Summer time . . . and the livin’ is easy

It’s true around here.

Summer time . . . and the livin’ is easy.

A little too easy, actually.

A lot too easy in fact.

Remember our schedule?

I think I forgot that it served a purpose.  A really good purpose.

I am okay with summer.  I like it, in fact.  A big fan, really.  We all need a little summer.

But as for our family, maybe we have been letting summer have us a little too much.

I’ve been letting it all slide.

I forgot to fix eggs for breakfast for the last three Wednesdays.

Which is not at all serious.  I know.

Eggs are not the issue.  (They never really were.)

But the problem is – I don’t want to fix anything.  If the kids have it easy, it seems like I should be entitled too.  And “easy” means I don’t cook.  So eat cereal kids.  Every day.

Eating cereal for breakfast is not at all serious either.  I know.

Cereal is not the issue.  (It never really has been.)

Without any semblance of routine in our home, breakfast or otherwise, life is just not working out all that well.

Things just break down.

All day.

Starting with breakfast.  (Be it eggs or cereal.)

The morning meal is being served and consumed later every day.  So late in fact that it is almost brunch and that just seems a little too easy, you know.

Except it isn’t easy at all,

because then it’s lunch and we have done nothing.  Naps are off skelter, which means attitudes are off skelter and that means emotions are off skelter.

And we all know that means everything is off skelter.  (Whatever skelter is anyway, around here.  I mean, I don’t know what normal is, so why would I know what skelter is either.)

I just know

it’s a mess around here, actually.

Just a mess.

It’s summer.

And that’s good.

But it isn’t vacation, you know?

And that’s how we’ve been treating it, I think.

Which is not working, by the way, so be warned.

Learn from my failures, friends.  Learn.

(Or don’t.  Whatever.  Off skelter might be your normal and you might like it.  Brunch might be your favorite meal and emotional breakdowns by toddlers might be your muse.)

I don’t know about you.  Or your house.

But this easy livin’ is not so easy here.

So maybe some things can slide.

And maybe when my house is overrun by a myriad of teenagers who can fix their own breakfast and clean up their own messes – then I can let more things slide.

But that isn’t the house I live in right now – no matter how much I kind of wish it was.

(Wait – driving teenagers?  More driving teens??  No.  I do not wish for this.  I will fix your eggs children.  I will spread your peanut butter.  I will.)

We can put the math book down.

It’s alright to sleep a little later.

We can play in the pool (the one foot pool) for the entire day.

But this crazy free-for-all that I have been allowing, even encouraging by my non-action?

That’s no good.

Not anymore.

We can take it easy.

We really can.

Just not that easy.

Because that easy is actually not easy at all.  Just the opposite, in fact.  The polar opposite.

So  . . .

Summer – come on in.

We welcome you into our days.

But you are not the boss here.

You work for us – remember that, okay?