Summer Is Coming: The Mindset Shift & Simple Hacks That Will Save Your Sanity

🎧 Listen to the full episode on Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon Music

Summer sounds dreamy—until you realize you’re now the camp counselor, short-order cook, and full-time lifeguard. In this episode, I open up with an honest take on how summer can feel both magical and overwhelming. The good news? It doesn’t have to be either-or.

Mindset Shift #1: Boredom Isn’t Bad

Boredom is not your problem to solve. I encourage you to normalize boredom and share research-backed reminders (including a powerful takeaway from Angela Hanscom’s Balanced and Barefoot about why kids need long stretches of time to settle into meaningful play.

Mindset Shift #2: Lower the Bar

Color-coded summer schedules not required. I’m getting real about what summer looked like with three kids under three—and why backyard sprinklers and buckets can be more than enough.

Mindset Shift #3: You’re Allowed to Protect Your Peace

Just because your kids are home doesn’t mean you’re on call 24/7. From saying yes to paper plates and no to endless snack requests, I walk through simple shifts to preserve your mental energy.

7 Practical Hacks That Actually Work

In this part of the podcast, I break down seven hacks that have made summers smoother and less chaotic:

1. Create a summer bin – one for the car, one for the garage.

2. Rotate yard zones – freshen things up without leaving home.

3. Sacred quiet time – for everyone’s sanity (and yours!).

4. Theme your meals – think Meat Monday, Taco Tuesday, Sandwich Wednesday and snack dinners outside.

5. Prep snack bins – your future self will thank you.

6. Pick one anchor activity a day – no need to over-plan, pick one activity to get you out of the house whether its in the backyard or somewhere local.

7. Say yes to outside mess – and keep the chaos out of your kitchen.

Your Outdoorsy Challenge

This week’s challenge? Build your own summer bin with what you already have. No fancy toys needed—just an invitation to play that lives by the door.

Want the full episode? 🎧 Listen to Episode 7: “Summer is Coming: The Mindset Shift & Simple Hacks That Will Save Your Sanity.”

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• EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

  Julianne Nienberg (00:00)

  Welcome to the My Outdoorsy Mom podcast. I'm your host, Julianne Nienberg, mom of three, backyard adventure enthusiast, and your go-to gal for making memories outside with your kids. This is your space to ditch the pressure of perfect and embrace simple, soul-filling time in nature that fits real family life. Each week, we'll talk motherhood, nature play, travel, and entrepreneurship with honest stories, practical tips, and guest conversations that'll feel like chatting with a friend.

  Whether you're raising wild little explorers or building a business during nap time, I see you. So grab your coffee, toss some snacks in your bag, and let's make some memories. This is the My Outdoorsy Mom podcast.

  Julianne Nienberg (00:39)

  Today's episode is for every mom who's looked at the calendar and thought, how is it almost summer already? I don't know about you, but May is Maying, and after the chaos of this month is over, a whole new kind of magical chaos begins. There's a term for it, and it's called summer break. If you're feeling that mix of excitement and low-key panic, you're in the right place. I've polled many of you, and while you're all excited for warmer days and later sunsets,

  Many of you have acknowledged that summer with kids can feel like an endless stretch of unstructured time where you are suddenly the cruise director, the snack queen, the short order cook, the lifeguard, the referee, camp counselor, chauffeur, and Uber driver extraordinaire. But my friends, it doesn't have to be that way. Today, I'm walking you through a few mindset shifts and specific doable hacks that will help you not just survive summer, but actually enjoy it and have fun right alongside your kiddos.

  Before we get to the hacks, I want to start with the mindset, because that's where the overwhelm really starts, right? Here are three mindset shifts that I've done over the years that can really change the game. One is embracing the idea that boredom isn't bad. Repeat after me. Boredom is not my problem to solve. Kids need to be bored. boredom is where creativity,

  problem solving and imagination live. Letting your kids be bored is not lazy parenting. It's developmentally appropriate parenting. And I'm going to challenge a lot of parents here by saying, most of the time your child isn't bored, they just need more time to settle into play. In her book, Balanced and Barefoot, Angela Hanscom discusses the notion of it taking approximately 45 minutes for children to settle into play.

  It takes an average of 45 minutes for children to find out who they're going to play with, decide what they're going to play, and finally come up with a play scheme. In an era of adult-directed activities and screens that are competing for our children's attention with its fast-moving graphics, children have forgotten how to be bored and how to wrestle with

  today, it would be to give your child the gift of boredom.

  Now I know many of you are thinking, my child will whine endlessly until they figure out what to do. A few statements and phrases that have worked for me. I can't wait to see what you come up with. Or I wonder what you could do with that tree branch. Or I wonder what you could build with those Legos. Take a deep breath, mom. Step back and see what they come up with.

  The second mindset shift is to lower the bar. Like lower, lower, lower the bar. Almost down to the ground. I cannot stress this enough. As a mom who has felt like I needed to do all the things once summer came, I'm here to tell you that you don't need a color-coded summer schedule. You don't need a summer bucket list or daily field trips to have a good summer. When I had three under three, their summer was spent in the backyard.

  I had very little bandwidth to take three kids on outings in the hot sun, but what I could do was throw on the sprinkler. I could give my kids buckets of water, bowls, cups, spoons, and popsicles and let them have a ball. It wasn't fancy, it wasn't us jetting off to some picturesque summer destination, but they laughed, they giggled, and I kept my peace by getting them outside in simple ways that felt achievable for me during that season of life.

  Your kids will remember the feeling of summer. They will not remember your itinerary or your checklist. And lastly, you are allowed to protect your peace. Just because your kids are home doesn't mean you're on 24-7. It might feel like it, but you can say yes to backyard time and no to the third snack in an hour. Other things you can say yes to, having 10 minutes of outdoor time to yourself, whether your kids join you outside or not.

  You can say yes to ditching the laundry pile and getting out of the house. You can say yes to paper plates, that's my personal favorite, and avoid the burnout of doing dishes. You can say yes to eating snack dinners outside to keep your house clean. I also give you permission to mute or unfollow anyone on social media that is making you feel like your summer is less than.

  Okay, real quick. I want to shout out one of my favorite parenting hacks for summer. The Cosmo Junior Track 4 Smartwatch. Do you remember summer in the 90s? Because I sure do. You'd hop on your bike, you'd ride to a friend's house and your mom would yell, be home for dinner! That kind of freedom feels harder to give our kids these days. But with the Cosmo Junior Track 4 Smartwatch, it doesn't have to be. It's a kids' smartwatch designed for connection without all the junk. No social media, just calls, text, GPS,

  pre-approved apps and safety tools that give your kids some independence while keeping you in the loop. I've been using it with my kids and it's been a total game changer. Especially when they're out exploring the woods, visiting a friend's house, or letting my older one explore the park during her little brother's baseball game. I love that I can control who she contacts through the parent portal and—

  and that I can set up a safety zone perimeter around my home and track her whereabouts thanks to GPS. If you want to give your kids a taste of that nostalgic 90s freedom with a modern safety net, check out the Cosmo Junior Track 4 smartwatch and be sure to use my discount code JULIANNE for 15 % off. I'll link it in the show notes so you can learn more.

  All right, let's get into the nitty gritty of hacks that'll save your sanity this summer. These hacks are real life tested by yours truly, and they make summer feel way more manageable when you have kids at home. number one, create a summer bin. I know everyone wants to have a super organized garage or a super organized mud room where everything has its place, but sometimes that's just not possible.

  For us, I keep a bin in my car for on-the-go adventures and I keep a bin that lives in our garage for summer toys that my kids can reach for and toss back in. Think outdoor play basics like bubbles, chalk, magnifying glasses, bug catchers, frisbees, giant bouncy balls, soccer balls, you name it. Toss it all in one large bin so your kids can grab and go and help with cleanup. No organizing required. I'll link a couple of the bins I use for my car to corral all these items together.

  Pack number two, rotate yard zones. Hear me out. There was a season of life where we didn't leave the backyard for a couple of summers. I had three kids under three. I was the kind of mom that preferred my youngest, slept in his crib for most naps, and I'm pretty sure I was potty training one, if not two, of my kids at the time. So at any given moment, I had a naked child running around my home and property.

  So to keep things fresh, I would rotate our backyard setups.

  during those years. So every few days I would move it to a different corner of our yard. When they were that little, it felt fresh and exciting and different for them. I'd set up a blanket in one spot with some books and toys out there. And then I'd move it to another part of the yard with different toys and a snack.

  We once moved some logs from one part of the property closer to our patio so the kids could use them as chairs or tables and they started moving them around on their own. Talk about great heavy work right there. A box that once held our patio furniture became a cave one day and then the following week it was moved and became a boat in another corner of the yard. Little changes like this, especially in the eyes of your little ones, make your space feel fresh and exciting without spending a dime. My favorite part. Hack number three.

  Quiet time is sacred. Set a daily quiet time for everyone. In fact, this is a hard must for me. During the summer, we all take an hour of quiet time where my kids go to their rooms or sometimes they play what they call doors and they all sit in their doorframe and talk to each other. We're kind of past the season of needing naps right now, so they know their quiet time is for quiet play in their rooms. They can listen to their yodo players play on their bed, but they cannot come down the stairs.

  I'll also include a link for the yodo players because those things have worked so hard for us over the last four years. they are the best toy for independent play, for silent reading time. And we love them. We listen to ours every single day. And also, let's be real. I need that quiet time to rest and recharge myself for the second portion of our day.

  Visual timers are great for quiet times. link the timer that we have in the show notes as well. Hack number four, theme your meals. This is a huge one, moms. I think one of the biggest things that causes me to feel burnt out real quick in the summertime or any point in the year is the thought of having to feed my children all day. I really try to grocery shop only once a week, so that means I'm setting aside one day a week, usually Sunday,

  to meal plan, shop and prep for the week ahead. One thing that has made meal planning much more bearable for me all year long and especially during the summer is having theme days. Think meat Monday. We're big meat eaters, so we're either eating chicken, ground beef, steak. Think taco Tuesdays. Wednesdays is for sandwiches. Thursdays is for leftovers. Fridays is a pizza night and Saturday is scrounge the fridge and freezer.

  Having theme days has really helped me not stress about what should I cook? What do I have? And especially in the summer when you're outside most of the time, these are easy meals that I can prep, make plenty of, take on the go, and turn into a picnic lunch. Hack number five, snacks. Okay, one of the best things I ever did besides installing a lock on my pantry was to invest in some snack trays.

  where I could prep healthy snacks and have them ready to go in our fridge. I'll link the exact trays I love and have used over the years, whether it's in the home or on the go. This summer, I'm also going to try that snack bin hack I've been seeing on social media, where the kids can choose what snacks they want to have for the day, but the snacks live in a bin on the counter, so they can grab it without asking me a million times. If the snacks are all gone, then they're free to eat a full meal at breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

  Like I said, I also installed a lock on my pantry last year and that's been a game changer of keeping sneaky snackers out of my pantry. Hack number six, pick your anchor activity. Choose one daily anchor activity that gets you outside. Choosing one activity a day makes this a really manageable and achievable goal for you so you feel confident getting your kids out more, especially when they're really little.

  and it grows your child's confidence in getting outside. When I had really little littles, my must was one activity a day. Two was simply too much for my brain to handle, but I knew that one was manageable and achievable. It could be your morning walk, backyard play before lunch, or an afternoon nature scavenger hunt. When I had three kids under the age of five, for me, it was getting outside right after breakfast.

  sometimes we ate breakfast outside and it just felt like a natural progression to getting them to play afterwards. Maybe it's a trip to your neighborhood park in the morning before lunchtime. It could be that you leave the house every morning after breakfast and return for afternoon naps. Maybe it's a bike ride or a stroller walk after the afternoon naps. Keep it predictable so your kids start to expect outdoor time. And it builds independence over time as well.

  Not only does it build that muscle memory of getting outside for them, but it's great for you too. Get out of the house, whether it's in your backyard or out in your community.

  Hack number seven, say yes to outside mess. All right.

  I had a hard time with this for a while, but once I started to embrace that the outdoors was free game for messy play, my life changed for the better. So set up a designated outdoor zone where mess is allowed. Mud pies? Go for it. Sidewalk paint? Just do it. You'll spend less time managing mess inside and going crazy if you say yes to doing it outside. I'm a bit OCD when it comes to paint, so I always let my kids paint outside.

  They'd paint boxes, they painted old play structures with washable paint, they painted rocks and sticks, they painted each other. As long as they did it outside, I did not give a rip. Play-Doh, 100 % an outside toy. I had a set of stainless steel dishes and thrifted pots and pans that lived outside and they were free to make whatever they wanted with it. When we step back and designate these open areas for children to make a mess, their creativity will flourish. So here's your reminder, friend.

  You don't have to be on all day this summer. You don't have to turn your house into an arts and crafts camp. You're allowed to choose simple, repeatable and realistic. Summer can be sweet and simple and soul filling without being exhausting. So start with 15 minutes outside. Try one new thing a week and let nature do what it does best. So for your outdoorsy challenge for this week, I'm going to say create your own summer bin.

  raid your garage, raid the inside of your house, and grab a few forgotten toys, throw them in a bin, and set it near the door. That is an instant invitation to play, and I promise you, your future self will thank you.

  Julianne Nienberg (14:09)

  Thanks so much for spending part of your day with me. I hope this episode left you feeling encouraged and inspired to get outside and enjoy nature wherever your feet are. If you loved what you heard, it would mean the world to me if you tap those five stars or leave a quick review. It helps other outdoorsy minded moms find the show and grow the sweet little community. And if you're looking for more ways to simplify, slow down, and connect through nature, you can find me over on Instagram at myoutdoorsymom, read the blog at myoutdoorsymom.com, or explore all my digital resources and seasonal guides in the shop.

  Everything's linked right there in the show notes. Until next time, take a deep breath, step outside, and I'll meet you back here next week.