Wanted: Stress-free Holidays
|
Posted by Wei Yin Wong Dec 9, 2008 |
Ah, school holidays. How we love them and hate them!
Pros - we all can sleep in late and don't have to worry about going to school late, we can go to the park whenever the weather is nice and we get to play, play and play.
Cons - Stress, stress and more stress - for the parents, that is.
Having a break with stress is as good as not having one at all. And with kids yelling at each other, their breakfast not eaten, the laundry half-done and worse, the car breaking down even before the journey starts, the holidays can easily turn into a nightmare. And have I even started on Christmas preparations?
Well, for me at least Christmas won't be so bad. Almost all my relatives are back in Malaysia and I only have a handful of close friends here in Melbourne. So there isn't much to prepare and shop for. Which is a good thing considering the current financial crisis.
But I still have to go through the five-week holidays and keeping the kids amused and busy can be quite a challenge. We had a wonderful one-week holiday break at a beach town during the spring holidays nearly 3 months ago. So we won't be going for any long holidays. And there lies the challenge for me - how to avoid being driven up and over the wall with two active kids if they are home with me.
So I've been buying cheap art and craft stuff from the Reject Shop and bargain shops so that my kids can create some masterpieces out of them. And I always find the ones that they can cut, paste and stick without my helping them. The less I need to watch over them, the more house chores I can complete.
I've also made some plans with the mothers of my kids' friends to take turns hosting little fun time at our homes. Kids love to have other kids over at their home and love visiting other kids. So this swap-homes- and-play arrangement is great. Instead of having the kids at home seven days a week, we now have them four days a week.
Of course, we still have to take the kids somewhere. The library, the playgrounds (there are many of them here so we can go to a different one each time!), shopping malls, cinemas, beach and perhaps the zoo will all be good, fun and cheap places to go to.
When the kids are busy playing, they at least will leave their poor mum for a while. And that's when I have a few minutes of precious stress-free moments. It won't be long before one of them starts yelling "Mum, can I do this?" or "Mum, Joshua is hitting!" or "Mum, Joanne is dirtying the carpet" ...
For more stress-free tips, read also:
How to Have Cheap Holiday Fun for Kids
How to Reduce Stress during Christmas