Thursday, July 3, 2014

Quality Time Is Overrated!

When I was a kid, summer television was terrible because it was nothing but reruns.  There were no new shows, season premiers, or series finales. Nowadays, it seems networks use the summer months to try out new shows or even start a new season. I, however, am taking my cue from the days of old and I'm going to be doing some blog reruns during the month of July. I have chosen a few old blog posts from the archives that I published when I had, basically, no followers at all.  Since most of you probably haven't read these, hopefully it won't be as boring as summertime TV used to be!

This first rerun is one I could have easily repeated over the last couple of days.  I truly believe that summer days are for relaxing and being lazy.  During the busy days of the school year, I long for summer days when we can sleep in, stay in our pajamas until noon, and not have anywhere we have to be.  Then, those days get here and the guilt starts to set in.  There's too much TV, too much lazy, and not enough "quality time."  When I re-read this post, it was perfect timing and I wanted to share it with you in case you were having the same guilty feelings.
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This post was originally titled "Quality Time, Schmaulity Time" and was published on June 5, 2012.
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Does the internet ever make you feel like a bad parent?  Lately, I've been reading lots of posts on Facebook, Pinterest, and other blogs about fun family outings, crafty things to do with your kids, and that sort of stuff.  Quite frankly, it's been making me feel rather guilty.  I/we just don't do a lot of that around here.  Most of the time, I'm just happy if there's a few minutes of peace and quiet in the day when we are not running here, there, and everywhere and when the kids aren't fighting or complaining about something.

Today, however, it was a beautiful afternoon, we didn't have anywhere we had to be, and I was determined to spend some quality time with my girls.  So, after school, I took them to get some ice cream. Then, we made a quick run to Target It was actually going pretty well until we were about 15 minutes in.  That's when the 4 year old had a doozy of a meltdown and that was the end of the Target trip.

By the time we got home, everyone had composed themselves and we all headed outside.  My middle daughter, 7, complained because she wanted to stay inside and play on the computer, but I forced her to go outside for some fun!  (Is it still fun if it's forced??)  The oldest, 9, wanted to throw a frisbee with me and ONLY me, so she was less than thrilled when the 4 year old wanted to join the game.  She told her sister to go away, so, there was, of course, another meltdown.  After about twenty minutes, they all made their way back inside and I was left outside playing fetch with the dog.  I headed inside as well, and took a break from trying to create quality time.

Within about 30 minutes, the girls all went back outside one by one.  I decided to give it one more shot and went back out to join them.  It lasted all of 15 minutes and was ended abruptly by a bike crash.  (Don't worry - everyone is fine!)  We ended up sitting on the couch together watching the last 20 minutes of  "Four Weddings" on TLC.  That's a quality, girly thing to do isn't it??

Now I remember why we don't often do the "quality time" activities like this - it almost always ends in disaster, frustration, or bickering - OR all of the above.  So, today I say Quality Time Schmaulity Time!  Sometimes just surviving is good enough.


So how often does "quality time" happen at your house and what does that look like for your family??  Leave me comment and let me know! 

5 comments:

Janine Huldie said...

Just yesterday, I took the girls to the library for quality time, plus Emma needed some new books to read for her Kindergarten book report. We came home, read the book and then sat down with her to do the mini report. She got through the hard part of writing her name, book and author with me fine. When I let her loose to draw a picture, all hell broke out and she was crying that she colored too much yellow and wanted to erase it. Yup, total fun times here and my great uncle was so right, "The road to hell is truly paved with good intentions!" ;)

Lisa @ The Golden Spoons said...

Ha! Yes! My girls were actually playing together yesterday. I was feeling guilty that we hadn't even left the house int two days, but then I thought "Why disturb the peace??"

MamaRabia said...

Same here. We just got Henry back from a ten day trip to Grandma's and for as much as we all missed each other, it only took 3 hours for the first fight!! I try for quality time, but it usually ends up as snuggles on the couch watching cartoons. Of course, that's what I remember from my childhood, so I guess it's not horrible!

Tamara Bowman said...

Today we went for some quality time and it led to one of the worst fights with Scarlet ever. I think it was the heat/humidity/hunger/exhaustion. Nasty combo.

Chris Carter said...

Oh have I been THERE!!! It seems to me, the real good quality time stuff just happens naturally. I can't 'plan it' or it just breaks down right as it unfolds. It's those captured moments like last night, when I had SO much catching up to do, but the kids wanted to light these smoke bombs soooo badly. I of course wouldn't let them without adult supervision. They begged. I said yes. We spent the next hour lighting off every one of them in the package and laughing and playing and they were SO excited and grateful to have had this time together. :)

Now, if I had planned something? Different story!

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