Wednesday, May 29, 2013

School's Out

C's and my semester ended a couple of weeks ago, and Wiggle's last day of school was last Thursday. So now we are footloose and fancy free for the summer. Actually, the months of unstructured time stretching out in front of us are giving me heart palpitations at the moment. Of course, there are tons of things I want to get done and tons of summer activities I want to make sure we do. Then there's summer traveling, C has a couple of conferences to go to, and I have to get mentally ready to go back to "work" next fall with my internship.

As far as the things I want to get done around the house and yard, I've made some progress - I set-up an office in the basement complete with curtains, desks, lamps, and a nice rug. The rest of the basement looks a little like a hoarder is squatting down there though. My tools are spread around the ground and tool bench, baby toys are piled up needing to be boxed up or donated, various papers, out-of-season clothes and the like are in bins, but should really be culled down. I have a perpetual pile for Goodwill by the front door that shrinks and grows, but never seems to disappear.

Upstairs, the painting projects, of which there are many, all need prep work that requires me to get dusty and covered in flaking paint in the precious hours after the boys go to bed, so needless to say they have not been started. I'm almost decompressed enough after the semester to start on them though. Almost.

Outside, I enjoy cutting things down and/or back, but the rate of growth seems to be outstripping my rate of cutting. And we have massive amounts of poison ivy that as far as I can tell have gotten bigger and angrier after I sprayed them with weed killer. I will make real progress in the fall when things die back again, but I want to keep the jungle slightly contained until then which is proving to be no easy job. We also need to power wash the siding and then, hopefully, paint.

Oh and I want to add insulation to the attic, have the fireplace converted to gas, get either can or track lights installed in the living room, kitchen, and family room. Have a ceiling fan installed in the family room, re-do much of the kitchen, etc, etc, etc.

Not all this summer though, but I still need a master list so I can do things in a somewhat logical order. The list both excites me and makes my head hurt.

Meanwhile, every room has at least one "junk" bin or basket that I am slowly going through, returning things to their rightful rooms (Buster is like a one-man moving company), putting like things together, and throwing the broken or dilapidated things out. It's slow-going, but it is going, finally.

We went to the pool this weekend and it was bracingly cold right now, but I look forward to sunny, hot afternoons there as the summer progresses.

I have also been scouring pinterest for fun summer activities, but the true goal is to find things that Wiggle wants to do without us. The thing is playing with a four-year-old kinda sucks. OK, no, it really sucks. Everything he does involves making up rules, changing the rules, making sure the rules only favor him, adjusting the rules so he's the only one who gets a turn, etc. So even when we are playing with him, we are generally in the position of arguing that the rules can't change or perpetually waiting for our turn. But he insists on having someone play WITH him all the time. Of course, we don't indulge his whims or play with him every time he asks, but then it means we have to deal with floppy-bodied, exasperated, whining. He doesn't "want," he only "needs," or rather "NEEEEEEEEEDSSSSSSSS!"

I do love getting to be home with both boys and spending time with them, but I'm finding these days that to have the ability to occasionally tag-out for a few minutes helps the day go much smoother. Luckily, since C is working primarily from the basement these days, I get to do that almost every afternoon. It also means that I have small blocks of time to actually get things done, during business hours, no less.

So come on summer, bring it on! I'm ready.