Seasonal Planning: Summer Edition

Before summer begins I’m asking myself these questions:

What do I remember about last season? (last summer 2023) If you can remember it a year later it was probably significant. (If you can’t remember: open camera roll, IG feed, calendar, journal)
What has changed? What mattered then that doesn’t matter now? (Schedule, Relationships? Health?)
What worked well? What didn’t? (Camps? Dinners? Trips?)
What am I already dreading about this next season upcoming, summer 2024 (June/July/August)? There’s always something.

Then I grabbed a calendar & plotted 2 big summer buckets that were already planned: camps & trips

Scheduled Time

Answering these questions was a great tool in preparing expectations, mostly mine. Our family operates best with a little bit of structure. I found the structure by pulling out camps & trips that were already scheduled and placed them on a calendar first. Each summer we choose 2 (wk. long) camps for the boys. Our 6 yr. old does half days and our 8 yr. old chooses full days. We choose to travel less in the peak summer months because that time in our area is absolutely beautiful. Our two larger trips were at the beginning and middle of summer.

Then I added weekly commitments

Planned, not yet scheduled yet

For the past three years both of our sons have joined a mountain bike group that meets once a week over the summer for 10wks. Depending on ability levels, one bikes for 2hrs, the other for 3hrs. This weekly commitment in itself gives me at least 1.5hrs. free and adds structure to our weekly schedule.

My husband also planned to mountain bike with my older son in a race series called the MidWeek mini enduro riders. There were 6 races on Thursday evenings sprinkled throughout the summer. I added those dates to the calendar knowing I would sub in for 1-2 races and also have 1 on 1 time with my younger son on those particular evenings.

Other important dates to be aware of

Important Dates

I noted when school starts for us (mid-August) and that my older son’s soccer league practices begin in (mid-July) and has 2 summer tournaments - end of July and beginning of August.

What time chunks are left unscheduled?

Unscheduled Time

Then I looked for the blocks of time that were still unscheduled - those came mostly before and after camp days. We also had whole weeks that were free (I noted those: 1 wk. in June, 2 wks. in July (July 4th & last wk.), and August was wide open. I plan for unscheduled time because it’s the only way to ensure it stays unscheduled.

Reflecting back on the Summer: Saying No

I think it’s important to reflect on what things you say no to. I ask myself - was that a good decision this year and would I trade it with something for next summer? Here’s the things we said “no” to:

We put formal swimming (lessons & swim team) on hold for both spring and summer. The team takes off in August and there’s no major meets in these months anyway.

We said no to trips in those 3 peak summer months and pushed our big East coast trip to end of May. Yes, we decided the boys would miss the last week of school because of this.

I said no to my own mountain biking and focused just on run traiing for my 50K. This was hard. In previous years I biked 2-3 days a week Looking back, this decision was just fine. I’m biking a ton in September because my 50K ultramarathon is over and the boys are back in school.

I want to learn to garden. I want a small plot to care for in our community garden. I envision spring evenings planting, summer evenings pulling weeds and fall evenings reaping a small harvest. But this summer was not the year for it. One day, will be.

Something to think about

Choices to make

I don’t think I realized that the little things we do each week take more time than you think. All four of us play piano. If each family member puts in 30 minutes a day to practice that’s a lot of time spent at home, at the piano. After years of playing, we’ve realized as parents we want to prioritize this skill.

We want our children to be bilingual in Spanish. This isn’t easy when the primary language spoken in our home is English, but it doesn’t mean it’s not doable. My husband reads to our sons in Spanish, my mother-in-law chats over video in Spanish, and we have a tutor come to our home once a week. We chose to go on a trip over spring break to Mexico City which blended our love of adventure with learning a language.

These 2 areas of our family life (piano & spanish) are teaching me that a small skill practiced over thousands of hours is not only hard but takes an incredible amount of time, attention, and discipline. We can’t see the benefits quite yet. I am learning that these are choices we make in our families. I am also recognizing that to continue these goals, we must say no to other things.

Summer goals

My kids - They had a hard time voicing their goals at the beginning of summer, but I do think they are a little young to know how to look at the big picture. I encouraged them to come up with a list and it included things like: bike, read, play soccer, do science experiments, cook in the kitchen, play with friends. This was immensely helpful for me to know what to prioritize and to work hard to find camps where they would be with friends.

My partner - My husband said no to any gravel or mountain bike races this summer, which he does regret. I think reflecting is learning what we can say no to and maybe what we shouldn’t sacrifice.

My own - Complete a local 50K. I have to realize that this isn’t just a one off goal. This is four months of training and dropping 40hr running wks. This is waking at 4am, and doing speed workouts in the dark after putting children to bed at night. This is not just a goal made by me. I need a family backing my decision and supporting me along the way in order the fills the gap of my absence in the home.

Filling in the rest

Scheduled

I wanted to learn a new skill with my sons this summer - we chose fishing. I signed us up for 4 evenings of learning to fish together in July and it was such a wonderful, magical experience. This is what I will remember when next summer rolls around.

We also took on a new commitment in June of hosting a pianist who competed in Salt Lake City. She stayed with us for 10 days and we not only transported her to her concerts but showed her the very best of Park City. We had such an incredible experience with this that I know we’d like to commit to this every 3-4yrs.

So when did we have time for the science experiments? The cooking camp? The reading aloud? Ha, are you even still reading this? To me, these are the jewels of summer - the times when we work on our relationships with each other the most.

Unscheduled

Science experiments were completed mostly with my younger son after his half day camps. But I don’t think I would have ordered them and completed them if it wasn’t for planning ahead and seeing the gaps of our unscheduled time. When he asked me for a craft or science experiment I had a list and supplies already at the house.

Cooking camp ended up being 1 meal the boys made each week with me. Because they’re still young we did all breakfast ideas this summer. My elder son learned to pack his own lunch including making a sandwich for all his camps. That was huge.

We read aloud the most we ever have this summer. It was the one goal I stuck to religiously. Any down time when the boys were tired of being outside they worked on puzzles or played Legos and I read.