Teachable moments can come from a wide variety of sources, including other parents. From time to time parents write blogs for us that we think you will find interesting, useful, or entertaining. Please enjoy this post from a fellow parent.

Summer is here.

And while your kids are likely looking forward to sleeping in and lounging around, you’re probably greeting the thought with some trepidation. After all, unless you’re a teacher, summer doesn’t really change your daily life. You don’t get to sleep in. You still have to go to work and handle the daily tasks of maintaining the household. Yet you now have this added wrinkle – a houseful of kids who expect you to cater to their every whim.

Well this summer is going to be different. Or it can be, with just a little planning.

You see, a kid’s default mode is laziness. In the absence of any other directive, they will go about the day expending as little physical or intellectual energy as possible. That means sleeping until noon. That means sitting on the couch playing video games. That means lying on the bed chatting with friends on a mobile device. All while expecting you, the parent, to do laundry, cook meals and act as a personal chauffeur.

It’s not just general idleness that’s the problem, either. Without the regimen of school, kids can feel as if no rules apply during the summer months, which can lead to an uptick in rudeness and disobedience. And of course when summer’s over and it’s back to school, the shift back to a world of rules and expectations can be rocky.

Luckily for you, the parenting experts at Boys Town have nearly a century’s experience in dealing with this very topic. And they’ve put their heads together and come up with the Breeze Through Summer Contract.

Simply click the link below, check the boxes that apply to your kids – and even customize a few of your own – and you’ll have an ironclad document spelling out exactly what’s expected of your kids this summer. And though the contract’s stuffy legalese is intended with tongue firmly in cheek, its content is based on many decades of experience and will help your kids enjoy their break with a bit more purpose than summers past.

Customize and print your family’s very own Breeze Through Summer Contract. After all, life really is much easier when you know what’s expected of you.