Summer activities
Things are looking up for the kids this summer activity-wise, thanks in part to my mother's good, or bad, fortune, depending on how you want to look at it.
Mom has gone back to contract work -- and I'm hoping it's for the final time. As I told her after her last full-time job ended, I've been watching her bounce from "bad marriage" to bad marriage for the past 23 years, and I'm rather tired of seeing the same pattern repeat. I'm hoping that she'll just stick with being her own boss from her on out.
Anyway, this has opened up some flexibility in her schedule, and she's decided to make the most of it by volunteering to do some things with the kids that Bonnie and I just couldn't do because of our work schedules. Robert's taken up a weekly sailing class, and James is doing a science workshop for the next few weeks, and Mom is carting them to both activities.
Emme's the odd man (or girl) out in this equation, but that seems to suit her just fine. Emme spent all of the past two summers at camp, every day, and she really wanted some down time this summer. Besides, she's not spending all her time shut up in her room -- she is getting out for a puppeteering workshop that Robert's also involved in.
There have also been some other activities Mom's taken them to. Last night, for example, was a bonfire at a nearby beach. Bonnie and I were both exhausted from a busy workweek, so Mom took the three kids, and all of them had a good time toasting marshmallows and such.
I realize that none of this is as glamorous as a summer vacation to a far-off place, but quite frankly, I don't have nearly as many or as vivid memories of those sorts of activities when I was a kid, versus just hanging out with my friends and family and enjoying the warm weather. I'm also rather antithetically opposed to "overscheduling" the kids to make sure they have activities every day -- I don't think they need it and I don't think it'd be healthy for them if they did.
Besides, we live on Cape Cod, for goodness' sake. There's quite enough going on around here that we don't need to travel *that* far to have fun.