Summer Blues

It's amazing the difference a few years makes.

I ran into a neighbor friend this week who has two children in grade school. We were talking about summer and soon realized how differently we thought about it.

For her, summer is about spending more time with her kids while they're not in school. It's enjoying concentrated time with them with the added bonus of family vacations, swimming and baseball games. She is dreading the beginning of school and wants to squeeze every last drop out of these hot, lazy days.

As the mother of preschoolers, I have a very different opinion. No question, summer is fun and we've done some neat things. But the day in and day out of summer is torture for me. We do playdates and see our friends, but the kids are basically sick of me. We've been together non-stop for 9 weeks. All the creativity I had at the beginning of summer is gone. We've done all the fun things I had planned. We've done all the crafts and read all the books. I'm out of ideas and we still have 5 1/2 weeks to go.

There are some good parts to our non-structured days. I'm embarrassed at how many times I've let them stay in pajamas until past noon. They've barely worn shoes since May. We've had more than our fair share of ice cream and we keep running out of sunscreen because of so many days spent at the pool.

So here's to summer and to the final stretch. I'll do my best to enjoy these last few weeks, but my heart really lies in the fall. We all need the structure, they need to spent time with people other than me and quite honestly, I need a break.