Literally the first word Bennet speaks in the morning: WALK!
At breakfast, lunch, and dinner: WALK!
When we leave the house to get in the car: WALK!
While I'm getting him dressed for the day: WALK!
As soon as we get home from a walk: WALK!
Some mothers have to listen their toddlers say "no" all day long. My son says "walk". Usually we go on one walk a day, which I feel is pretty good. We stop by the park and play a while and then continue on home. But I hate the heat and humidity that a central Illinois summer brings and I'm afraid Bennet might be a little disappointed when his mom wants to spend 10am-7pm indoors.
So I'm wondering what your plans are for beating the summer heat? Do you have tips on cheap entry prices for swimming pools? How do you fill the long days of June, July, and August with toddlers but little sweat and screen time? Is that even possible?
8 comments:
Our 16 month old LOVES forts!
Summers are tough, especially since ours last 6 months!! Do you have a baby pool or sprinkler? That's how we survived in our old house, the back porched faced East so we couldn't go outside until about 4pm so I had to get creative in the mornings... but the evenings were spent outside in the water... This summer we will be using and abusing our pool downstairs!
Confession here: I pretty much hate going outside if the weather is less than perfect and if there are bugs around and I also don't like for the children to watch too much television.
So I let them have run of a particular room. Yes they destroy it daily and yes it is a mess to clean up, but the vast majority of the toys are confined to that room and we have canvas and plastic boxes that all the toys go in. If the category of toy has an assigned box (puzzle box, little people box, kitchen box, etc), the clean up doesn't take all that long. And the boxes are stacked by the wall nightly for use tomorrow.
We do go outside too, but usually not until near sunset. Of course their father loves to be outside so when he's out, they go too, and I stay in the house with the baby. :)
I grew up in an area that averaged 70 degrees......year round. I'm a bit of a pansy when it comes to heat, and having moved to the south was a huge adjustment.
We change up our schedule quite a bit. We get out of the house early even if it means going before I've had a chance to really make myself presentable or do my chores, it's our first priority. I remind myself that I'll have plenty of time later (oh joy?) stuck in the house to do things like cleaning.
When my daughter was a toddler we made a bit of a mess, I would frequently get out a pot of water and measuring spoons and let her play with it (supervised of course) seeing what floats, what sinks, what holds more/less. She had great fun. I also let her take super long baths, those not only wore her out, but cooled us off.
We spent plenty of time "cooking" too, letting her place pieces of fruit in an ice cube tray and covering them with juice to make Popsicles. Making fruit salad, and taking advantage of avocado season by putting the meat of a few avocados in a bag with some salt and seasonings and letting her mush it up until it becomes guacamole. I also now throughout the year look for fun extra stuff to do indoors in the summer. I keep those things hidden and bring them out when we have tough days.
Cycling toys helps too, I have certain toys that only come out on specific days and that makes them seem new and special.
I got pretty long winded there....sorry, but I totally sympathize. As a side note, I don't remember how I found your blog, or whether I've ever said hi....so hi. :)
Great tips!
@Mama - Hello to you, too! Very nice to meet you!
Baths. I sometimes let my kids play in the bath for as long as they want. I just sit in the bathroom and read a book while they play. I did this a lot when I had a 1, 2, and 3 year old. We live in TX.
I would say a cheap plastic pool for the yard. That is what gets me outside with the kids ( i hate it). That way they can "swim" and Abe still gets his afternoon nap. It drives me crazy that all the pools open at 1pm!!! By then he is exhausted - NOT the time to drag four kids to the pool. Splashdown opens at 11:30 I think but is way way too expensive.
We have also done long baths and typically I let the kids mess up the house a ton in the summer. I figure if it keeps them busy, then it is worth it to have extra clean up later.
It won't help you much now, but we've gotten our kiddie pools at the end of the season for a couple bucks at places like Menards.
When I was younger, my parents would entertain us by giving us large paint brushes and we'd "paint" on the sidewalk/driveway. Or, I have a recipe for fingerpaint. Too bad you don't live closer, BloNo has some awesome sprinkler parks.
Of our three summers here, two of them I've been pregnant, and I just end up sweating it out. Of course, trying to make most of our activity in the morning and evening.
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