During the summer when I was little, I played outside in the woods. I climbed trees and tried to gymnastics in the backyard. I baked mud pies on the side of the road. I tried to garden. I made a pretend house out of a new refrigerator box. I swept out the garage and pulled weeds. I rode bike and tried to hang out with my brother and his friends. This was life in West Virginia in the 1980s. Every so often I’d go to summer ballet classes. Every year we’d go to the beach for a week.

Black family walking along the beach with a young boy on the father's shoulders.

My favorite thing, by far, was going to camp. For sleep away camp, I grew up through the Girl Scouting system. For day camp, I grew up canoeing, swimming, riding horses, and learning archery at Antietam Day Camp. I didn’t spend much time inside, and I definitely didn’t spend time studying. My dad worked outside of the home year-round, and my mother was an elementary school teacher. She was home for our summers, and I’m fairly confident she was in charge of managing them too.

Summer in the suburbs wasn’t so mellow.

I tried my best to recreate the freedom of playing outside from sun-up to sun-down for my kids. Their life in the suburbs was so very different than mine in the country. I had a dream they’d enjoy the backyard, make friends in the neighborhood, and bike. But there weren't kids to play with in our subdivision. People were more protective of their yards, and the expectation was that kids stayed off other people’s lawns and didn’t ‘cut through’ their properties. Honestly, it still makes me sad.

Winter’s here, so you better start planning.

Even though I’m a planner and can think months in advance, it still surprised me that the work of planning summer break now starts around Thanksgiving. I’m confident my mom’s “planning” for what we’d do during the summer took just a few hours. There were a few phone calls to camps, forms to complete, and payments to be made. This covered a few weeks… and the rest were up to us.

These days, the holder of the School Breaks (Summer) card is expected to do research. There are camps galore, tailored to your child’s specific areas of interest. If your child had attended camp or an activity the prior summer, you’re responsible for seeking feedback from the child on whether it was a good fit. Would they like to repeat it, or look for something new? Research for sleep-away summer programs or those geared towards high schoolers, starts the moment the back-to-school rush dies down.

Planning turns into designing a master schedule.

Our kids have no fewer than twelve weeks off from school during the summer. Although I wish eight of those were spent making mud pies and playing in the woods, instead I’d calculate week by week how I could possibly drop off and pick up each of them from various locations. Looking back, it was a logistics nightmare. (If you’re in the thick of it now, I see you.)

Although my husband is the holder of this portion of the card now, when it was my responsibility, I’d schedule a sit-down with each kid and present them with a few options of day camps. (Expectations shifted from my preferred eight weeks outside and four weeks of camps to the exact opposite: at least eight weeks occupied at camp.) They’d rank their favorites, then I’d set out to map out the puzzle. Sure, I was at home during those years, but camp was one way for me to maintain my summer sanity, and it allowed me to have dedicated one-to-one time with each kid during their ‘off weeks’ from camp.

I’d also ask them to contribute to a list of activities, adventures, games, meals they’d like, places they’d like to go, etc. in advance of the summer break. This is the invisible work of motherhood. This is the unpaid labor that is meaningful for families and children. It takes planning, preparation, connection, and care - all for the purpose of giving children a break from the school setting and a way to get curious and explore their limits.

Picnic table with six kids doing a science and art exploration. Adult standing at the head of the table in blurred, summer, outdoor background.

The master schedule lays the framework for registration.

These days, depending on your level of privilege, the holder of the School Breaks (Summer) card may have also done hours worth of pre-work: building relationships with other parents and educators to get an edge on registration timing tactics. By talking with and connecting with parents of older children, these parents have done an additional layer of research to ensure that they’re up and online at the right hour, write the correct things on the application, and pay in a timely manner to guarantee their child’s spot in a particular program or day care.

I chose to circumvent this process but acknowledge it’s reality. Now that my kids are in middle and high school, there’s less pressure and anxiety around the registration timing. There are different types of opportunities for them, some which require travel and longer term boarding. The pressure shifts instead to teaching kids life skills, volunteering or working for pay, and experimenting with career-oriented opportunities.

But wait! Don’t forget the packing and supply list.

Phase one involves the hours and hours of research, pre-planning, and registration. Phase two is the actual camp planning. Because this card is quite lengthy, in our house we’ve divided it into two cards. My husband now manages phase one. I’m responsible for completing the online registration and payment, the health forms, and lastly, the dreaded supply list. Preparing for camp, especially a sleep away one, is like back-to-school preparation times ten. I typically aim to complete my portion of the card at least a month in advance of school being out so that I’m not scrambling once the kids are home full time.

Again, if we lived in a rural area, I believe at least some portion of this card would look differently. The mental load might be shaped differently. I recognize my nostalgia for the past doesn’t equate to the reality of the present, and I also know how critical it is for children to be occupied and supervised in order for parents to be able to work.

Summers are precious for all. They give everyone a chance to slow down and breathe, yet the amount of preparation needed seems absurd. The more you can make this work visible in your home, the more we can value the thought behind designing a summer that feels like a break.

Be sure to join me on Instagram every #FairPlayFriday where I’m chatting with my Facilitator community.