Summer Parenting: Negotiation

School is out. My children are home. It is raining, and I have a school year’s worth of delayed projects that I want to complete.

My own school year ended over a month ago, and I have spent the last month at home alone during the day. I’ve established a routine that incorporates exercise and work, and I spent most of my days alone and things were quiet.

But now the children are home, and I find my work day interrupted as I am called on to negotiate sibling spats and answer for the 458th time the ultimate question in 2009: Can I get on the computer?

My husband and I started talking about this summer long before the kids were out of school. We talked about what we didn’t want to happen and ways to make sure things went more smoothly.

Other than the endless “can I get on the computer” questions, there are the countless declarations that something “isn’t fair!” And since I have been actively discouraging my children from physically hitting each other, I have also heard a lot of “Mom, will you tell them to take care of their clothes before I punch them in the face?”

Oh, and I have to tell the oldest one over and over to SHUT UP and/or STOP IT because no one wants to hear her half-mumbled singing as she somewhat but not really sings along with the music playing in her Zune.

Summer break is a joy, isn’t it?

I am trying to balance how the children will spend their time that will 1) limit sibling rivalry, 2) limit interruptions while I’m working, 3) keep the house clean and organized and 4) keep the children busy enough to avoid too many “I’m bored” proclamations but also not busy enough that there will be some summer enjoyment.

The biggest change we made this summer was the requirement that all children be up at 9 a.m. This was primarily done to keep my husband and I from threatening to punch anyone in the face when we are rudely woken up by a loud laughing child at 2 a.m. on a work day.

The problem was that the children would stay up late and make noise that disturbed our sleep when we had to get up the next day. The children would also make messes when they were up late at night that they didn’t clean up. And the next day, the children would want to sleep in until well past noon and were absolute pains in the butts if anyone tried (dared) to make them get up before noon.

And so, every day, I have things that I know I want to get done. I allow the children time to wake up, get dressed and eat something. There are some days when the chores come first, and there are other days will I allow some children some rewards first. For instance, today, the computer has been claimed for an hour at a time starting at 10 a.m.

Yesterday there was no computer at all. The children also tell me that we didn’t let them use the computer Sunday either. I don’t recall that, but I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt.

The children, however, were quick to point out all the time that I spent on the computer yesterday. Except I am spending this summer working from home, and I have jobs that I have to do that involve online work including tutoring papers and grading papers for my online classes. Plus, I am presenting at a conference next week, and I need to prepare, which includes researching some online resources. I don’t spend ALL of my time on Facebook.

My oldest child will be the first one on the computer today, and she has already turned on the computer in anticipation. She wants me to type in the password before 10 a.m. so she won’t miss a minute of her 60 minutes online. She is worried that if I don’t, she won’t *really* have as much computer time as the two other children who will be logging on after her because it would be absolute bedlam if she only gets 59.5 minutes compared to another child’s 60 minutes.

When I became a parent, I never realized the negotiation skills I would have to develop.

The oldest just tried to hand me the laptop to type in my password. I declined, and she counteroffered — “Well, can you type it in at 9:55 because it takes time to load, and they will get more time, and IT IS NOT Fair.”

If nothing else, I am definitely teaching my children that LIFE is NOT fair. You’re welcome.