Cleveland park

Last night in choir practice we had quite a few outbursts and some uncontrollable laughter. Our choir director said it was all because of teachers. Of course all the teachers in the room stood up ready to defend themselves, but then he went on to say that every person has been affected and ingrained by teachers in the sense that when the end of May rolls around suddenly we all start acting up because we've behaved so nicely all year long and now we just want to cut loose and be done already. That's another reason we decided to homeschool and to do it year round. I didn't want them to experience that feeling of just being done with learning already. 

I definitely have been feeling the lets-get-this-over-with way recently. The motivation I usually have to teach just isn't there and the itch to get out and go and have a vacation has been replacing my thoughts of formal leaning and I, of course, have been feeling guilty about that. 

I even joined an upstate mothers meet up group to get us out of the house to socialize and do fun things, but when it came to RSVP to some events I started feeling guilty if it wasn't on our Freeday or there was two in the week I wanted to go to. Then I was reminded by my attentive husband that they are just kids and they need that before they get to be school age and we have to start doing school. I also remembered that doing stuff outside of the house for learning purposes  during the summer was my intention all along because I believe children can learn a lot that way if they have some guidance and are pointed out things they wouldn't recognize or know on their own.

So yesterday I took them to Cleveland park's playground in Greenville for the first time. Take a look at how happy they are and I had a pretty good time too. 

It was right by the zoo and then I realized I could even take them to the zoo on a weekday and not have to schedule it on a weekend when Josh can go with us. But not that day. We spent so much time at the playground that there wasn't time for anything else. I hope this is the beginning of many more adventures and I can stay guilt free about not doing planned lessons in front of a mat.