Well, okay, not the first. We’ve already had a week. But I mean the first without sun, sea and sand on our doorstep. Well, with a little sun perhaps…. 😄
First thing yesterday morning I made three summer holiday rules…
a) Be awake by 9am
b) Dressed and eaten breakfast by 10am
c) Before any screen time you need to have…read for 20 minutes, tidied your room, done a maths problem or a writing task (of which I will provide), done a job from the job box, and played or done something creative for 40 minutes. 😄
Of course, Alfie growled at this. But he would do – and esentially it is mainly meant for him – for he is our ‘screen curiosity box’! 😂
(And the waking times are meant for Leon and Maya…the teen / preteen…who could sleep until 11am if we let them!)
Then, Maya wrote us a ‘bucket list’ of things to do, before the words ‘I’m bored’ arise….
So far, so good!
Leon and Maya spent the day playing board games, messing about in the garden and doing some gardening, and some maths problems. Barely any screens involved.
And Alfie was a little trickier – he did keep sneaking back to that screen! But he also read a book for an hour, tidied his room, did a job, did some drawing, made a film with Lilly, and played outside with his friend Rasmus, as well as with his siblings.
Ted is never a problem with a screen. He’s never even touched an ipad or a mobile phone!
I also have a ‘vague’ structure to each day, which I kind of used last summer holiday, being ;
Monday – Library Day
Tuesday – Art Day
Wednesday – Outdoor Adventure Day
Thursday – Recipe Day
Friday – Educational Day
Well. We’ll see how that goes. As far as I’m concerned, every day is educational day really. And sometimes we won’t want to do what’s on the ‘structure’ – like if it pours with rain, or if we don’t need to change our library books.
But it’s nice to have a bit of structure. And nice to have a bit of a routine. But as I want to be flexible, I’m going to make it depend on how we feel on the day!
For example, yesterday was ‘outdoor adventure day’ (though essentially I want us to go outside every day!), but having just got home from Turkey, we didn’t want a big adventure.
So I just chunted them out in the garden as much as possible. And we had fun.
Jumping over the water sprinkler…
And playing ‘Star wars’ with badminton racket ‘laser swords’ and bubbles from the bubble machine…. 😂
And Leon and Maya spent a lot of time in the garden, especially in the evening. I’m not sure what they were doing – but there was a lot of laughter – so they must have been having fun!
And Ted. Well, he spent the whole day with Celina, in her paddling pool. 😄
So, it was an ‘outdoor adventure’ kind of day, despite being in our own back garden! 😊
Squashed Tomatoes 