Self-Improvement Saturday - Summer Sanity?

Today is the first Saturday after the last day of school for the year. Today there were parental trips to the store and Home Depot for home improvement projects, there was some cleaning and I updated the back deck furniture a bit. 

The kids spent the majority of their day on Minecraft. Trust me it won't be this way for long. Tomorrow is Father's Day and we have a few things planned. Then starting on Monday, they will have their summer nanny for 5 hours a day and they are not allowed any computers during her time with them. 

My self-improvement Saturday is looking for and preparing to try out a few ideas for keeping my sanity (and maybe theirs) during the dog days of summer. 

The Peaceful Mom (at http://www.thepeacefulmom.com) offers up a Summer Sanity Daily Planner to keep track of daily activities such as personal care, daily duties (chores), enrichment (say what?) and entertainment. 

Over at Simple Mom's blog, she has a list of 200+ summertime activities for bored kids. I may be referring to this (or print it out and post it on the fridge) often. Check out the list: http://thesimplemom.com/2007/05/27/200-summertime-ideas-for-bored-kids/. A few of the suggestions include: 

• write in your journal
• find an ant colony and spill some food and watch what happens
• play charades
• make up a story by drawing pictures
• draw a cartoon strip
• make a map of your bedroom, house or neighborhood
• call a friend
• cut pictures from old magazines and write a story
  *** and don't forget taking photos & crafting *** 
  
  
  Last but not least is the idea of giving your kids a daily checklist (similar to the first idea but different). 
  
  
  I may not be Catholic, or anywhere near it, but over on the Catholic Mom blog, Jennifer Fitz has some thoughts and suggestions on allowing for screen time but within a reasonable schedule, including things that also need to get done and other activities as well. 
  
  
  Since screen time, particularly computer use, is an issue in our home, I am thinking of trying something similar. First I need to see just when the kids wake up on their own in the next week or so. I have to make sure I am ready to go to work by 10:00 a.m. 4 days a week. I want to plan some fun family activities on my days off. I want to add a couple of daily chores to the kids weekly ones. I would like to have my own version of a sanity schedule in place by a week from today ... 
  
  
  and somewhere in this schedule I hope to have time to do my Etsy activities and some down time too. Right now that down time includes watching "New Tricks". 
  
  
  Wishing you a sane and wonderful summer!
  
  
  Ciao for now, 
  Mama Zuzi