Summertime.
Free time!
And let me ask you, how do your children really do with free time?
I can tell you that I have 3 children. Each one is amazing, beautiful and wonderful and so very different from each other.
But the one thing they have in common is a struggle with free time. Each for their own reason but the end result is the same.
Now me? I LOVE free time. I can fill it easily or not fill it and be just fine.
Not my beautiful children.
So when summer arrives, we rejoice, we throw away school papers, schedules and probably their ripped backpacks. And we do a big happy sigh and welcome SUMMER!
And for 2 weeks, we do nothing or anything whenever.
No plans are made to accomplish a summer goal or grow a brain cell.
And then, because I know my children, we start to structure our days.
Or shall we say- Lightly schedule their days– Think of the term “in pencil” because “in pencil” means we can be flexible but still accomplish things.
(And somewhere along the way, teach our kids flexible thinking)
So as a veteran mom of over 30 years total and over 27 with my beautiful daughter, Elizabeth who has special needs, I wanted to share some of the things that always worked to create a bit of a summer routine.
Wake time/Bedtime- This is one thing that I really held tight to. Most kids love to just get up whenever or go to bed whenever.
But with special needs, it helps to keep a “general” bedtime, sure maybe one night it is a bit later or maybe a bit earlier. But it falls into a certain range.
I learned that a well-rested Elizabeth is just so much calmer. Not calm just for us but for her. I mean who wants to feel upset and tired all the time.
For us, Elizabeth’s sensory issues seem to increase with her fatigue. Coping also goes out the window.
For us to all have good summer days, we needed rested bodies. Maybe one later movie night is met with an earlier bedtime the next night.
And as a bonus, when the rest of the world is struggling to right the ship of sleep schedules before school starts….you are already there!
Breakfast- We made sure that everyone had breakfast…. but maybe it was our picnic morning, or breakfast on the deck or maybe we took it to the park and played and enjoyed an early park day.
Also, pizza worked fine for some breakfasts and so did hamburgers. Just making sure to start the day with something to keep Elizabeth and her sibs from bottoming out from lack of food.
We have all experienced the hungry Elizabeth and well, it is not pretty!
So breakfast = a fun and good start to the day that set the tone for success.
Activity– What do you kids like to do? Emily swam and Michael played flag football in the late summer.
I think these activities put into the schedule allows the siblings to know that, although therapies for the sibling with special needs are part of their schedule…. THEIR activities matter.
The siblings are on this journey with you. And I know 100% Emily remembers sitting in plastic chairs in waiting rooms while her sister did her occupational therapy appointments.
So, planning for them, in my opinion, is an absolute must!
Movement- Maybe it was hopscotch or catch or tag. We took walks. We moved everyday! Whatever works for you is the way to make it easy and something you will do each day.
Quiet reading time – I love love love reading and so I do my kids.
We always scheduled quiet reading time for the late afternoon. That sweet time after a full day but before the evening dinner/bath time schedule.
We would ALL read together and for Elizabeth, maybe it was an audio book on headphones.
But we all did it together for ~20 minutes a day.
I loved it and I knew it was just Quiet and Productive
We always did the library summer reading programs too!
School time- Getting their brains thinking each day was certain goal. There are bridge workbooks that keep their brains working but not to the point of stress. We would work this into the schedule each day. For Elizabeth, this was the time to work on some IEP goals that she needed help with.
Again, it is such a good thing to do to keep their brains thinking and avoid the summer slide.
And if it is scheduled, then it is much easier to accomplish often and well.
Craft time –Kids love to make things, so we would plan some fun summer crafts or cooking to do. The sibs would love it; Elizabeth would love doing something fun with her brother and sister …and it would also work on some fine motor skills for Elizabeth.
Therapies- It so goes without saying that these therapies for Elizabeth were part of the fabric of our life. We knew when they were and how to work around them. But while we were waiting for her, I would ask Emily and Michael what they wanted to do. Maybe it was a book I could read to them or watching a movie on a tablet or just talk.
I tried to make those time better for the siblings because they knew why they were there and they knew how hard their sister was working, so helping them better pass the time was my hope.
Oh, my gosh, Michele! Did you do all this every day? You may ask.
And I would say, absolutely no way.
BUT…
I knew I had great options to pick from to fill a day well.
So, we would make a schedule. All of us… to plan what we wanted to do. And we would put the above choices on a sheet to pick from.
And it helped so much to make summer fun and avoid that empty feeling of doing nothing…
Of just free time
To move, think and have fun everyday.
That was the goal of our summer activities.
Oh and to make memories of course!