Free

It was screen free week at school.

Boy am I glad that's over.

I did realize, however, that even when it's freezing cold outside because winter simply refuses to loosen the death grip it has on this land, my son does just fine without the two dimensional people who live inside the box.

He doesn't use the computer yet.

We don't let him play video games.

The only thing we had to worry about was the television. I gave him his choice, "If you want to be TV free, go for it. If you don't, fine by me." Because I'm a stellar mom like that. Mother of the year, right here. But honestly, I feel like I spend enough of my life telling my kids no or not now or don't do that. I'm not going to force him to participate in an optional screen abstinence program. He doesn't watch that much TV as it is.

Of course you know he wanted to do it. Because of all the PRIZES and COMPETITION and EVERYONE ELSE IS. You want to know who was devastated when he didn't win a single prize. One guess. Yep. Still, he made it all week.

On Monday afternoon he said, "Can I watch a little TV?"

I answered, "Sure. Unless you want to do Screen Free Week."

"Oh. Yeah."

He never asked again. Not once. He put on a jacket and played outside. He played games. He read. He had soccer games and kid's club and homework and two play dates. One night he took a really long bath. With army men.

Um. I know if you have boys there need be no clarification on that last sentence but, for the record, moms of only girls, my son did not actually bathe with members of our military. He took handfuls of plastic army men into the tub with him. Good. Now that we've cleared that up no one needs to call any authorities.

So this kid of mine, the one who didn't bathe with military personnel, just went off track for the last time this year. He goes back in two weeks and will have roughly eight weeks of school left before he's a BIG, GROWN UP, 1st grader. (For some reason I just wrote 8th grader because, apparently, 8 years passed in an actual blink of the eye. So, whew. I feel better knowing that he's really only going to be in the first grade. Nothing like a typo to calm down a mama who wants to click the pause button on her son's youth.)