Are You Supposed to Do Anything In Summer?

The other day I was trying to get Luke to do something, anything, instead of just hanging out. He had spent the morning reading and playing LEGOs and was begging me to let him play on the computer. "But you haven't done anything all day!" I wailed.

"It's summer," he said. "You're not supposed to do anything."

I can't decide if he's right. In the past, I've always been the mom who gets workbooks once school is out and makes him do a couple pages a day. It takes less than 15 minutes which, by my rough math calculations, still gives him 12-14 hours to do whatever else he wants to do each day. I don't know how much it helped, but he "graduated" elementary school last month having made straight As every quarter since kindergarten.

So, we compromised. We bought a French workbook and a math riddle book. He's learning French for the first time in middle school next year so he's intrigued and the math book is fun. Other than that, I still have to coerce him into practicing one of his many instruments each day or maybe doing a difficult chore like putting away his part of the laundry or feeding the dog.

Am I mean? Is summer about doing nothing? Am I really asking him to do something?