Accomplishments

Summer Checklist

1. Spent lots of money on kaytanot that were over in about 3.5 seconds.

2. Spent two mind-numbing weeks (or was it years?) entertaining kids at home, answering the following question multiple times a day: What are we doing now? Also: What can I eeeeaaaaatttt?

3. Pooled it up, making the most of our membership, to the point where I tell the kids we're going to the pool and they act as if I told them we're going to clean up elephant dung.

4. Stopped trying to clean. At all. At some earlier, more energetic point in the summer, I wiped counters, cleaned floors and washed dishes multiple times a day. Now I just numbly stare at the accumulated filth and think, "Next week, my precioussss. Next week."

5. Answered "yes" to whatever the children want during our many food shopping trips together. Before they even ask.
"Can we get - ?"
"Yes."
Which is how we've ended up with 5 boxes of Shabbat cereal per person and a lovely cashier.

6. Considered it a success if at the end of the day, there are 3 children sleeping in their beds. (Extra points if the children are actually my own.)

7. Toured the North.

8. During our tour of the North, drove through many random itsy-bitsy towns (some Israeli, some Arab, some both) in our attempt to find Nice Hikes. At some point said to Donny, "Look at the map, we just make a right and follow the brown line for a while." This usually resulted in us being "lost," having to "turn around" and swearing to "never follow the brown line again."

9. In light of #8, learned to use Google maps on my phone to great effiency. "Oh look. We are lost. We should turn around. Why did we follow that brown line?"

10. Strictly followed our Vacation Diet
Breakfast: In the past, this just meant cereal. But this year we stayed in a hotel-like place, which came with breakfast. There was a wide variety of food, so my children ate cereal.
Lunch: A healthy variety of Snacks - fruit, granola bars, crackers, breadsticks, rice cakes. You have to know how to mix it up every day so the family doesn't get sick of it. Also, artikim. Of course. Although there were not ice cream stands at every 5 km in the Western Galilee as there were in the Kinneret region. This is probably because the the Western Galilee is much less trafficked than the Kinneret area during the summer months.
Dinner: Something Mommy did not shop for, cook for or clean up from. This can include Eating Out, BBQ or ordering pizza. We did them all, at least twice.

11. Marveled at how the same children who spend much of their day not starting fights with each other can play so nicely and quietly when it's bedtime.

12. Completed the whirlwind school supply shopping early in August, yet still await two books that "haven't come in yet."

13. Enjoyed not making aruchat eser for two sandwich-averse children.

14. Attended at least one school orientation per child. (Not completely checked yet. I've only attended two; there are two tomorrow. Yes, that's right. And I only have 3 children.)

15. Had way too many bad-time-to-run-into-an-ex moments. (Term coined by my good, though blogless friend, LISA.) Many of them involved me covered in bits of soggy cheese and Bamba dust, careening through a parking lot holding a screaming toddler and pushing a wayward Rami Levi cart, with two shoko-drenched children wandering aimlessly behind me, shoving each other.

So it seems that I am nearly all checked-off. Time to go back to school!

How many did YOU do?