A Week In The Life of Amaro

 On the first weekend of June, 

my husband and I came to the decision that I would stay home

with the new baby and with Amaro.

This was instead of me working just to pay for two daycares.

Amaro was later taken out of his daycare completely.

This meant that keeping him entertained, exercised and educated

(The Three E's!)

Fell entirely on me.

I had to come up with a plan for each week for the summer

up until probably mid-September when he turns three,

to keep him in a routine and make sure that he doesn't 

become a "child of the screens"... 

meaning he would be going and discovering and being active

instead of being left to play on a device or watch TV

whilst mommy sat lazily on the couch.

Here's what a Monday through Friday week in his life will look like:

I made a proposed plan for each day,

with an alternative if it is an inclement weather day.

"Ready Set Play" is an indoor jungle gym.

"WW360" is "Well Women 360", a recreational facility 

with a spa, cafe and Montessori playground.

What are the "field trip" spaces, you might ask?

I am still working on compiling a list.

And I am open to repeating "favorites".

So far I have:

• Marineland, which is a dolphin conservatory
• Feeding giant koi fish downtown
• The library
• The community garden
• Feeding ducks at one park that has a pond
• Shopping at the dollar store (he can pick whatever he wants!)
• Decorating a donut at The Donut Experiment 
• Visiting the pet store and looking at all the fish, lizards, hamsters and rescue kittens
• The alligator farm, which is a zoo with many reptiles and also some birds and monkeys
• The pirate museum

Obviously, some are best for sunny days.

Some would be more fun on a cloudy day

instead of a hot one.

Others could be done on either.

 

As for the arts and crafts...

I have a two-year-old

in a small condo

with a large amount of rugs and carpet,

no backyard and no convenient space for

"messy play".

So I am somewhat limited on what I can do.

Pinterest is full of suggestions for crafts

to keep a toddler busy,

but for now, 

I have to rule out the ones with dye,

shaving cream, lots of sand,

mud, copious amounts of water or paint.

Also, my son will take a crayon

and draw on every surface that ISN'T

the coloring book 

if you turn your back for just a few seconds.

I'm hoping he outgrows this soon.

In the meantime, I'm working on projects

that he and I can both agree on.

So far, I have:

• Sensory bins. These are little plastic shoe boxes filled with fun, colorful objects that have a theme. Several of the ones I made so far involve finding little "lost" plastic animals buried in some kind of material. 
• A larger bin of ice or orbeez in the tub, with scoopers and tools for grabbing them
• Making necklaces out of cereal
• Supervised crayon time
• Learning one letter of the alphabet and gluing something that starts with that letter to a huge drawing of the letter 
• Sorting objects by color
• Teaching him to cut up soft fruit with a crinkle cutter
• Mixing simple ingredients 
• Crafts with popsicle sticks, google eyes and pipe cleaners

These will be great activities to do 

when the weather is stormy

or I am simply too tired 

to lug him and the baby around

for a second time in one day.

Our first full week of this format was largely a success.

But now for the big test:

Can I keep it up for the entire summer?

Or will I soon grow too exhausted to maintain it?

By August, will we have a smooth rhythm going,

or will I have reduced it to a cycle of just 

neighborhood walks, the pool and the same two crafts?

Time will tell.