SPREADHSEETS FOR HOlidays activities?

[Flobberghasted]

flippign nroa this mum is unhinged

twinset i am actually a tiny bit as my friend always has loads of time!

ds has just broken up for his 12 week summer hols.
I have a Charlie and Lola calendar up in the kitchen and have been frantically scribbling on it for the last month.
There is more tippex than pen on it currently and I am already frazzled - he only finished school on Friday.

has anyone got a good playdoh recipe??

Some recipes here

thankyou!

I, with the exception of occasionally barking at my children to do some housework, completely ignore them during the holidays.

I put in some arbitrary restrictions, such as limiting TV and computer time.

I find that if they get bored, they will become creative. And it works. They end up doing something, such as making a movie from start to finish (scripts, props, acting, editing).

I could not imagine directing their holiday time. They have enough of that, and I do enough of it, during the school year.

But ScienceTeacher, that's because it sounds as if you're able to be around for the entire holidays. Many people can't be, so have to organise something.

I bet LittleLapin has a spreadsheet

Only joking LL

I have a list of events/places to go etc but we dont have anything a rigid as a speadsheet.

Am very at califrau 10 weeks

mind you we dont have a spreadsheet because I am crap at doing spreadsheets

I agree it is easier when you are a teacher as you have those long holidays so there is no pressure to cram it in. We have the added complication of hvaing to factor in time with her dad, so I need to be organised so I don;t plan for her to do something or accept an invite when she is with her dad.

Some planing and organisation do children no harm. If I see of an event or activity I know dd will want to do I need to plan ahead or make sure the time is free. I also as a teacher do have work to do in the holidays and have to schedule meetings etc so again have to organise my time.

I have a colour-coded holiday spreadsheet .

It's coded for days we need childcare for all 3, days we have childcare arranged for 1 or 2 but need the 3rd sorted, days I'm off, days DP is off, days we are all off but at home, days we are all off but away, days we have visitors. etc.

Then I add in a list of things we want to do over the holidays, so we can remember those things and places when we're thinking what to do.

It's complicated but I don't see how we'd possibly remember who's where and what childcare is booked otherwise.

could simplify life with a holiday nanny or au pair but the dds like holiday clubs and activites, but can't all go to the same ones.

Does your spreadsheet have drop down menus?

{competitive spreadsheeting emoticon]

Hooidays = do fuck all
no bed time
no get up time
swim and get tanned

Um, no. No drop down menus. It's really a table with coloured in bits.

My dds are feral enough already, they really don't need 6 weeks sustained practice at it during the summer holidays.

I'm doing mine right now!

I'm not colour coded though, but only because it wastes ink.

Fennel I think you're ace!

DH thinks friend and I are control freaks for having lists/spreadsheets/calendars of holiday arrangements for our DC.

However, if we didn't then DS would end up home alone and/or I would be out of a job.

Needs must. We have done our best to build in "time to be bored at home" but it's not easy .

Yes I am very unorganied naturally so have to work extra hard at being organised.

The week I forgot to send my dd to school coincided with me trying to take a more relaxed approach to life and binning the spreadheets ! DD begged for them to come back.

I'm sorry but your post has just made me laugh, twinset. My mother always used to send me back a day early. What does that say about our relationship, I ask myself?

Shucks, and here was I hoping that this would be like the meal planner thing. I normally work, and so have to have the summer planned out, but usually just in week blocks, ie week with childminder, week with my parents, week at some sort of camp type thing, fortnight with me and my parents, week with dh. Within that plenty of ad hoc stuff (my parents spend the summer in the country, so plenty of space for free play there). This summer however we have just moved to America and I have 9 weeks to play with. I'm not working yet, we have a flat with no garden, know very few people, and don't have a vast amount of money. I like the ad-hoc life, but bet I'd like to have at the very least a spreadsheet of possibilities! I'm not sure I'd like to be friends with any of the people in that article but I do think it is a bit unfair to say they, or anyone who likes to have a plan are therefore wankers.

I read that article and thought "Holy sh1t", got on the internet, made a phone call and thank heavens ds is now booked into an activity laden week playscheme in the middle of the summer hols whilst dh and I are at work.

I have been promised that I may wince when writing the cheque to pay for it but he will most likely be asleep before bedtime each evening and begging to be dropped off early in the morning so that he doesn't miss any of the next day's activities.

The rest of the time we will be on holiday with him or he will be spending time in more routine childcare (with no archery or abseiling on offer).

Can you tell its our first summer holidays, do I sound naive about it going smoothly ?

No, no, It will be fine, don't worry at all

My dds tend to go to the bogstandard school based non-archery childcare. Because I have 3 dds and it's 1/3 the price of the smart archery-and-abseiling one, as well as being closer to home.

But they have bows and arrows for home-based feral archery practice.

dd1 is very excited about the new playscheme run by artists on our local hippy organic farm. That'll probably be ultra feral and unstructured, that lot can't organise anything.

LOL att eh spreadsheet nutters justifying thier maddery

Thanks Cod! I think I need aonother spreadsheet to sort my time as it is 2 in the morning and I have just finished my reports and I am back up in three hours to start again!