Hi Guys! Welcome Back to My Summer

The first day of summer started with Olivia climbing her little butt out of bed at 6:50am. And WHY would she got back to be when there was fan fiction to read and tablet games to play and dads to annoy?

Most school mornings I have to almost drag her out of bed. But that first morning? She was bright eyed and ready to start her summer.

Sadly for her (but mostly for me) I have to work this summer and so her summer isn’t going to be quite as fun as past summers have been.

Since I just started my job (you know, nine months ago) I don’t have a lot of vacation yet (I currently have four hours…HOURS) of paid vacation time. Sure, I also have four days of unpaid time (aka, personal time) available to me but who wants to go on a vacation and spend money when they’re not actually earning any money? Not me, I’ll tell you.

So we’re going to have to skip Cedar Point this year. We skipped it last year too since I wasn’t working and you know, that pesky money thing. I was also still recovering from radiation and so wanted to stay out of the sun and let some of the residual swelling at the surgical and radiation site go down.

We do plan to have a little fun this summer. I’ve found a really groovy sprinkler thing at Sam’s Club that can make your yard resemble a water park. No slide, alas, but it’s still really cool and it’s only $30.

My mom plans to take Liv and the boys (my nephews) to a really neat water park about twenty minutes from our house. I might take an afternoon off and join them once. It’s got slides, a pool, a wading pool, a hot tub, water cannon, etc. We went a couple of years ago and had a blast.

Since the local pool doesn’t open until 1:00 each day, I will probably take a few afternoons off this summer and take Liv to the pool. Alyssa, that weirdo, prefers the lake. Ick. I much prefer the lovely chlorine of a pool over the muck and sand and weeds in a lake. Alas, Olivia just likes water and so, in hopes of getting Lyss to go with us even a couple of times, I’ll probably suffer through a few visits to the lake. Of course, there are the weekends.

This year the 4th of July is on a Thursday, so we get the 5th off too as a holiday so yay, long weekend!! We’ll definitely do something.

I hope, though, that during all of her non-water time, Olivia will remember to put her tablet down even a little and read a book or three.

I’m not actually expecting this to happen…just hoping.

Of course, if I were a decent parent, I’d MAKE her read but since I’m not there all day, well, we know how well that plan will go down.

Confession: I was there all day every day last summer and I didn’t make her read. See above re: not a good parent.