July 2010 Newsletter for Blended and Step Families

In this month’s Newsletter:

• Article on the Summer Blues
• Summer Activities Challenge
• Free podcast for newsletter subscribers (limited time offer)
• Step Family Summer Video
  

The Summer Blues

Summer’s half over and you’re counting the days until school starts.  If you hear another, “I’m bored,” you might just jump out of the window!

Structure

I know all of the adults have plenty to do, but the kids need a little more guidance. These are great opportunities to:

• Enroll in a camp to improve educational or sporting skills
• Create art projects
• Catch up on summer reading (look at your local library for weekly activities)
• Clean up their rooms (or the garage, or the playroom…..)
• Try on clothes and get rid of what doesn’t fit anymore
• Read the daily newspaper or local parenting magazines for ideas on free family activities in your area

Share the Responsibilities

• Switch off with another parent (or several parents) and each family takes responsibility for a small group of kids (preferably of similar ages) for a day at a time.
• Talk with parents about taking turns keeping the kids one evening, so you and your spouse can take a well- deserved and much- needed date night!

Staycation

Explore your city. Go to the Chamber of Commerce, pick up brochures, and pretend to be a visitor in your hometown! Look for local family specials, cut out coupons, and visit the popular and not-so-popular attractions in your town.  In my hometown, we have the Raptor Center, where you can visit owls, eagles and other birds. The kids LOVE it!

Search on the internet for your Parks and Recreation websites and look for family vacations. Put in your internet search, “family activities in _______”

Here are some more ideas from Education.com and their Summer Activities Challenge: http://www.education.com/summer-activities-challenge/

Balance

Don’t forget you need a balance, every week, of alone time, couple time, parent/child time, and blended family time. When you get out of balance, your kids are unhappy, you are emotionally drained, and your spouse is unhappy.

Take a look at last week’s schedule and see if you set aside time for yourself, your mate, your kids and your blended family. If someone was skipped, figure out how to create time this week. (P.S.- spouse comes first!)

Fun Activity for all ages

As you sit around the dinner table tonight- here’s a fun activity for your family. What’s the most annoying or overused word or phrase?

Here’s some to get you started: It is what it is, OMG, like, you know, whatever. 

Have fun!

Summary

There are seasons to life- fun seasons, busy seasons, and tough seasons. Sometimes summer is a rough season in our life, but fall is coming!  Cooler weather, kids in school, after school activities, regular bed times…. It won’t be much longer J

Free Podcast

As a Blended and Step Family Newsletter subscriber, my gift to you in July is a podcast on Creating Balance in Your Step Family.  This step family podcast will be free until Sunday, August 1^st, 6pm eastern. After that time, I’ll put it for sale with the other resource materials.  Here’s the link to download your free podcast on Creating Balance in Your Step Family. http://www.TheBlendedandStepFamilyResourceCenter.com/podcast

Step Family Summer Video

Check out some great step family tips for summer time fun, and beautiful step family photos and video. 

Talk with you again soon.

Shirley

Shirley Cress Dudley, MA LPC NCC

Shirley@BlendedFamilyAdvice.com

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