Spring Break for the Bambinos

Last week was spring break for the bambinos.

It is always difficult to juggle the school breaks. But this year’s spring break seemed the easiest (and therefore, truly, best) ever. Maybe because we’re living on campus? (That makes Mama working during the bambinos’ spring break so much more fluid in so many ways.) Or maybe it is because they are getting older? (They are so much more self-sufficient; they can play for long stretches on their own; they don’t need as much structured time.) Or maybe it is just a fluke? (Who knows?)… but it was a great and relatively easy/painless week for all involved. Don’t get me wrong: there were some ‘moments’ (i.e., close-to-the-brink-of-insanity while hoping-a-video-keeps-them-quiet-during-a-meeting and/or one or another parent almost loses their mind while trying to make the work-at-home-kids-at-home thing work and/or one child or another almost loses their mind from intense unstructured time with their siblings for days on end…. yes, it is all in there. The good, the bad, as always, all wrapped up together.

Anyhow… we put together a great week full of unstructured down-time and change-in-routine, balanced with some fun outings that made the week feel really special. The key (for us, at least) is having a plan! And then implementing it. Our plan was good. And it went off with very few fumbles.

The highlights were the bookends of the week: at the start, a day trip to NYC (to see Annie on Broadway!!!), and at the end, a day trip to the beach (the Jersey shore! not our favorite beach, but a beach nonetheless, and sometimes a beach is all you really need).

Of course, a trip to NYC is not complete for us without soup dumplings at Joe’s Shanghai! And a trip to the beach in March is not complete for us without all three kids in their parkas up to their knees in the frigid ocean. In between all this we had lots of fun with other things too. Including– K & O got Meera much much closer to mastering the art of the cartwheel; a few fun chunks of time with awesome babysitters; the rare experience of three of us sitting still at one time and reading together quietly in the family room (when I say ‘rare’ I mean very rare… particularly for us particular three); a family slumber party (a sleep over in the family room complete with pizza, a movie, and a big breakfast the next morning)!; and lots of other things too that were not captured in photos.