Summer = Boredom?

School's Out!
But, geesh, you wouldn't know it by my first gra...I mean second grader's long face.
"I don't want to be bored," he claims.  Bored?
This calls for a party.

(Notice the dress. This is day three of her wearing it. See, I need to sew some more!)

Congratulations on finishing first grade, Connor!  Actually, we had absolutely no worries about him finishing first grade. He is an excellent student, and I'm hoping Aubrey will be the same.

The beginning of summer break also calls for some planning. 

To assure him that we will not sit on our duffs all summer long, we created a summer fun folder.  I first asked them to give me a list of everything they wanted to do this summer. "Go swimming at the Aquaplex!" my oldest two shouted in unison.  Okay, got that down. Next? "Umm, walk to the park".
And there their list ended.  Huh?  You have no place you want to go? Camping? The zoo? The beach? Nothing else you want to do?
They needed some help.  We added road trip, swim lessons, as well as a slew of crafts to the list.
Thanks to my dear friend Denise, we had a whole stack of Family Fun magazines for ideas. We pulled out the instructions for the things we want to try, and placed them in our summer fun folder.
Our goal is to check off every one of the twenty something items on our list before school starts up again.

And look, one of our summer goals is to learn our ABC's. We will start with the first three letters.

 Just kidding!  Each of these jars belongs to one of the kids (except for Donovan, who is too young to participate).  
            Perhaps our next child's name should start with the letter "E"!?

With all of the kids in the house all day long again (I sound like I have more than four kids), I am going to need all my tricks to keep the harmony. Seriously, you wouldn't believe what a difference one child can make.  Especially when they had it all figured out who was boss, until the next oldest started intruding.  

I'm also going to need to get serious about chores once again.

Thus, our jars.

I will create a list of various tasks and assign a point to each one.  Each point equals one marble.  For example, brushing your teeth is worth one point, making your bed one, vaccuuming two, and so on. 

Once the jar is full, the child gets to choose between a night out with mom or dad, or $5 to spend at the store.

But you can lose marbles too. Bad behavior means you have to give up a marble.

I'm hoping this system helps keep the peace in our home this summer.  Hopefully, we'll get to a point where they say "oh, I don't need a marble for that, I'm just doing it to help you out."