As the last few days of the summer slipped through my fingers, I felt relief (what mom doesn’t look forward to the kids’ return to school?) mixed with sadness and a little guilt. Back in June, as we were wrapping up the last hectic weeks of first grade, I was full of good intentions about spending more time with my daughter this summer. As a single mom running her own business from home, I have a history of getting caught up with work and letting the day get away from me. This summer, I set out with a new plan that included taking Fridays off and only working half days on Wednesdays. The idea was that my daughter and I would have a summer’s worth of day trip adventures to look back on at the end of the season.

My plan would have worked, too, if it weren’t for life getting in the way.

My business picked up suddenly and I was left scrambling to meet deadlines. I added camp days to my daughter’s schedule or let her stay home, watching movies, while I sat in the next room hammering at my keyboard – so close, and yet so far. My dreams of idyllic mother-daughter outings were evaporating like so much fog – disappearing before my eyes.

So, when the first day of school arrived (August 31^st for our neck of the woods), I felt like an utter failure. I’d let the summer get away from me, and now it was gone. I can’t get those days back. I can’t make up for the lost time that I sacrificed to the gods of fiscal responsibility. My daughter had a great summer, it just wasn’t the summer I’d hoped for and now it was too late …

… or was it?

A day before school started, my parents and my little girl drove north for two hours and spent the day at an outdoor adventure park with a ropes course, mountain slide, and other active attractions. Though I was grateful for the time to work (I was, once again, on deadline), I was sad that I couldn’t be the one spending the last official day of the summer with my daughter. Sometimes it feels like everyone except me gets to have fun with her. But, it doesn’t have to be that way.

So, on Friday of that week (the kids didn’t have school for some odd reason), I packed my daughter into the car and we retraced the route she’d taken with my parents a few days earlier. We spent a gorgeous (and exhausting!) day climbing, riding, sliding, bouncing, and chasing butterflies. And we enjoyed other mini outings over the course of the long weekend – aimless meandering about town complete with window shopping, a late season visit to the beach, breakfast out at a place we’d never been before.

Although the summer is over, I realize that there’s no reason we can’t make time for fun NOW. There is always this moment. There is always a chance to make a memory – even if it’s just a memory of walking around town, hand-in-hand. Sometimes, those quiet, non-events make the best memories.  So, instead of being sad that the summer is gone and my best-laid plans fell by the wayside, I’m now excited to think of all the adventures that still await us. There’s no expiration date on having fun with your kids. The summer season may be over, but the season of fun never ends.