Summer Camps

33 days left of trying to figure out who belongs where when. 33 days of my anal-retentive color-coded day-by-day schedule for the two boys which seemed to be the only way I could keep track of who was doing what camp. And we're not that bad. My kids aren’t doing ten different camps this summer like some of their friends. My kids do Y camp, which is 1) in-town, 2) reasonably priced, and 3) available for before- and after-care (read between the lines, working parents, I can drop off as early as 7:00 a.m. and pick up as late as 6:00 p.m., which is a wonderful thing when you have to work these damn full-time forty-hours-a-week gigs so that you have these things called a paycheck and benefits).

They also went on a one-week vacation in July with us. That’s right, we had a family vacation for the second year in a row. And because you can reserve the same unit for the same week the following year while you’re at this campground for a minimal fee, they’ll have another vacation next year. They come back, and I worked it so that they had a week at a half-day camp (9:00 a.m. – 12:00 noon), which was just a lot of goofing around and games. Then this week 10yo DS was at D.A.R.E. camp, and 6yo DS was back at the Y. 10yo DS joins him again next week, and they’re at the Y until the end of summer. It was tough at the beginning of the summer because the road/bridge to the side of town the Y is on was washed out/closed for repairs due to the rains we got in May, and the detour was VERY congested, and then it got a little dicey the past two weeks with the half-day camp starting late and ending early and D.A.R.E. camp with it's middle-of-my-afternoon pickup. It was stressful trying to work out who would be picking up (mostly me) and dropping off (again, mostly me).

I’m hoping to have a jump on next year. I’ve been throwing all the camps’ brochures and info into one folder at home, not that I’m inviting more transportation headaches but as 10yo DS gets older, the Y doesn’t thrill him as much. So, in the interest of not being argued with every morning, I want to give him the option of other camps in the area (preferably FULL-day). I’m planning on sitting down with few blank calendar pages this weekend and sketching out what camps happen when, along with their registration deadlines, so that next year he won’t be pissed that I didn’t get him into the same camps as some of his friends. It will also give me an idea about money.

To all the parents who can work it and have the summers off, I envy you right about now. I know that the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence, but I dream of the day I can take two or three weeks off during the summer and just veg with my kids.