their summers with fun and play! That's exactly what I want for Tate...unstructured fun! I was with a friend yesterday who has her 18 month old twins in a 2 week French school for 6 hours a day to help their application to the international school in town. 6 hours a day! For 2 weeks! For 18 month olds. She asked if I was putting Tate in a certain camp next summer which has reading camp and math camp etc. Besides the fact that it cost 5 times what I paid for daycare PER WEEK, I am not putting my 5 year old in 'camp' to learn how to read. Even if he couldn't already read, I wouldn't do it. I was just horrified. He goes to fun camps at this point, and I intend to continue that as long as I can if I'm not going to be able to be home with him in the summers. ok rant over..sorry. xoxo

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