Mom guilt hit me hard the moment the bus stop chatter started to rumble with talk of all things camp and summer vacations. As I’m writing this, our summer is wide open. No plans are set in stone. No wild trips in the books. As a parent, I feel like we are always measuring ourselves against others, and summer break is no exception.
I expressed to my husband how lousy I was feeling that I didn’t have it all planned out. No concrete summer adventures to share. I felt like I was doing our daughter an injustice.
After letting these thoughts consume me for a little bit, I took a minute to look at the little girl this all revolved around and it hit me. Sure, she loves a good vacation or a day trip to a new, exciting place and hopefully we can make that work for us. But that’s not all she wants. She wants to be with her mama.
She wants it to be a summer of us (and Daddy, of course), and I realized that’s really all I want too (not that I would complain about a frozen drink by a beach somewhere at some point). But what I want is so much simpler than that.
I want us to spend endless afternoons soaking up the sun with the sound of splashing in the pool behind us.
I want us to perpetually smell like Coppertone sunscreen even if it’s just from an afternoon of sidewalk chalk with our neighbor friends.
I want us to spend those comfortable mornings at the playground, swinging without a care in the world before the sun starts burning too bright.
I want us to have movie marathons on those rainy summer days and ice cream sundaes on those hot summer nights.
I want to clean sticky, marshmallow-filled hands after an evening of s’mores by the fire.
I want to close the playroom door at the end of the day to avoid cleaning up the mess you and your little friends left behind all day.
I want BBQs with our family and friends, looking at a backyard filled with the leftovers of water balloons and too many snacks.
I want long car rides with loud music, no destination in mind.
I want to stay up late and (hopefully) sleep in later.
I want to show you that we can do so much with so little. Fancy doesn’t equal fun. Expensive doesn’t equal excitement. We don’t need to have every second of our calendar filled with wild adventures (even though I want those for us too).
But most of all, I just want us to breathe. I want us to take this time to slow it all down just for a little bit. Take off some of the pressure. Take off the impossible standards we tend to set for ourselves the rest of the year. As a family, we have really struggled the last few months.
It took me a while to admit, but I have been far from the best mom version of myself lately. My own struggles and battles got in the way, and I let so much time slip by, and I don’t want to do that anymore. I want to spend this summer being present with this little girl who craves time with her mama. I want to be the reason she smiles and laughs and has a summer filled with magic. Even if we have to make it right here in our own backyard.
by Amy Weatherly 
by Tynea Lewis 
