Balance

One of the hardest things with having more than one child when one of them has special needs is trying to find a balance between them.  There have been so many things that Baylee has had to sacrifice because of her brother.  It may be something simple like going for a walk or bike ride, to going to the park, a party, an amusement park etc.  I don't necessarily think she resents him for preventing us from going and doing all the time but I know that she is a 9-year-old little girl who just wants to have fun, especially since this is her first 'real' summer at home since I am not working anymore and she doesn't have to go to a babysitter early in the morning.  It actually took her a while just to learn how to sleep in.

This year I decided to make a summer bucket list for us to complete.  50 items.  Some of them were simple like camp in the back yard (for her and her dad), see a rainbow (finally completed 2 days ago!) and build a fort.  Some are pay-it-forward like donating to our local Ronald McDonald House and to Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center's Child Life department because they have done so much to help Carson.  And lastly, completely indulgent like a DQ Blizzard, soft-serve ice cream, making Icees and baking bread.  Most of these are free or as close to free as I could get.  As of today we have completed 38 items.  Many of the things on the list are things that really only 3 of us can appreciate but we always try to have Carson with us when we do them so we are doing them as a family.  I can tell you it makes me so happy to see Baylee happy and doing fun things instead of just sitting around the house on her iPad all day.

Most of this summer has been much colder than normal.  Monday of this week the high was about 68 I went to the grocery store in jeans!  It's the end of July in Ohio! That's insane.  Usually by now it's 105, we are sweating our asses off and just begging Mother Nature for a breeze.  That has hampered some of our bucket list items such as having a water fight, swimming at night and going to a water park.  Maybe before school is back in we will be able to warm up enough for maybe even one of these things.  If not, I may take matters into my own hands and white out those on the list and add new things...

Tomorrow is Carson's first day of home-school Kindergarten.  He'll probably be studying astrophysics lol.

XX

Summer Bucket List:
1. Camp in the back yard
2. Go to King's Island
3. Go to The Cincinnati Museum Center
4. Make tie-dyed clothing
5. Make home-made Icees
6. Go to the Newport Aquarium
7. Go to the movies
8. Make rock candy
9. Go to a farmer's market
10. Watch fireworks
11. Go to the Cincinnati Zoo
12. Play at a playground
13. Go geocaching
14. Have a picnic
15. Go for a bike ride
16. Make homemade pretzels
17. Go to a waterpark
18. Go swimming
19. Go swimming at night
20. Go to the mall
21. Disney movie day
22. Play in the rain
23. Make a pet rock
24. Make a photo booth picture
25. Go to Jungle Jim's
26. Go to Recreations Outlet
27. Play putt-putt
28 Go to Kings Island at night
29. Make jewelry
30. Watch tadpoles grow into frogs
31. Summer reading program at the library
32. Feed ducks
33. Plant a tree
34. See farm animals
35. Go to Ikea
36. Catch lightning bugs
37. Donate to Ronald McDonald House
38. Donate to CCHMC child life
39. Have soft serve ice cream
40. Build a fort
41. Have a water fight
42. Have a UDF malt
43. Barnes and Noble summer reading club
44. See a rainbow
45. Pet a turtle
46. Have a Dairy Queen Blizzard
47. Milkshake from Rally's
48. Make a clay whistle at the library
49. Have dinner on the deck
50. Have a baking day