It’s summer – yay! Sleeping in! Fam time! I am so excited!! but also – what do we do everyday?!
I’ve been trying to come up with a routine for us – particularly for the mornings.
First things first, Let everyone sleep until their hearts are content. (: This usually means that JB gets up super early, then I get up an hour or so later, then wes, and finally tuck.
Breakfast – I’ve been serving it on the bar off our kitchen counters. This just started happening, and they haven’t been using their little table for meals unless we have company over. We always put music on first thing in the morning.
I just printed out this summer devotional from gather & grow which is so sweet and looks like it’s great for their ages. I am planning on starting with something like that – it’s pretty short but it’s a good way to start the day.
We’re also doing a sight word of the week. I have him write it on our chalkboard wall… and kinda quiz him about it whenever I see it.
Since we haven’t been using the little table for eating, I thought we would use it for activities. I moved in one of the storage pieces from their playroom into their corner of the kitchen. I filled it with their workbooks, crayons, toddler scissors, stickers, coloring books, the bob books, red books, and other educational items.
After breakfast, I’ve been setting up a little activity for them to do. Some activities include – pattern play, counting kitties games, painting, drawing, scissor exercises, stickers, etc… We do one of those activities and then tuck reads one of his books to wes. Then writes his name and my phone number in his red book from school.
Then we are either getting ready for the day with showers if we have plans or if they playing outside or in their playroom together. They play really well together at this age (most of the time!) and I know it’s so important for them to just have free play where they use their imagination. They are always building forts, coloring on boxes (or walls…), and are lost in their own city they’ve created. I try to do a devotional, some chores and/or answer emails/work on the blog. Whatever we have time for. I am really trying to not be tethered to my phone at all in the morning.
Per my friend Denise’s recommendation, I wrote down a list of all the things we can do in our area. These things are parks we love and want to visit, beaches, zoo, museums in our area, activities going on (like home depot kids classes or story time), pools, fishing, baking… etc. I am excited to start doing my monday tradition again. Every monday when they were younger I used to take them to Trader Joe’s, then to the childrens museum… but school happened. So now we are going to get back into that, and all of us have missed it.
After we do something for the day, errand or something fun, and have lunch – wes usually falls asleep on the way home.
I don’t mind Tuck watching something then (we only let him do disney or pbs kids) on the TV if he asks. Lots of times he’s just fine playing outside or with his toys. We don’t do ipads (unless they are sick or traveling). I also don’t have anything for them downloaded on my phone, so they also don’t think to ask for that either. I made that mistake traveling in the fall, and put something on my phone for them and then it was ALLLLL wes wanted. As soon as it wasn’t there anymore, he stopped asking for it.
This is usually when I try to work on a blog post, edit photos, pick up, do some laundry, prep dinner… whatever is pressing. Then wes is up usually after an hour or two… we try to go outside, go on”listening walks”, head out to the dock, start dinner..
We have two weeks of storytime soccer camp (until noon daily) planned, a week of tennis/golf camp, and friday art camp planned. But lots of free time this summer to have fun, take little trips, and enjoy each other.
Not every day will go like this of course, but it’s nice to have an outline for our day – and my kids really love having an idea of “what’s next”. What kind of routine are you getting into for summer? I’d love to know what works well for y’all!
