As much as I love modern technology and how helpful it can be, some days I find myself wishing I could just throw the phones and iPads in a draw and forget about them.
I already know that our kids are just better without their iPads and the PlayStation.
There's less arguing, less tantrums, more willingness to GET UP OFF THE COUCH and, even though we limit their screen time, it's so clear that they just behave better without staring at a screen.
In saying that, the iPads have saved my butt on a number of occasions, and they're amazing for the kid's school work, as all Havanah's bookwork has an 'app' option, allowing her to complete her work on the app instead of sitting at a desk and writing.. which isn't how we roll in our house. This has been a game changer for our Homeschool Journey!
As a family, we enjoy shutting the tv off and playing a board game or just laying in Mommy and Daddy's bed and laughing about things that no sane person would consider to be entertaining. We are happy in each other's company.. that's just us.
So to prepare ourselves for, yet, another busy week of hospital road trips to the city and more appointments once we arrived home (no joke, we were in a different doctor's office every day this week!), we planned an entire 'UNPLUGGED' family weekend for last weekend.
Let me start by saying, YOU CAN'T WING IT! If you honestly want to do this, and put your whole heart into making it work, you need to prepare. The rules were simple..
NO ONE LEAVES THE PROPERTY
NO ONE ENTERS THE PROPERTY
NO PHONE
NO IPAD
NO COMPUTER
NO PLAYSTATION
It was important that we not leave the house and have no visitors.
This weekend was for our family and no one else. We owed it to ourselves and the kids to spend every minute of our unplugged weekend focusing on each other.
Not leaving the house meant we had to stock up on a few things.
Junk food - Netflix and Stan were still allowed, so we wanted to ensure we had movie snacks, as well as things to nibble on during board games!!
Essentials - You don't want to run out of things like toilet paper, milk, tea, coffee and chocolate.. Chocolate is an essential.. no one asked you anyway!
Baby Essentials - If you're like us, you don't really think about it until you're almost out. We buy formula and nappies weekly, but it's things like Bonjela, Baby Paracetamol, Wipes (we buy our wipes in bulk so we usually only buy once a month) - and we're in struggle town if we run out of Banana Baby Mum-Mum Rice Rusks for Carter.. he's a machine with those things! They taste like paper to me.. but they're his jam!
Cash! - We never have cash on us. Ever. So we made it a point to have some in case we wanted to order some Chinese food.. it's one of our faves.
When I did that week's grocery shop (and when I say 'did' I mean, when I ordered it online for 'Click & Collect' and had John pick it up after work), I made sure to include a couple of special items - baking ingredients, ingredients for our favourite meals, stuff for delicious breakfasts.. that kind of thing.
We kicked it off on Friday night when John got home - around 6:30pm.
The kids were REALLY excited. They turned their iPads off and put them in our bedroom.
John and I left our phones on but put them away so they weren't close by - still allowing people to contact us in an emergency.
The computer got shut down and our TV went off until we wanted to watch a movie together.
For the entire weekend, we played board games, we painted with the kids, we cooked and baked together, we read books and we got outside.
On Saturday morning we had to remind Brooklyn that he couldn't have his iPad.. but that we could get the playdough out and then maybe later they could help John to wash the car - he was stoked!
With our phones away, John and I paid more attention to each other and to the kids.
We weren't telling the kids to 'wait a minute' or talking to each other with our eyes on our screens - which we're now seeing has become a really horrible habit.
We talked about so much that, on Sunday, we all took time to just do stuff on our own. John and I read our books and the kids played happily in their own rooms while Carter napped. It was a kind of peace that we didn't often have.
On Sunday night, I had to get us packed up for our trip to Westmead Children's Hospital for Carter to have another Sleep Study Test.
We all went to bed fairly early and hoped that there would be no hiccups in the morning - we felt so refreshed!
Until we woke up to a little boy with very sore cheeks and vomiting in our bed.
Brooklyn's molars are giving him grief, so we had a super long morning.. but we were on the road by 8am.
All in all, we had an incredible weekend together and we will definitely be implementing more of these weekends with each other!
I'm interested to know if anyone else has tried the 'unplugged' weekend with their family?
How did it go?? Or maybe you're thinking about implementing something like this in the future?
Let me know in the comment section below!
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