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Tips for How to Navigate Your Child's Summer Home From School

So your sweet little kindergartener or preschooler has graduated their first year at "big kid" school? Hooray! Such a milestone... but wait... Suddenly a wave of anxiousness comes over you... Home? ALL-SUMMER-LONG? How are you supposed to juggle ALL-THE-THINGS (home, work, life... don't even get us started on all the laundry!) with your little(s) back at home? Summer is now well underway and we're still figuring this out! Are you?

If you're anything like me, you're freaking out a bit... But then you pause and remember to call on your "village" (you know the ones). In my case? That's our team of super-awesome Sparkle mom's with kids ranging from teens still in high school, teens graduating high school and newly adult children! (They have ALL the tips and tricks.)

So let's take a simultaneous deep breath. We're in the right place! Lucky for you all, I'm going to share their years of summertime-with-young-kiddos wisdom with you today!

I asked each Sparkle team member to chime in with their very BEST tips for how to navigate summer break! Here it goes... DEEP EXHALE

The Sparkle Team's BEST tips for a child's first (second or third) summer home from school:

Planning & Organizing Your Days: - Get organized! Using sharable calendars, apps, or similar is a huge asset for keeping various schedules in order between parents. Google Calendar is a simple and solid choice! - To ease into the day, take a few minutes the night before to set up a project for kids to work on first thing in the morning — blocks, stickers, dolls, even stringing Cheerios onto dental floss for a necklace (and a treat). This can buy you a little time to get yourself centered before diving into the day! - Create a daily routine with a chart/list so everyone can keep track. Kids thrive on rhythm and will be more settled in the home playday/workday with clear expectations. Also it helps to clarify between parents/caregivers who is in charge when. The chart/list can be a craft project too. - Create a summer bucket list — and then plan out when the activities will happen so there’s a clear sense of home time and adventure time.

Outside Fun: Outings & Activities!: - Never underestimate the power of water play. Set up a kiddie pool, a sprinkler, or even just a big bowl of water on a patch of grass and watch your kids explore the joy of getting everything wet. - Lemonade stands are fun, but remember: for young kids, it can be a fair amount of work for the grown-ups. If your kids are passionate about a lemonade stand, see if you can recruit an older child or teenager to help mix up lemonade and support shy kids who aren’t sure how to manage conversations with adults. (Bonus tip: you can also try crafting some lemonade stand bunting to go along with your stand! Another fun activity to fill their days) - Try to plan something special to do together each day — big or small! This can be a special one-on-one activity or as a family. It creates those special summer memories to carry you through for years to come!

Energy Management - Rotate the energy throughout the day. An outing to the park can be followed by a quiet lunch. After-dinner dance parties can lead into a neighborhood walk (stay quiet to listen for wild animals), then reading time. Shifting the energy high and low will be as good for parents as it is for children. - Know your own kids and their limits. For some kids, getting too hot can be a recipe for an instant meltdown. In cases like these, prioritize pool outings and air-conditioned spaces on hot days, always saving the nature preserves and picnics for more temperate forecasts. Other kids might be sensitive in other ways — requiring regular snacks, or cycling through introvert/extravert time. If you listen, kids will teach you what they need! - Setting up realistic expectations of the day (especially with slightly older kids), so everyone has a good sense of the day and can plan accordingly! (See the daily routine referred to above in the "Planning & Organizing" section.)

Call On Your Village! - Create summertime kid care “co-ops” or playdates! Share the caring with other families — whether it’s a regular rotation or a one-time swap. - Arrange play dates with other parent-friends. Two parents juggling all-the-things is better than one!

Get Some Outside Help! - Solicit help from others. Ask your grandparents, aunties, uncles, and BFFs to help share the load. - Summer camps! They are such a great resource. Make sure they are a camp your kiddo will actually be excited about! Does your kids like sports? Try looking up a local sports camp! If they are more theatrically inclined, look to see if your local theaters are putting on any special theatre camps.

Quiet-Time - Plan “media times” to give parents a break. Keep it within the limit that is healthy for your child and doesn’t overstimulate them. This is the perfect time to throw on a Sparkle Story so you can get to things like laundry or making dinner. - Reserve special toys or activities for each week. Don’t introduce everything at once at the start of the summer. Perhaps clean out toys/games and put some away, and then rotate over the summer.

We hope this helps!

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