I love half-term, but for all the wrong reasons! Anyone else with me?

[ContessaGoesMarchingDOWNTOHELL]

I LOVE half-term, but people act like I'm a selfish monster when I explain why!

1. The kids spend all day happily bouncing around and going on exciting adventures with their (reasonably priced) holiday club, staffed by long-suffering yet kind childcare professionals with a great sense of humour. They return home exhausted, grubby and happy (the kids....mostly)

2. We avoid having to battle the bored half-term masses at every free activity and save a few pennies not buying entry to overpriced attractions and buying desperately-wanted cheap tat/sugary things

3. I spend the week working, mostly from home, for which my teams are grateful because generally we're short-staffed at this time

4. I get to leave work at my usual time (school hours) and have a happy few hours ponking around the garden every afternoon

5. We get to save up our leave (and money) for the 'big' holidays at Christmas/Easter/summer, and have a few days left over to attend school events during the year

This thread isn't meant to devalue the experiences of those who love having half-term with the kids; I just wanted to extol the virtues of another approach

Anyone else with me?

Half term for us isn't until next week and I'm both looking forward to it and dreading it.

I'm looking forward to it because I won't have 3 lunch boxes to make, or rush around to get 3 fart in a trance primary school age kids ready in time to leave, or have to deal with 3 rounds of homework tantrums every single day.

I'm dreading it because my kids can argue over fresh air "she looked at me" "his arm touched my chair" "she's playing the game I want to play" "he's breathing too close to me" and because my house always turns into a shit tip no matter how much I clean.

I'm a sahm so really no good excuse to send them to holiday club, not that it doesn't cross my mind anyway especially during the summer break.

Oh and the "I love my child soooooooo much I couldn't imagine not wanting to spend every second with them and I miss them sooooooooooo much when they're at school can fuck right off. Every one of us loves our children, doesn't mean we don't want a break from the little darlings now and again.

Posted too soon. I meant I’m taking the week and absence of DC at home to catch up on all my house stuff.

My half term is marvellous in another way.

1.The dcs had a super week in their half term (last week) going for manly bike rides and filling their boots with PlayStation nonsense with their lovely SAHD father.

1. I am off this week (teach in a different county) so I get to play at SAHM for a week, make delicious packed lunches and naughty dinners, wave them off to school with a smile and be there at the school gates.

1. In the hours that they are away I can catch up with work, friends, reading and coffee drinking. And ponking around in the garden of course.

Everyone’s a winner (except me, last week, at work wishing desperately I could have a week with the kids.)

Oh, and your week sounds great if it works for you and you shouldn’t be being made to feel guilty.

Fewer cars on the road is one thing I like.

As they get older/less feral they will be rewarded with being allowed to stay home and moulder all through half-term**

How generous of you

@Arrowfanatic You have reminded me of the way mine used to go into meltdown about how one of them was looking out of the other's car window. The one in the middle, obviously, was only allowed to look straight ahead.

At least they are now of an age (15-18) where they can happily moulder (good expression, OP). It doesn't stop them arguing, though. The space outside bedroom doors is apparently part of the particular bedroom.

Half term next week for us. I am very lucky to have generous family and friends who look after DS for me in the school holidays while I work. They all spoil him and do loads with him, win win for everyone. I can't take any time off work this time as it's a busy period for us but we shut down for 11 days over Christmas so I'll get lots of time with DS then.

Mine hates holiday clubs and after school club so I send him to holiday club as little as possible because he has to go to ASC three nights a week.

I'm with ya OP. My DS loves his holiday club & chooses which days he wants to go (based on what activity is planned). A lot of his friends from school go & best of all...? He gets a packed lunch (as he still has universal free school meals)!!

Maybe OP your children don't know how to get along with each other or find something to do to entertain themselves because they've never had to. Shipping them off to be entertained all day every day isn't teaching them very much. Might make for an easy life for you, but they're missing our on some valuable lessons about just knocking about as a family.

skunk yeah, I'm super generous!

Bigger we knock about as a family for 3-4 hours after school every day (if not more) and at weekends, and on holidays. I think they get plenty of practice at it and they're still pretty dickish! It's not even full-throttle entertaining either - choices include 'come to the supermarket with daddy' or 'help mummy in the garden'. They're hardly overstimulated as a general rule.

I'm glad it's not just me who thinks a half-term with kids in holiday club is fab

And as an aside, we are currently bonding over the Bake-Off semi-final (despite me having my phone to hand). See, we bond!

Shipping them off to be entertained all day every day isn't teaching them very much.

Just as well OP also lives with them every evening and weekend too. Or maybe she “ships” them off then too

@BiggerBoat1 Not that I can speak for the OP, but my DC are murderous together despite the fact that I have been a SAHM for 18 years and they have never attended any kind of holiday camp. Only in my dreams.

My DC and her friends aren’t «being entertained». They are learning loads at their musical theatre camp! And they sing at breakfast, while making their packed lunches and when they get home (though I have banned choreography rehearsal in the kitchen). IMVHO they are learning way more useful stuff than they do at school.

She works school hours ffs! It's really not good for kids to spend every waking moment with their mum! Its also a good idea to have your own life when your kids are young and not only focus on them.
I love ds-he's kind, funny, insightful and nutty but I REALLY don't want to be with him ALL THE time. I think that's quite normal!

It's really not good for kids to spend every waking moment with their mum!**

But they're not are they? They're at school normally. I actually think it's really good for children to have time with their family wherever possible and to feel valued enough to not just be shipped off to a convenient alternative. If you have to work then of course you have to work, but to ship them out so you can have a week of peace is sad.

No issue with using childcare while you’re working but hanging around in the garden while your kids are still in childcare wouldn’t be for me. Do they know you finish work early but don’t pick them up? That does seem a bit like wanting to spend as little of the half term with them as possible tbh.
I also love half term but for completely different reasons. I work term time so I love that we can lay in and either go out in the afternoons or the kids will do things like art that they never get round to in the rushed school evenings. We usually have a boardgame each evening as well. I love that it’s so chilled and we all get to bond a bit.

Oh yawn. Newsflash! Women are allowed a break from their children. It’s not sad. It’s fucking wonderful. What’s sad is when women feel they can’t take a break because they’re mothers and instead they have a breakdown. That’s what’s fucking sad.

A few hours EVERY day in the half term when you’re not working isn’t having a break though, it’s treating them like an inconvenience.

No it’s having a break. Stop being ridiculous.

I don’t think it’s being ridiculous. No-one needs a 3hr break from their kids every day of the holidays. Especially not when you’ve already been away from them all day at work!

How on earth can you state that no-one needs a 3 hour break for 5 days? You have no idea of people’s circumstances. My son has SEN and is hard work, I work full time, I’m a lone parent, with zero input from his father. I take whatever break I can get and I deserve it. He isn’t being sent to do hard labour or intensive tutoring. It’s a fun holiday club. Hollow laugh at you thinking you have any idea what other parents need. You haven’t a clue.

I think information like that may well have been in the op.
I’ll rephrase what I said. Unless you actually need respite then you don’t need your kids to be in childcare for 3 hours every evening of the holiday when you haven’t had them all day anyway because you’ve been working! If the kids are old enough it will be quite clear they’re not wanted at home.