Summer's winding down

These are the last lazy days of summer. Z. goes back to school next week. She finished her last project of summer homework (read three books, do three different projects, one on each book) yesterday. At first I was okay about the summer homework, she has always had summer reading to do. But as time went on I got more and more annoyed by the three projects. Why couldn't they have been done during the first weeks of school? Why does everyone's summer need to be bogged down with getting your child to focus on school homework projects? I am wondering how many kids won't actually have them done.

I'm nervous about what this means in terms of homework this coming year. The homework guidelines at her school say that 5th grade is 1 to 1 1/2 hours of homework per day plus 30 minutes of reading. She plans on playing soccer as her after school sport this fall so three days a week she won't be home till at least 5:30pm. She has piano lessons the other day. So she has 2 hours of homework, piano practice and dinner, which leaves very little down time (crucial for a child like Z.) which means that she will have a very hard time winding down and falling asleep. She's in 5th grade for goodness sake! I don't know, I am trying to take the wait and see approach, but as it gets closer and closer to school starting I am having a harder time doing that. Homework isn't just annoying for the kids, it's annoying for the parents too, who have to make sure that they are home to do it, have a focused place to do it, etc. Makes me long for those carefree days of preschool and Kindergarten!

Meanwhile, Z. hasn't really wanted to do anything but hang out at home this month. At first this was making me nuts. It's not that we are spending every day home, we have had errands to run of course, but we have done very little "fun" things out together (we went to the zoo once) as she's happier staying home (remember what I said about down time, the girl loves her down time). This week though I am feeling happier to just relax. I've been out by myself, I have had two support group meetings this week, which helps, but I think the anticipation of the flurry of activity that starts back up again next week has me savoring the relaxation of so much unstructured time. Sometimes I get into these things where I feel like I have to be productive all the time (which is funny because I am so far from it), it's like the clock is ticking so loudly in my ear that I'd better not waste any time. I have been forced this month to slow down and remember that doing "nothing" sometimes is the best thing. Initially I found myself bored and tired, but now (now that it's almost over of course) I am finding myself savoring it. 

One thing we did do out this week was go shopping for an appropriate outfit for Z. to wear to a friend's son's bar mitzvah in a few weeks. This is a challenge as she wears only boys clothes and has very definite ideas about how she dresses. She does understand that special events like this do require a bit of flexibility though, and I am not asking her to do something she is uncomfortable with, like wear a dress. She had some black uniform long pants already so our goal was to find a shirt and some shoes. We actually found two shirts, both in the women's dept. (which was huge in that she has really rejected anything that isn't boys for a while now, except for socks and those silky Nick and Nora boxy pj's with the long sleeved button down tops from Target). They are button down shirts, but have a little bit of taper to them (but we bought them big enough that she feels comfortable, nothing that she doesn't want to show shows). One is white, the other is white with a black and gray stripe. Simple, classic, nothing fancy, but presentable for a daytime event I think. She actually loves the white shirt and I think will wear it whenever we go to an orchestra concert or out to dinner, etc. A. and I both agreed that for the bar mitzvah the striped shirt will look best.

The shoes were much harder, she is at the top end of kid's sizes (a 6 1/2, but that doesn't really exist so it sometimes means a 6, sometimes a 7, both of which are hard to find except for in sneakers) so we needed to go look at women's shoes. I figured a place like DSW would be good, lots of selection, "discounted" prices, etc. I had in my mind that a simple black leather loafer would fill the bill. Wrong! She hated them and they didn't fit her right (the backs always flopped up and down, regardless of how small the front was). Her feet are long but they are still small and narrower than women's feet. There was one pair of shoes in the whole store that she liked. A $60 pair of Anne Klein black suede tie shoes, the only pair of tie shoes in the store besides sneakers. They were very nice and because of the laces keeping the shoe on, the size 7 1/2 fit great (women's sizes are about one size up from kid's sizes I think). But $60 for a pair of dress shoes she's probably going to outgrow in a few months? At first I couldn't do it and we left and continued our quest, but then I realized that tie shoes are not in style right now so we found nothing to even try on anywhere else. So back to DSW where I sucked it up and paid for the shoes (actually "only" $50 because I had a $10 certificate). I told her she is going to have to wear these shoes a lot!

Well, one last hurrah this weekend, we're going to see family including Z.'s beloved cousin J. I am really looking forward to spending time with them, but only wish we still had another week of summer afterwards. September is a busy and stressful month between school starting and my ct-scan and drs. appts. But for now I am going to stay in this lazy summer place as long as I can and try to push off the stress till it actually happens. A good idea, hopefully I can do it.