Summer 2012 has thus far been me feeling overwhelmed with a side of panic and a splash of hysteria. Is it just me or do all mothers weep while questioning their job performance? There are days I can not fathom why I have this job. Like yesterday when I calmly warned Poppy that if she continued to whine and cry about not having an orange gummy bear she would lose all of her gummy bears at which point she looked and me and twisted up her tiny face and whined even louder so she lost all of her gummy bears then proceeded to tantrum for at least an hour an a half.

I've been thinking of numbers lately. You know how when babies are little we tell people how many months they are? What if we just kept doing that? What if we did that for everything? I think it might validate my existence just a little bit. Let me introduce myself, my name is Greta and I have a 98 month old girl, a 79 month old girl, a 52 month old girl and a 30 month old boy. I have been at home with them full time for approximately 81 months. I have 27 months until my youngest will be in Kindergarten. I am 435 months old and I enjoy walks on the beach with my husband who I met 303 months ago. We like art.

See what I mean? It kind of makes me sound like a super hero, or possibly like The Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe.....

In other news we have had a summer 2012 reboot because after talking to every parent I possibly could we have come up with some new summer strategies. For instance, allowance. Good allowance like the kind you don't want to lose that will then be divided into spend, save and give. More on that later. Also back to no t.v., video games or computer during the week. There are exceptions like today when I was re-doing the pink in the girls hair and they needed to sit still for a while. We are also going to make a chore wheel that spins so each day they get to spin for a different chore, not my brilliant idea by the way, thanks M. Oh, by the way, my girls have pink stripes. It's kind of a summertime thing and since they don't get to wear hot pants or bikinis I let them have some fun with their hair. Here is our first attempt:





 This time we left the pink on longer:



Much brighter.

Then, the best purchase of the summer. Brand new water bottles for the girls that they are in charge of. That means no more half filled water cups all over the entire house and no more me carrying giant leaky water bottles that they all fight and cry over whose turn it is to drink and then Charlie dumps the water out anyway because he is boy and that's apparently what they do, to every thing.


Dear Summer 2012,
I have rebounded and I will make you fun no mater what.

P.S. Thanks for getting hot enough that all my kids lips don't turn blue at the pool anymore.