For us, Day One of Summer was officially yesterday.
On Wednesday evening, PhilBillPaul and I enjoyed a lovely dinner out by ourselves and we had an animated discussion on starting the summer off by making a solid, serious plan for regaining control at our house.
Crazy things were discussed like getting our kids to do their chores every day. The chores that we consider a normal part of being a family member.
We got even crazier and thought we would sit down and talk to our lovely children about all of us working together to create a peaceful environment at home. We thought we could all start fresh and have a nice, relaxing summer.
Still trying to help them connect the dots about this simple fact:
“Mom won’t yell if you did the things we’ve asked you to do since you were three.”
We’re tough, I tell you. Here are some of the unreasonable things we keep reminding nagging them about…
“The rules haven’t changed.”
“Work before play.”
“Clean up your own mess.”
“Make your bed.”
“Brush your teeth.”
“Put toliet paper in the bathroom.”
“Hair brushes don’t belong on the kitchen counter.”
“Bath towels belong on your hook, not the floor.”
“Beach towels are not to be used as bath towels.”
And my all-time favorite because I just want one place in my whole house untouched by sticky hands and dirty feet…
“Stay out of our bedroom.”
Imagine my delight when we got home to find a water glass on my night stand that wasn’t mine, the TV set at a volume I’ve never listened to in my life and American Idol’s season finale deleted from my Tivo.
Oh yes, Mama Bear said someone has eaten my porridge, slept in my bed and left a big trail of evidence.
I won’t even go into the *story* that we got a.k.a. THE BIG LIE that kept getting bigger.
So our first day of summer was spent contemplating how long two of the three teens are grounded.
So much for our peace treaty.
Okay, I’ll stop now. As you can see, my expectations are way too high. This is all my fault.
Everyone would be a lot happier if I took more Valium and never left my bedroom.
I’ll let you know how Day Two goes…
Little Lesson (LL): The fun never ends.
Share a Little Lesson (SALL): What unreasonable things are you requiring your kids to do this summer? Eating, sleeping and going places doesn’t count.

Fatal error: Uncaught Error: Call to undefined function genesis_before_comment() in /home/customer/www/sherralifelesson.com/public_html/wp-content/plugins/genesis-gregs-threaded-comment-numbering/plugin.php:48 Stack trace: #0 /home/customer/www/sherralifelesson.com/public_html/wp-includes/class-walker-comment.php(183): wpchildthemes_comment_callback(Object(WP_Comment), Array, 1) #1 /home/customer/www/sherralifelesson.com/public_html/wp-includes/class-wp-walker.php(147): Walker_Comment->start_el('', Object(WP_Comment), 1, Array) #2 /home/customer/www/sherralifelesson.com/public_html/wp-includes/class-walker-comment.php(139): Walker->display_element(Object(WP_Comment), Array, '5', 0, Array, '') #3 /home/customer/www/sherralifelesson.com/public_html/wp-includes/class-wp-walker.php(390): Walker_Comment->display_element(Object(WP_Comment), Array, '5', 0, Array, '') #4 /home/customer/www/sherralifelesson.com/public_html/wp-includes/comment-template.php(2391): Walker->paged_walk(Array, '5', 0, 0, Array) #5 /home/customer/www/she in /home/customer/www/sherralifelesson.com/public_html/wp-content/plugins/genesis-gregs-threaded-comment-numbering/plugin.php on line 48