Back to school, back to routines

Back to school signifies four major events for my family every August: Our official end of summer, a couple of weeks' worth of children in ill moods while they get acclimated to a routine again, the stress of homework and the re-emergence of pots and pans.

August means lots of things- from its initial escort into hurricane season to the end of sleep-til-noon slumber sessions for school-aged children.

I have a love-hate relationship with the month of August. It's my birthday month, so obviously I'm pleased to see it roll around every year.

But I don't enjoy trying to get back into what I call the "real life" routine with all the school obligations. For one thing, I don't enjoy homework. I probably even have a greater disdain for it than my children who are ultimately charged with completing it every night.

I lean toward the obsessive side on the homework. I want it neat, complete and correct. In a nutshell regarding the homework, I'm a teacher's dream and my children's nightmare.

And the ill moods in the morning usually subside after a couple of weeks. It takes that long for my children to discover that going to bed earlier equates to (easy) rising earlier in the morning.

I lament those late summer nights of sitting up with the kids watching silly sitcoms - the younger one just discovered TV Land in June - until midnight.

Moods are now fairly well under control. Check.

But the toughest challenge I have to overcome every August is getting on a regular feeding schedule for my children. Admittedly, in the summertime, that isn't a great concern. They're in bed when I leave for work, and the waffles are in the freezer.

On the rare occasion they do wake for breakfast, the food is there.

Usually, lunch is their first meal of the day and dinner is on my timetable, somewhere in a range of 5:30-8 p.m. Easy, no stress living. Going out to dinner is always an option and ensures even less stress - ahh, summertime.

Now, I'm expected to be more organized. School is seeing to that. And the pressure to cook more, oh yeah, it's there. Who wants to feed their children pizza when a homemade vegetable casserole is much healthier, and in my house, much more enjoyable than takeout?

Every year, I seem to forget how to maneuver August until it's past. Four more days and surely life will be more stable.

September usually does that for me. It's sort of the back-in-the-swing-of-things month.

But when all is said and done and I'm finished complaining about August, I'm still not going to enjoy forced cooking or homework - not in September or any other month.

Lisa Singleton-Rickman can be reached at 740-5735 or lisa.singleton-rickman@TimesDaily.com.