This is a guest post by Jamie Ivey (Wife and Mommy in Austin, Texas). To see the entire series click here. One of my favorite things about the summer break from school is how much time I get with my kids. We do life different in the summer than during the school year. We sleep later, stay up later, wear only swimsuits and pajamas most days, and eat most of our meals outside. We swim lots, ride bikes a lot, and go to the dollar theatre a lot in the middle of the day because it is hot here in Texas y’all! We love summer around here, and enjoy the laid back life it creates. I also view the summer as a time that I get to invest in my kids that much more. During the school year my kids spend 34 hours a week with their teachers and friends away from me. In the summer I get them all to myself each week. I get to 100% invest in them every single day. I don’t want to waste that time every year with my kids during the summer. I want to make the most out of every single summer I get with my children, because each year they get older and older and I won’t have all their attention each summer. Obviously you should read God’s Word with your kids all throughout the year, but the summer is a sometimes slower pace of life for reading times. You aren’t trying to rush in your 20 minutes of recommended reading a day from the teacher right at night while you are trying to get them in bed. No. In the summer, you can leisurely read by the pool, on a blanket at the park, or at 10am after your late breakfast. Why not use that time to do a Bible study with your child that’s aimed at them or find a devotional for girls that you can go through together. Whatever it is, cherish it, because in a few years they’ll have summer jobs that will occupy their time and you’ll be fighting their friends for time. Use the summer to truly minister to your children and ask God to move their hearts towards His. You have so much time with them and are investing in their lives every day, so use this time to ask God to point out specific ways that you can pray for them. I love to see growth in my kids, and petitioning God on their behalf is an honor that I cherish as their mom. I love them so much and I know and believe that God loves them abundantly more, and so to ask him to show me how to parent them well and guide them is an honor I do not take lightly. My youngest child starts kindergarten next year so this is our last summer before she’s a student for the next 12 years while in my home. This means I have 13 summers left before she goes off to college. My oldest will start fourth grade, and so my summers are even less with him. That puts a challenge on me as their mom that isn’t to be held as a burden, but as a joy. I get the honor of parenting them through the summertime in a different way than I do in the school year. My challenge to you moms is to cherish the summer. Don’t just cherish it because you get to sleep in later, or spend more time at the pool, but cherish it because you get more time with your babies. Use that time to explore God’s Word with them, to pray with them and for them, and to show them more about this God that loves them deeper than you ever could. Don’t let the summer go by without pouring out your life for your kids and the gospel. They are worth it.

Click here to see all of our Summer TGP Studies!