Keeping them busy

We’re slowly getting a schedule established for the summer. Weekends are generally as they usually were – Saturdays are catch-all days for doing anything and everything, and Sundays remain normal with church and our usual dinners with Friend and Doc and the boys (barring vacations and the like). But with our weekdays open – and the Webmaster at home – there is a lot of open time now when no one has anywhere to be.

So, here’s what I’ve come up with so far to keep the kids busy this summer.

Monday – Play date at the park day. Thanks to the wonders of email, the parents from Ane’s preschool class from this last year have kept in touch and each Monday, anybody who wants to can show up at a designated park at a specific time. It gives the kids a couple of hours to see their friends, run around and burn off a little energy, and have snacks/lunch together. The last couple of weeks, I’ve been taking Ane by herself, but yesterday I took Tad along, too. He did pretty well, and as all of the other parents had younger kids with them, too, and the park was plenty big and the day was sunny, there were no fights between siblings. The advantage to having the play date earlier in the day? Better naptimes.

Tuesday – We enrolled Ane in another session of preschool baseball clinic, so the Webmaster takes her to her lessons while I take Tad with me to Bible study at church. This way, each of the kids gets some time apart and alone with a parent. After Bible study, I always stop by the library, so Tad gets a chance to go (though I have to keep a tight leash on him and keep him quiet) and choose a new book or two.

Wednesday – If there is a good movie to see, I take the kids to Regal Cinemas Free Family Film Festival. It gets us out of the house for a couple of hours, and did I mention that it is FREE? Free is very good.

Thursday and Friday – Yes. Well, we don’t have anything regularly scheduled for those days. It would be nice if we did, but right now I’m just lathering the kids up with sunscreen and putting them outside for extended periods of time. It’s going to get warmer as the week goes on, so I’m sure we’re going to be bringing out the sprinkler and possibly the wading pool very soon.

The other major thing keeping us busy this summer is Tad’s potty training. We’re actually having some limited success with him at the moment, where if he has been dry for an extended period of time – say, after his nap – he is actually able to “go” when placed on the potty! (Disclaimer – we have had some, um, “aiming” problems. Girls are SO much easier on that front.) Tad himself is starting to make the connection of using the potty – we’ve found him sitting on the toddler potty, sitting and playing with his Star Wars toys that he’s only allowed to play with in the bathroom, and though nothing has happened yet during an instance that he’s taken himself potty, I’m hopeful that it won’t be long before something does.

We’ve also hit upon a suitable bribe for him – fruit snacks. He was never a big fan of them until recently – he’d play with them, stick them in his mouth, get them wet, then take them out and make a squishy mess. However, his teacher at preschool told us that he loved them during snack time, so we started using them as treats here. Tad wolfs them down eagerly now, and has begun to make the connection that IF he uses the potty, THEN he gets a treat.

What I wouldn’t give to be able to send him back to school in the fall mostly potty trained. Wouldn’t that be quite the summer project for us to acheive with him?

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 30th, 2009 at 12:37 am and is filed under Children.
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