Summer

Originally Written between 2017-2020                                                        

 

We’ve had this topic a few times before.  And, I’ve always written about how I spent MY summers – while growing up and having to take swimming lessons to my teenage years of balancing working in the drugstore and getting time away to spend the afternoons on the lake on a pontoon boat.

 

Not wanting to replay those wonderful stories, I decided to write about how my CHILDREN spent a couple of their summers growing up in Spring Lake Park.  

 

Let me start at the beginning.  I went back to full-time work during the summer when our kids were 5, 9, 11, and 14.  Michael, the oldest, was old enough to babysit – but for a couple of hours at the neighbors – not for an entire day and practically every day of the summer! I didn’t want to submit Michael to that and certainly didn’t want to submit his siblings to Michael for all that time!

 

I had just started working at Medtronic and really didn’t have any vacation time accrued; so, my working only ½ days was out of the question.  The cost of a paid babysitter for three or four kids was prohibitive.  So, that meant that Michael was in charge!  

 

Or so he thought.  We told him that he couldn’t just tell his brothers and sister what to do.   But, to force Michael to stay home all day wasn’t fair to him.  He wanted to be with his friends and go out of the house.  So, I traded off having Michael in charge from 8:00 – Noon and then David would be in charge from Noon to 5:00.  The next day they switched their hours.  They all had chores.  I typed up a “Chore Chart” for them.

 

They all had to make their beds every day and clean their rooms.  Then “check” it off as “done” on the chart.  Rebecca (age 5) had to empty all of the wastebaskets every day.  I mixed up the other chores such as feed the dog, empty and then fill the dishwasher, dust, vacuum, cut the grass…. Things like that.  Every day, they woke up to a new set of chores for each of them.  

 

Well, this went quite well for a while.  When I’d return home from work, I’d go upstairs to make sure they all made their beds and cleaned their rooms.  After a couple of weeks, though, I stopped checking up on them.  I thought things were going well.  But, a couple of years ago – now I’m talking 38 years ago after the fact – my boys confessed to me that after I stopped checking on them, they stopped making their beds!  I never knew!  I was too tired – or lazy – to check up on them and they knew it!  

 

Well, that’s not the only thing I did to make our household run smoothly during the summer.  Each of our four children were involved in sports.  Baseball – or T-ball in Rebecca’s case – to be exact.  Each one was on a different team.  Which meant, of course, four different schedules.  What was I to do?  Well, I bought a desk-sized calendar and taped up June, July, and August on the front of the door leading down to the basement.  Each child was color coded since one, two or sometimes all of them had either a practice or an actual game on any given day.  Between Norm and I, we were at a game five nights out of seven during the summer.  And sometimes on weekends, we’d travel to another city for a tournament! 

 

As busy and as hectic as it was, as I look back – I wouldn’t change our summers.  Having a job chart taught our kids responsibility (even though they didn’t make their beds!).  Rebecca has now taken after her mom and has a job chart for her boys.  They gripe and fuss but also know that as soon as they get their chores done, they are free for the rest of the day to play with their friends and have fun!

 

The legacy continues…….