Rebecca's blog: Summer holidays

As a break from the expensive clubs and far-flung activities I usually book for the summer holidays, this year I had arranged to send my tween and two teenagers to my parents’ home in the countryside during the weekdays. For various reasons, this plan fell through at the last minute, so I was suddenly faced with having to find ways to occupy them for the remainder of the break. Fortunately, we had a fortnight’s holiday booked, leaving just a few weeks of activities to arrange.                                                                                                

Having enquired at the various activities dotted around London that they enjoyed last year to find that they were all fully booked, and having desperately trawled the internet looking for absolutely anything vaguely age-appropriate which still had three spaces (“I’m sure you’ll enjoy salsa-dancing if you give it a chance, darling..”), I drew a blank. I recalled that whilst I spent my teenage term times being ferried around to a relentless array of extra-curricular activities, I whiled away the summer holidays with my siblings and friends coming up with creative ways to stave off the potential boredom. Far from viewing this time as ‘wasted’, I look back on these days now as some of the happiest in my memory and a welcome break from the structure and pressure of schoolwork and exams.

I therefore decided to work from home as much as possible and to get the kids to do a bit of the leg-work themselves in finding ways to fill their time. I’m fortunate that they’re old enough to understand why I’m doing my job and to appreciate that it’s my work that funds their respective appstore habits (not to mention the boring bills they don’t care so much about), so they’re relatively motivated in letting me get on without interrupting me when I’m working from home.

Each of them set about planning a project to research at the local library (spurred on by a stationery shopping spree, obviously – they’ve inherited my lawyerly love of numbered dividers and colour co-ordinated binders) and I set about registering them at the local youth club for when I couldn’t be home (sadly not my teenagers’ first choice of activity as that’s where the less stationery-oriented kids hang out). Without my prescribing a timetable for them, they got out their bikes and organised picnics in the park and project work in addition to the occasional bit of iPad time (which I figure probably won’t do any harm in small doses…I also fondly recall watching what must have been an hour or two of TV before going out to play in the mornings too).

And being within earshot of their conversations has given me a ‘fly-on-the-wall’ perspective on how they interact with each other when I’m not around. It’s alerted me to the fact that, over the years, I’ve grown accustomed to getting involved in their disputes, interviewing each of them to establish the facts and deciding on an equitable outcome. This has suited them as they know I will listen to each of their perspectives and that my decision is final, but as they’ve grown older, I’ve realised that I’ve made a rod for my own back as they often rely on me to sort out their petty squabbles (which usually begin with something like “two years ago, I lent her that bouncy ball and she gave me this crocodile..” and has somehow culminated in someone hiding someone else’s Kindle behind a wardrobe).

Despite my expectation that they would be pulling each others’ hair and screaming when things didn’t go their way, I have picked up snippets such as “I don’t want to play Lego with you as you always take over and that’s not fun for me”…”ok, well how about we work together but you can decide what we build”. It’s made me realise that letting them resolve their own conflicts rather than being available all the time is actually good for them, and that they will find a way through on their own. Except when they actually are pulling each others’ hair and screaming, of course. Then, I just thank my lucky stars that I have an office to return to in September...

Rebecca is a city lawyer and parent of three ‘spirited’ young people aged 11, 13 and 15.