Table 2 Selected quotations to illustrate key themes from parent interviews (n = 28), The FLEX Summer Study, Summer 2015

I. Summer activities vary substantially by family

“I don’t think there is a typical summer weekday. But in the summer, he has soccer camps and hockey camps …”

“She wakes up and … because I work during the day, she spends the days with my mother.”

“She did participate in summer school. That was a six-week program … 1 day a week for 2 h.”

“Their day-to-day activity will change if they’re going to camp versus if they’re staying home. But they’re pretty much scheduled …”

“Three days a week he goes to camp … and then 2 days during the week he’s with grandparents. And weekends at home with parents.”

II. Summer means less structure and more autonomy for most children

“… I kind of just let them be. I don’t pressure them into being on a strict schedule in the summertime. When they’re hungry, they eat … And we just kind of go with the flow … I don’t really make set plans or a set schedule. We just wake up and whatever the day brings, that’s what we end up doing.”

“During the summertime I kind of just let it … flow. You know, we go to the beach for the day. When we get there, then we just stay, and it’s not as structured. We don’t have to be home at 4:00 to get homework done before any activities or anything like that.”

“… there’s not the strict structure during the vacation. It’s up to him. He can change activities as he wants.”

“Because she’s on vacation, and I don’t want to put too much pressure … I want her to be a lot more relaxed and have her own time … she can do her whole schedule. When she wants to go to bed. When she wants to play, she plays, when she want to read, she reads.”

III. Summer poses few barriers to physical activity

“I think he’s probably more active during the summer …. I think he’s got more time to be active …”

“I feel like school is like, sit down and shut up, and do your work. You know, you’ve gotta sit there, and he … likes movement. So I feel like he’s able to get more energy out in the summertime ….”

“I think he’s definitely more active in the summer because of the camp.”

“Any things that make it more difficult to be active during the summer? No, because I think he is more active during the summer. So … it just makes it easier.”

“When it was too hot, even though he would want to go out and play, sometimes I would just keep them indoors. I don’t have them go out and play when it’s so hot like that.”

“Well, the weather, for one … helps tremendously. Even though I gotta say during the winter, we’re out there, too. Then, having no homework. That’s a big thing for her.”

IV. Summer nutrition can be a double-edged sword

“Certainly there are better fruits and vegetables available … I think it’s a little bit harder during the winter to get a lot of fresh produce that truly tastes really good.”

“The pricing is obviously lower in the summer, for people to be able to afford more fruits and vegetables … it’s more available … I think that parents in general … might have more time to actually put the effort into cut up the fruit, and wash it and clean it and already have it set in a Tupperware. And kids can go ahead and open the fridge. They see that and they feel comfortable to kind of help themselves.”

“I guess because I’m off, I can do more grocery shopping and buy more fresh food. It’s a little bit more convenient … but, it’s also harder. Because no matter where we go somebody else has snacks that they’re sharing so … we try to watch what other people bring.”

“Well, I think we eat a lot of ice cream in the summer … we go to the beach, they get Italian ice, there’s popsicles. That snacky stuff is definitely more … It becomes more of a common thing in the summer than like a treat, where it wouldn’t be in the winter.”

“I don’t have that control at Grandma’s, and I know Grandma has a treat drawer.”

“Yeah, there’s so many fairs, and carnivals, and sidewalk bazaars with junk food and ice cream trucks. And what did we have Saturday? Fried dough!”

“… it gets hard when there’s like the cookouts, the barbeques … There’s always the burgers, and hot dogs, and … people only have their summer birthday parties or stuff like that.”

V. Rules are often more negotiable in the summer

“I teach, so I have summers off. So it’s not a daily routine for us to get up at a certain time … You know, I can let the kids sleep in until they need to, and get whatever sleep they need to. I usually try to get them to bed at a reasonable hour, but if something special is going on … you know, they’ve been able to stay up until … 10:30 at the latest.”

“In the summertime, like I said, we go out for ice cream more than I care to talk about [laughs]. You know, more than we would during the school year … definitely there are more treats during the summertime.”

“I think definitely more screen time during the summer, because I am not on top of them. They might be relaxing while I’m trying to do the laundry or do the dishes, and I might lose track of time, so they might get a few extra minutes here and there. So I definitely think during the summer they spend more time on it.”

“Usually during the summer I am a little bit more lenient [with screen time], because he doesn’t have homework to do … there are still rules, I think it’s just a little bit more lenient …”

VI. Summer break can be stressful for families

“I work part time, but you know, money is not flowing, so she comes to work with me. Fortunately, I’m allowed to do that.”

“It’s harder because they have more free time. There’s more to manage. School does half the day for you during the school year.”

“… as a working mom … it’s harder right from the bat to figure out what you’re going to do with your kids during the day. Or a working family, with two parents working … the structure of the school year is easier, I think.”

“Between work and everything like … affording three camps is just not possible for the whole summer for us, so … I have to still work, and find people to watch my kids on the other days, which my parents, or my husband’s parents normally do. But it’s hard, yeah. It’s hard to occupy them and keep them engaged for the whole summer.”

VII. Families are making an effort to practice healthy behaviors

“We have fruit available all the time, and they’re allowed to snack on that whenever they want … Vegetables, we try to have them with dinner and if we have one or two, they have to usually finish all of what we give them … They might have a little more during the summer.”

“A big garden! Right now we have tomatoes, cucumbers, squash, broccoli, green beans, peppers … scallions, onions, herbs. We used to get a vegetable share, where once a week we picked up a giant box full of vegetables. That helps, because everything was new and an adventure to try.”

“I have three boys, and we have three bowls of fruit on the table at any given moment.”

“Usually we end our meals with a fruit. We don’t have like a dessert after meals, but we will have like a fruit after meals.”

“I put vegetables in everything. Like, they just caught me making my meatloaf the other day, and it’s got spinach in it. They’re like, ‘Mom, what are you doing?’ and I’m like, ‘You’ve been eating this your entire life. Get over it.’”

“I usually try to make them pour into a cup. Like maintain a portion size, not to just walk around with a box of Cheez-its and just … devouring them.”

“No electronics before bed. Well, we usually watch TV at night, and then usually go up, wind down with some reading, and then go.”