Planning is important for anyone and difficult for a lot of people to do. I have found that setting up a calendar for our daughter has helped immensely not because we are so busy but because we don’t know what is happening next and what do we do with “down time”. So by planning activities we keep ahead of the anxiety of not having a routine for that day. Plus it has helped in organizing and keeping track of things on the other side too like when we do get busy we have a schedule we can follow.

I start by getting my kids a great calendar with fun pictures each year. I sit down with each kid (we only have two) and get all the important birthdays and days off of school down. This is done with an ink pen. When there is an extended break and I am working and the kids are going to be in Kidstop or with some other childcare provider I mark those days with a red pen. For instance summer break we put all the days in red that the kids were at YMCA I had Fridays off so we marked those days with a purple pen. We called them field trip days or purple days. I would schedule a fun event (picnic, swimming pool, movies, dirt biking) for just us on those days they both really looked forward to them. Then we marked all the weekends in green and called them “stay home days” these were the days for the whole family sometimes we would have things to go and do and sometimes we would just find friends to play with. But just visually seeing two days they knew they either had to find things to do on their own or we would be doing something together.

Both of my kids really like a routine so when school is out we have some anxiety and communication tends to break down during these times. If you notice your weekends getting a little chaotic try planning as a family you would be surprised at how things smooth out.