Summer's not even Here and my Kids are Bored Already!

Today is the last day of school and I'm a little nervous and I'll tell you why... See, normally my country-bumpkin kids stay home all summer. We hike down to the creek and we... well... just hang out all summer long. But this year they are coming of the age where that will NOT be good enough and who will suffer???

ME!

I will suffer because they will be bored. And when they're bored they bicker and whine. And understandably, there comes a time in every kid's life when hanging out with mom just isn't enough. But what's a struggling writer to do? Camp's expensive! Only the rich can afford to entertain their kids with really cool sleep away camps or even some of these posh day camps... I have no idea what I will do with a middle schooler and an almost middle schooler all summer long!

Summer officially begins today at 2:00 for his household and my kids are already bored and bickering. Like I said, I'm a little nervous. OK, I'm a lot more than a little nervous!

My goal this summer is to complete my novel once and for all, but now I am wondering how realistic that is with two kids who will need me to constantly come up with new and exciting things to do and places to go because they're own backyard just isn't cutting it anymore. And I will need to come up with things that won't break the bank. Even going to the movies these days is a ridiculous expense. How can I entertain them without killing my summer budget AND still finish my novel???

There should be a book for mom's just for this purpose. I can see it now... Seventy Fun and Inexpensive Things to do with Your Kids This Summer in Your Area. We can each take a different territory and write a little booklet about what these things are with a rating scale for affordability, fun-o-metor, restroom cleanliness, and more. I have been scouring the Internet looking for cheap day camps, or things like this and not much is coming up. Even horse back riding lessons for a half an hour comes to $80 a pop for two kids!!!! And with the price of gas soon reaching $5 in my neck of the woods, I don't want to have to drive too far. Plus with all that driving, I'll need a laptop so I can drop them off someplace fun for them, park it under a shady spot and type away...

Summer's not even here yet, and I am already looking ahead to the fall...

WRITING BUDDIES

Let's change the topic slightly, now that I've gotten my whining out of the way, I want to tell you a bit more about my brainchild idea as of late - Writing Buddies. I wrote about it at the end of my last posting... a friend of mine and I will be writing buddies for each other over the summer.

This Friday will be our first phone conference where we will set "new page" goals and talk about how our writing is going, and brainstorm any areas in our stories that need it. Say my goal is to write 10 new pages, the following Friday we will phone conference again and check in... did we reach our "new page" goals, why, why not, brainstorm, etc. We will continue this process until we both complete our MG novels. We are both very excited and hopeful (but now I have this little thing called "kids" to possibly throw me off).

Drat! Retrospective perspective strikes again! I remember the good ol' days when you could plop them in for a nap, or in front of the TV, or on a blanket with some toys and still get some work done.... Not anymore! Welcome to the 'tween age!

So, how do you deal with kids, summer vacation, and your writing goals? Let's hear the ideas and let the brainstorming commence!

PS We weren't actually hit by lightning btw, but it sure looks like it, doesn't it??? This was when I was doing my evil experiments in the basement of how to silence children for a few hours each day so a writer-mom can get some writing time in-between the whining chant of "we're bored... there's nothing to do..." Wha-ha-ha-ha-ha.....