If you have children, most summer days are anything but lazy? This was especially true once my son was diagnosed with a disability. There were carpools to run with my daughters and friends. My son needed structure. That meant doing activities with him most mornings. It meant preparing him for anything on the schedule that wasn't super preferred. If you have a child with learning differences, you know what I mean. It doesn't matter if he has done something a 100 times. If it is a non-preferred activity then much preparation is needed to deal with it. Routines must be designed and taught on a daily basis. In between meltdowns and therapy sessions, I needed to run another carpool for my daughters. Grocery store trips had to put into the schedule. What about those laid back lazy days of summer?
I needed and so does every other mom whether they have toddlers, teenagers or a child with learning differences. But how? It may be afternoons at home on certain days. It may be some long weekends away from home with the family. This means there is no distractions of daily schedules of sports, music lessons, day camps or therapy sessions. There are no trips to WalMart, the grocery or even the corner drugstore. It may take a lot of work to get ready but once your family takes off from home it's about having fun as a family.
When my children were growing up we had lots of afternoons at home in the summer time. As they became teenagers, the lazy afternoons at home were a memory. With all the activities that come with that age...it was important to get "out of town." In fact we still do this. We spent Independence Day weekend in St. Louis doing some of the sights and seeing a Cardinals baseball game with our kids. We eat leisurely meals and spend time together doing things that we don't have time for at home.
It didn't always go perfectly. When a family member has a learning difference it takes time to figure out how to much fun was "too much" fun! What kind of preparation it took? How much schedule to have and how much down time is needed. We had some miscalculated adventures. There have been mishaps but our family kept trying until we found out how to have a few lazy days of summer!
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