The Summer Bucket List

For moms, summer can be a real test -- the kids are home from school all day, every day -- unless you send them to camp, of course. Our kids do attend a couple of weeks of summer camp, but the rest is up to mom!

Although we all look forward to the break from school, it takes a lot of endurance and planning to keep the summer happily humming along.

Tyler and Alyssa making the summer bucket list!

This year we decided to try something new -- a visual summer bucket list. We sat down together at the beginning of the summer and made a list of all of the fun things we wanted to do. Then, we wrote them on small sheets of construction paper, assembled them as a collage on a bulletin board and hung it up in the kitchen.

We checked things off our list as summer went along, and with only three weeks of summer vacation left, I can report that we will get to almost all of them. How exciting!

Anything we don't get to can certainly be carried over into fall! In fact, I like this idea so much, I think I may keep it going for a while -- I don't know about you, but I'm the kind of gal who needs visual, in your face reminders -- and lots of them! That's why this board, displayed so prominently in my kitchen, was so helpful.

The other thing that was great about it was that everyone got to have a say in what they wanted to do this summer, so it created a sense of equality. Plus, the act of making the board was a fun project. It also created the sense of living our summer with intention.

It's been such a wonderful summer, but I still think we will all be ready for the school year to start!

I'd love to hear from you about how you keep your summer fun and interesting!

A couple of people have asked me to share some of our ideas ... so here you go!

• Go out for ice cream
• Work on scrapbooks
• Grill out with the neighbors
• Purge from under the bathroom sinks (yes, we put a few work-related things on there, too!)
• Chicago Botanic Garden
• Menchies Frozen Yogurt
• Go to the library
• Catch fireflies
• Organize the craft closet
• D'Agostinos Pizza
• Field Museum
• Painting pottery
• Six Flags Great America
• Cooking fun in the kitchen -- trying new kid friendly recipes
• Visit a farm
• Ice skating
• Roller skating
• Try Marco's Pizza for the first time
• Swimming at the pool
• Downtown Chicago 
• Arlington Park Horse Races
• Bowling
• Try Smashburger for the first time
• Go berry picking

Moms and Anger

I heard this episode of Focus on the Family today that really hit home with me. Enough to make me sit down and write this.

It was about anger and moms. The guest on the show was Julie Ann Barnhill. She wrote a book called She's Gonna Blow.

I completely resonated with this woman. As I was listening I couldn't believe what I was hearing -- experiences so similar to mine. A couple of her stories were so funny they made me laugh out loud. I was shocked to hear someone else expressing part of what I went through as a mom.

With one child, I was fine -- so patient. People would compliment me everywhere I went on how patient I was. But then came baby #2, and oh my goodness. Suddenly there was much more stress ... and anger too. There simply wasn't enough of me to go around. This stress and anger took me aback. At the time, I didn't understand where it was coming from. But what is even worse is that I had no idea this was happening to other women. I thought it was just me.

There is a book I read several years ago called, I Was a Really Good Mom Before I Had Kids. I have always said if I wrote a book, my title would be, I Was a Really Good Mom Before I Had Two Kids.

Being the perfectionist that I am -- I have had to accept the fact that it is impossible for me to please both of my children at once, and that kills me, because I love them both so much. I believe that desire to please them both is part of where my anger came from.

The author says this anger during motherhood is a compilation of everything that may be causing us stress in life -- finances, career, relationship troubles and even problems from our past. She said it works like a volcano -- before the big eruption, there are many small earthquakes that signal something is wrong, but we ignore them until we lose it completely. Usually, the brunt of our anger is taken out on our kids or our spouse -- the people we love the most -- even when they are not the cause of it. Then we are filled with regret, shame and guilt.

Just knowing that this problem is not unique is healing. But Julie's insights and practical ways to handle the anger were also very helpful.

What do you think about this topic? Have you ever experienced surprising levels of anger while parenting? I'd love to hear from you on this!