Summer of the Tired Mom

I wrote this over a month ago, and am just publishing it now.  This was a loooong summer for me.

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This is a gross generalization, but I feel like I've talked to enough people recently to have a loose theory that parents of young children generally do not love summer vacation, and parents of older kids really do.

Well, I have young children, and I definitely do not love summer vacation.  I decided last spring that 5 years old was really young to farm Gigi out to summer camps.  Plus, we're paying for a private school tuition which includes a payment through the summer months, so the idea of paying even more for expensive camps was painful.  However, a few weeks into the summer break I was wishing that I had at least lined up a few weeks of camp.  Now I know better, and already have my plans in the works for next year.

You see, I have a 5 year old, and a 2.5 year old, and for some reason it didn't occur to me that they would fight.  All the time.  And it started approximately when my energy fell apart and disappeared, which was basically all summer until recently.  I'm 19 weeks pregnant, which meant that I was right in the middle of an exhausting first trimester when school let out and suddenly there was a need for sibling mediation approximately 400 times per day.  Gigi and Orion love each other fiercely, but they are siblings and now how to irritate each other like nobody's business.

And then recently I've been feeling better, and we've gotten into a groove that really works.  Right before school starts again, of course.  My main strategy is to have somewhere to go every morning of the week.  Park day?  Play date?  Exercise and Pool time at Tutu's house?  Gardening at our community garden?  Story time at the library?  Sure!  Just get. us. out. of. the. house...