School's out for summer ... FINALLY

Today is the last day of school and thank God. The month of June is a nightmare when you're trying to get your young offspring to bed so that they can sit in the classroom on those all too rare warm, sunny days. As anyone who has ever visited Ireland during June knows the sun shines bright until late. As you can imagine it's hard to convince little Sean or Siobhan to go to sleep on time when the sun is still high and bright in the sky until around 10pm, or later if you're in the west or north.

For reasons that are beyond my comprehension, the older kids (13+) finish a month earlier even though they are the ones who can better accept the late sunsets. So not only do the younger children have to endure a month of classes on at least one hour's missing sleep they also have to put up with their teen brothers and sisters being barely out of bed by the time the school day is over.

I'm just glad that my son is finally finished with school. I only wish I was looking forward to a whole summer of playing ball, riding my bike and going swimming (but not in the Irish Sea!).