I’ve been sitting on the couch for almost an hour, writing for one of my various assignments as a freelance writer. In the next room, I can see my five-year-old son, Reagan, playing with Legos, while his two-year-old sister, Marella, works on a puzzle beside him. Every now and then one of them will come to me asking for help, but mostly they’ve been playing by themselves.

We’re one week into summer vacation, and it might be audacious of me to assume this is how the entire summer will go – but for the most part, this is exactly how I plan on the summer going.

We adopted our two-year-old last September, right before her second birthday, but my five-year-old is well-versed on how summer vacation, or any other day, goes in our household. They get 30 minutes of screen time total (divided between morning and afternoon), and other than that, they are largely responsible for their own fun. Sure, we do plenty of things together, like play outside (which I will not yet allow them to do unsupervised), or bake cookies, and sometimes we play a game or color. But they also realize that I work from home, and they already know not to expect me to be a constant source of entertainment for them.

It’s funny how children can make up their own fun when we let them. When Reagan was two, my husband worked long days and crazy hours, and I felt stuck between needing to get my own work done, and wanting to give him the best summer possible, knowing he was starting preschool in the fall. I tried crafts – the homemade foam was a disaster – and realized I’m not that Mom. We tried playing games outside for hours, and I found myself constantly looking at my watch, wondering when we could escape the heat. And I realized I’m not that Mom either.

Over time, I’ve realized I’m the Mom that loves my children, and I love getting work done. And so, we found a rhythm -- first him, then both of them – where they play by themselves for long stretches of time, knowing eventually they will get my undivided attention again, and I’ll be happier and more relaxed because I’ll have gotten at least a large chunk of my work done.

I definitely get some raised eyebrows when people ask what our summer plans are, and I say “nothing.” Our society tells us children need to be in this camp, that summer learning program, this music class. But sometimes children need to be just children. I have fond, beautiful memories of my childhood, playing outside with my sister, running in the grass, playing with our dolls. I don’t have one memory of my mother actually playing with me. We’d clean the house together, we’d weed the garden together or spend time in the kitchen together, but I don’t ever remember her sitting and playing with me, or even giving me much to do.

She wasn’t responsible for me finding my own fun, and I’m not responsible for finding my children’s fun. And left to their own devices – without the option of TV or an iPad to occupy them (and dull their creativity) – children will make up their own entertainment. They’ll build forts and make up games and color and be children, and do childlike things. I could probably count on one hand the number of times Reagan has told me he’s bored over the last year or two, because he knows he is in charge of finding something to keep him occupied. And he will.

I think it’s going to be a good summer.