6 Ways My Summer Breaks Have Changed

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We’ll be starting our 12th homeschooling year in a few weeks. It doesn’t seem possible. Lately, I’ve been thinking about how much our school has changed since we began (most notably, the kid who started the whole thing is now a graduate). That got me thinking about how our summer breaks have changed, too, particularly for me, as the homeschool mom.

6 Ways My Summer Breaks Have Changed

photo credit jenny downing on flickr

1. I no longer stay up half the night. That’s probably the biggest way my summer break has changed. I used to be a night owl. These days, I’d just as soon go to bed early, watch a Castle or Bones episode with my husband, and go to sleep at a decent hour, thank you very much.

It may also have something to do with the fact that I used to have to stay up late to enjoy a quiet, peaceful house. Now that my kids are all older and night owls, I have to get up early to do that. Either way, I’ve learned to really enjoy the morning hours and not struggle with getting up nearly as much as I used to.

2. I don’t arrange park play dates. Okay, we didn’t do a whole, whole lot of that even back in the day once the weather got hot. However, now all of my kids are way too old for park play dates. These days, it’s bowling (with Kids Bowl Free) and laser tag, the jump park or rock climbing (both on the agenda, but not experienced yet), and maybe some roller skating.

3. I’m planning on seeing some summer movies. You know the summer kids’ movies that many of the theaters do? Our local theaters are offering a movie, drink, and popcorn for $4. We used to never do those. Know why? Because the movies play at 10 AM. Remember how I used to be a night owl? Add to that the fact that my kids have never liked to get up early either and 10 AM movies have never appealed to us.

Now that I’m up early most days, though, it doesn’t seem so impossible to get my youngest – the only one who’s interested in going with me – out of bed in time to go. The most disappointing thing? The movie I most want to see is playing the week she’s at camp. Oh, well. I wonder if people would look at me strange if I went alone?

4. I get up early to run. I confess that I had gotten lazy there for awhile, but I’ve been running again the last few weeks – thanks to the accountability of my amazing running buddy – and building my distance back up. I don’t always enjoy it at the time, but once I’m done, it sure feels good to have gotten the day off to an active start. I don’t ever, ever want to go back to being obese.

5. Summer breaks don’t involve nearly as much sweet tea. You would think summer and sweet tea go together. They do, but just a couple of glasses a day these days, not a gallon. Yes, seriously, I used to drink a gallon in a day or two. Again, I don’t ever, ever want to go back to obesity.

6. They’re much shorter than they used to be. With us schooling year round, taking a six week break for summer and another at Christmas, our summer breaks are much shorter than they used to be. I won’t lie and say that I don’t wish we could extend our break by a couple or four weeks – I enjoy a relaxing break as much as the next person – but we all really, really enjoy having a break week after every six weeks of school, so we’ll take the short summer.

Have you been homeschooling a while? In what ways have your summer breaks changed over the years?

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Kris Bales is a newly-retired homeschool mom and the quirky, Christ-following, painfully honest founder (and former owner) of Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers. She has a pretty serious addiction to sweet tea and Words with Friends. Kris and her husband of over 30 years are parents to three amazing homeschool grads. They share their home with three dogs, two cats, a ball python, a bearded dragon, and seven birds.

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4 Comments

  1. I can so relate to this!! I am still adjusting to having NO alone time in the evenings, and I absolutely MUST have my 2-3 hours of quiet time in the mornings in order to get all my “thinking” stuff done!

  2. Well done you for running each morning. I bet you feel much better in yourself?
    I’ve lost 7 lbs since I started to sleep. I seem to naturally be eating less because I don’t need the food simply to keep going. I wonder if it will continue to fall off? Well, one can hope. If not, I’ve got me a plan! I’ve photocopied the couch to 5k. It’s a start, right? Maybe I need to get myself a running buddy – we’ve got a coffee shop just at the end of our road and I can see ‘couch to 5K’ turning into ‘couch to coffee shop’. Either way I’ll not be on the couch anymore….

    1. I’ve heard of studies that have been done about the fact that people who don’t get enough sleep gain weight. It does have to do with consuming more calories because you’re awake longer, so that totally makes sense. Sounds like a nice added bonus to me. I also know a great many people who have successfully completed the Couch to 5K program. It’s really similar to what I did on my own. Once you get to where you can run 90 seconds without feeling like you’re going to die, it gets better. 🙂 You can do it!

  3. We school year round now (with a few breaks here and there) and our summers have changed a lot as well. I am working on getting my walking in the evenings happening again. I was a size 23 less than 4 years ago and now I’m down to a 10/12 and want to stop when I reach 8 (was a size 0 11 years ago, funny how life changes us). I’ve been stuck at my current size for about a year, the size 8 dresses fit but not the pants… Soooo… time to get walking again, cut back on the pop and sweet tea (sigh), and kick my butt into gear! Now, if only I could motivate myself to put down the crochet by ten pm and get some sleep before 2 am 😉

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