What are you doing?

We've been home now for ten days and we're well and truly settled into holiday mode. Well I'm working, but on reduced hours. Breakfast is a eat-it-when-you-get-up affair and bedtimes are a little later. We're still eating lunch and dinner together most of the time.

The boys are sitting around doing lots of electronics, but our agreement does mean that we have leverage and they're being pretty good about taking some reading time also. Exercise has been a little harder to get out of one or two of them. Creativity? Varies per boy. Our eldest has been playing around on his guitar a lot and changed the strings today. Our youngest has been slowly putting together a scrapbook from our trip, but he's easily distracted by electronics. Board games and movie afternoons/evenings have also been a part of our days.

As I type the third dinner in a row is being prepared by a boy. The boys have varied considerably in their willingness and ability to manage doing this. Most of the time I've been needed as a consultant if not a motivator in the kitchen with them. This current meal is proceeding well at present (oldest boy, one would hope so).

Pokemon Go. Yes, that's entered our house (it came to Japan only last Friday). Because our boys don't have roaming data plans, they are stuck at home or at wifi spots, or, with David or I going with them with our phones as portable wifi. That limits them quite a lot, but is better for our pocket. David's gone walking with one boy a couple of times and this afternoon I'd planned to go for a ride to my favourite park. I really wanted to go on my own, because I enjoy the serenity. 

However I tried to be a good mum and tossed the idea out that anyone who wanted to come with me could. Well I ended up taking the two boys who have gotten into Pokemon. It was a bit of a deal. First one then the other couldn't link with the wifi on my phone, then one would lose GPS on the game or the app would become unresponsive. Most of all they needed to learn how to "lead" us around the park (i.e. check with the other about if it was okay to go and to say "let's go". These two boys don't usually get on that well, so it was all a bit of a challenge (complicated by my lack of understanding of the game). 

We went past this little playground in the park. It struck me as noteworthy
that my parenting has changed. The boys used to get so excited about swings and
slides and things to climb on...now they're excited about catching imaginary
things on their phones!

However we did get outside and ride more than 10km. And we're all still talking to one another! The park was nice, but as "tethered" as I was to these gaming boys, I couldn't go far. So I didn't find anything too fun to photograph.

This is a type of cherry blossom, obviously not blooming now. There was a Pokemon stop here and the app
named what type of tree it was, kind-of cool!

David's doing lots of reading, playing games on his iPad, and doing a particularly tricky jigsaw puzzle (penguins). Actually I think most people have been dropping in to do a couple of pieces every now and then—it's about all we can manage at once.

As for me, I'm gradually working my way through a To Do list that contains a number of projects in-between regular household tasks like grocery shopping, and vacuuming.

Tomorrow we will all get out of the house and go into the city to help pack and post the magazine issue I helped finish off while we were camping. We may stop for a treat while we're there...that's not been decided yet. Oh, and I believe a little bit of Pokemon hunting will be going on too.

Summer holiday guidelines

Here are the guidelines for the summer. I read it out to the boys last night. They weren't super happy, but resigned (helped by the fact that they had full tummies).  I pointed out that we were looking for balance and if we saw them exercising 20 hours a day we'd pull them up too. That added a moment of humour and seemed to give perspective on this issue. It isn't just about electronics, it is about learning to get a balance in your life when you have a lot of freedom and few responsibilities.

I'll try to report back here on how this goes. You'll notice that there's no measurements here, I haven't said "every day" or "before you get to use your devices". Nor are there specific limits promised on internet time, that allows us to use discretion. We'll see how it goes and what revisions are necessary and how the guys rise up to meet the challenge.

Tip toeing through the forest of parenting in an electronic age

Today's the first day of the Christmas/summer holidays for our boys. We're trialling a new strategy. This is what the boys found when they finally got to the breakfast table:

Knowing that our boys can whip up a storm of nitpicking at the words and rules, we've deliberately kept it simple and generous to start with. It's generated some interesting discussion, especially, "We think that unlimited is too much screen time."

I countered with, "I did modify it with 'virtually'! But our goal is to help you do some self-management here." 

We don't want to be spending the holidays with stopwatches in our hands and be fighting constantly over how long they spend on electronic devices. We also want them to begin to self-limit.

Note that as I type at 9.46am, all the above jobs have been done and the boys have gone out for a jog/ride together. No protesting, no problems!

Note also that we'll be taking them to 1 ½ hrs of wrestling training this evening, and insisting on electronic-free reading/rest time after lunch.

We've limited their access to electronic things much more in the past. Usually they get half an hour each on Saturday and Sunday (with only a little more on holidays). And TV is rarely on for more than 45 minutes in a day (except when the cricket is on). 

But with our eldest (15) buying his own tablet three months ago, the balanced has shifted a little. We haven't restricted his time on his own tablet except when homework wasn't getting done, or other important tasks. I'm not sure if we were wise or not. Like all parents of our age, this is new. We're tip toeing through territory that didn't exist when we were young.

But with the younger two having school iPads next year and our oldest having a "Bring your own device", things are about to get more complicated. So, we continue to tip toe.