If you’ve read any of my posts by now, it’s no secret I am a single mama to three littles…a single mama who also works full time as a third-grade teacher.
So when the last day of school was upon us, we celebrated the turning off alarms and threw schedules to the wayside. We looked forward to more unplanned days, relaxation, couch snuggles, and more time to just breathe.
And the angels sang HALLELUJAH.
Well, they sang Hallelujah for a minute. Then there are kids banging on my door at 5:00 a.m. fighting, wrestling, begging, whining and needing to know what we’re doing next, where we’re going today, what’s for lunch, when is dinner, and CAN I HAVE ANOTHER SNACK!?
If you’ve read any of my posts by now, you also know I love my kids big and hard. I am pretty much obsessed with them and with being their mama.
But.
That doesn’t mean being their (single) mama isn’t HARD, y’all. As much as I love the less structured days of summertime, I also realized we need to have something in place to keep them from driving me absolutely bonkers.
Cue happy sticks, mad sticks.
After seeing a couple people post on different social media outlets about how to keep yourself and your kids surviving all things summer, I came up with my own survival system that has proven to be a keeper.
It’s a nice step away from our typical time-out punishment and offers both positive reinforcement and consequences for poor choices. So far, my kids (even the two-year-old!) look forward to working to get a happy stick and actually respond well when they have to choose a mad stick and carry out a consequence.
And also?
My baseboards are the cleanest they’ve ever been.
WIN WIN.
In fact, I think I may create a happy stick, mad stick system for myself.
Remember to move the clothes from the washer to the dryer? Happy stick = happy hour starts an hour early today
Do you have any summer survival guides as a mama? Please share because we all know raising these little humans is the best thing ever, but also? So freaking exhausting. And I don’t know about y’all, but I’ll take all the help/advice/tips/tricks I can get!
