Brain Download

Things are always busy at our house in the summer. My childrend who normally wake up at 7:00 am during the school year, fell compelled to push it to 6:30 or 6:00 and even occasionally 5:45 in the morning. Part of it is the sun is up and so it feels like morning earlier and earlier. But most of it is excitement. I like to pretend that it is because I am so exciting as a mom and have so many fun things going on, but evidence tells me that they are excited to watch TV (something they cannot do on mornings during the school year). They know they cannot watch TV until all the chores are done (get dressed, make beds, eat breakfast . . .etc. .. ) and so it is amazing that since school has been out they have hopped right up and gotten to work.

Seriously though, I do try and have fun things and some not so fun things to do each day.

• Swim Team -- We go each day to practice. It starts at 9:00 (by then they have done all the chores and even watched a 1/2 hour of TV). We ride our bikes for the exercise and I bring toys and games for the little ones to do while the big girls practice.
• Summer Reading program -- I make the kids read by themselves for 30 minutes each day. Every year we go to the library and sign up for the Summer Reading Club. This year, you can sign up for it online and track your books on an online journal. Whenever you hit one of the benchmarks, they will have your "prize" ready and waiting for pickup at the library.
• Summer Math Bust -- In an effort to keep up their "fast facts" Julianne and Catherine have to do 2 math fast fact sheets a day. They have a chart and if they can get 100 % on the sheet in their time frame (julianne is 1 min 45 sec for 35 problems and catherine is 4 minutes) then they "bust" that square. The squares are (Adding 0's, adding 1's, adding 2's, etc. . . ) Hopefully we will get through adding, subtracting, and more. (So far the 0's, 1's, and 2's have been pretty easy. I keep telling them it will get harder!!!
• Playing, playing, and more playing -- we go to the pool, play with friends, and play with each other. It is no wonder they pretty much drop into bed each night totally exhausted.

Last night was our first "real" swim meet. We got there at 4:45 p.m. It was a bit overcast and quite windy which meant that the 88 degrees did not feel all that hot. The meet was set to begin at 5:30, but it actually began at 6:00. By 7:45, Julianne and Catherine had each swam 3 events (the 4x25 freestyle relay, 25 yd freestyle, and 25 yd backstroke). Adam was getting tired and Madelyn was pretending not to be. The meet was on event #26 and Julianne's final event was event #64, the 4x25 medley relay at the end of the meet. I decided to take all the kids home and then come back with Julianne for the end while my sister Carrie stayed with the kids at home (since Trent was out of town). I proposed that to Julianne and she did not want to go home. She wanted to stay with her friends. I asked some of our good friends to keep an eye out for her and we quickly packed up (all but one chair so I would have somewhere to sit when I came back). I headed home with the 3 others and quickly got Adam bathed and asleep and the other 2 ready for bed. Carrie stayed and by 8:35 I was headed back. I was trying to hurry, because I knew that despite Julianne's desire to stay, that it would not take very long until she was nervous and missing me. (She puts up a good face for a little while and then she worries). Sure enough as I walked back into the pool she was sitting in my chair, next to our friends, in near tears. She said her stomach hurt. (I know she was just nervous -- would I make it back before she swam, would I ever come back, are there bugs in the grass?, it's getting kind of dark . . .). I figured that she would recover now that I was back but I think the nervousness combined with fatigue was setting in. As I listened to the announcer, they were on event # 34 and it was now almost 9:00. I quickly calculated that her event (#64) might not occur until close to 11. I asked her if she wanted to go home and she said yes and I did not try to talk her out of it. We packed up, informed the coaches and were home by 9:15. She told me on the bike ride home that she was just really tired, because we never stay up that late. I told her I would remind her how bad it feels to stay up late the next time she wanted to. (Isn't that bad of me????) By 9:30 every one was asleep. And they all stayed on their beds, all night long, until 7:00 am. YEAH!!!