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I have started to write this post three times already today and am just not getting it done. I started to write about how 42% of mother’s have Pinterest related stress, but once I wrote that statistics, I thought, “I can believe it.” Then there wasn’t much else to say.

I thought I’d write about my current challenge on this photo-a-day thing I’m working on, but it came off as really whiney and an invite to a Hilary With One L pity party.  That got scrapped immediately.

Then, I thought I’d do a Mother’s Day recap, complete with the blow-by-blow of my day, my meal (which I failed to snap a photo of), my gifts and so forth.  It was a good idea until my conscience sidelined me with thoughts of “Fake-booking” and “Insta-glamming”.  This is a thing now you know, creating these utopian images and status updates for Facebook and Instagram that portray you in a nothing but a rainbow dappled light.  I know for some folks, what you see is really what you get — the kids getting along nicely, a chef style meal prepared at home, a fantastic outfit for a fantastic date or ladies’ night out.  Other times, what you see couldn’t possibly exist anywhere but on the pages of Pinterest or Tumblr — the kids getting along nicely, a chef style meal prepared at home, a fantastic outfit for a fantastic date or ladies’ night out.

I kid, sort of.

delete. delete. delete.

I thought I’d write about what I know.  True story: I know a little bit about a whole lot.  That post was just a bag of crazy with a dash of no direction thrown in for flavor.

I looked at the date and realized that May is just about half-way over.  Huh! The girls will be getting out of school for the summer in three weeks. 

Holy crap-cakes.

I mean, I know they get out the first week of June. I’ve got it written down.    When I looked at a calendar and saw that’s about three weeks, okay four weeks, away, as the young kids like to say, “Shit just got real.”  Three weeks!   That’s gonna happen real, real soon.  For all my previous proper prior planning, I ain’t got nothing this time around.

Again, I kid. Sort of.

I’ve got some things lined up, but it’s no where near the activity filled fun-fest that was last summer.  Maybe that’s a good thing.  Maybe instead of being constantly involved in this, that and the other, we’ll just keep it fast and loose.  They’ll do a few camps here and there, those 9 to 12 type of deals, as well as VBS.  After that, who knows.  Maybe we’ll hit the zoo. Maybe we’ll do the fountains at the mall.  I’m even toying with a day trip to Chick’s Beach for old time’s sake, though the last time I did a baby at the beach, I only had two kids and at least half a dozen other mom’s in my playgroup to run interference.

In my head, I hope our summer will be kind of lazy. I see us going to the pool and the library. I see the girls running through the sprinkler and learning to ride their bikes (finally).  I see faces smeared with popsicle juice and arms slick with bubble solution.  I see skinned knees and legs dotted with mosquito bites.  I’m seeing walks around the neighborhood, catching fireflies in a washed out pasta jar, and lots of chalk drawings crawling across our driveway.  There will be barefeet, sunkissed faces, and halos of pool scented hair.  There will be trips for ice cream, trips to the mall, trips to the museum.  Friends will come over. Bedtime may even be pushed back.

Who knows, maybe some of that will happen. Maybe none of it will happen.  I’m pretty sure if my girls got a hold of that list, they’d do it all on the first day — before lunch — and then ask, “Now what can we do?”

This time, I’m not kidding. 

Guess I better get planning.