Our Summer - Unplugged

I woke this morning, eyes blurry and mind thick. The numbers on my digital alarm clock showed the time, 5:57, in neon blue. And then I heard it: a noise in the living room. Muffled. But distinct.

"Babe," I groaned, rolling over. "It's not even six o'clock and they're already watching cartoons."

They usually ask for permission before they turn on the tv. Today they chose not to - a sign of things to come, namely entitlement and stubbornness.

That's how my day started. By seven o'clock my two oldest children were already begging for some new toy that had been advertised on the commercials eighty-five times.

By eight the whining was unbearable.

The idea occurred to me for the first time at nine o'clock. I immediately wrote it off as unrealistic.

While chatting with a friend, the idea returned, and I casually mentioned it to her. She thought it was a great idea - for me.

"I'm thinking about going unplugged this summer," I said, explaining the cartoon situation. "No tv, videos, or computer for the boys."

And then I was overcome with panic because I realized just how hard that would make my life if we went three whole months unplugged. So I started to argue with myself:

"We can't go unplugged. What if I need to get something done?"

Why don't you include your children?

"What will they do all summer?"

Do you trust them to be creative?

"I have no idea how to keep them occupied that long."

Books. Play-doh. Puzzles. Water fights. Picnics. Painting. Cooking. Trips to the library. Swimming lessons. VBS. The options are endless.

"Going unplugged will require me to be on top of things. That's hard work."

Parenting is hard work. You should have thought of that before you had children.

And so the argument went, back and forth, for well over an hour. But as I watched my boys play outside this morning I couldn't help but wonder what an entire summer without tv would be like. What would happen to their creativity? To their imaginations? As I weighed the pros and cons of this little experiment, I stumbled onto the deciding factor. A question:

"Will I ever regret unplugging the tv and the computer for one summer and letting my children play?"

No. Can't say that I will.

So after a few moments of hyperventilation, I took a deep breath, pulled the plug (literally) and went about planning what we will do for June, July, and August. Honestly, I don't have it all sorted out (I'm depending on you guys for some ideas) but I am starting to get excited.

I'm two hours into our unplugged summer and I'm expecting that this week will be detox. I'm expecting whining. And attitudes. I expect that I'll be tempted to quit. So I need you to ask me how it's going.

Before I get angry e-mails, let me explain that I don't think television is bad. I have friends that do, but I'm not in that camp. I just think that I have come to rely on it too much. It's been a long year - what with having our fourth child and my husband working 60 plus hours a week. So I want to try something new.

Here are the rules for my little experiment:

- No television.
- No computer games.
- No movies.

We don't have video games, so that's one less thing to withdraw from.

As a family we will spend more time doing the following things:

- Playing games instead of watching movies.
- Playing outside with the boys on the trampoline and in the yard.
- Going for walks and bike rides.
- Cooking, baking, and performing "kitchen chemistry."
- Reading.

I anticipate that we will ressurect those long forgotten afternoon naps for the the older two because they will be playing harder than usual.

Play. That's the word that keeps popping up here. I want this summer to be all about "Play."

So now a question: will you join me by unplugging as well? Trust me, if I can do it, you can too. For those of you brave enough to join on this wild adventure, you can click the button on the right hand side of the blog titled "follow" or you can just meet me back here a couple times a week as I chronicle this long and wonderful summer.

Someone told me recently that we only get eighteen summers with our chidren. I'm already down six. Twelve more summers and my oldest child will be gone.

No, I don't think I will regret this one little bit.