Less with more

January 24

Sometimes I have to jump in to something with both feet in order to figure out that it is not the right direction for my family. So after two weeks of almost constant after school activity I learned or more accurately re-learned, that we all do better with less. Fewer activities means more time to just be. And I'm a big fan of at least attempting to create time for my children to just be. Time to explore and play, rest and go wild. But I get caught sometimes, I get so excited about all the things we could be doing. All the activities, art, sports, music there are so many choices. I want us to participate and experience everything. But then we have days like today. We are just burnt out. I'm sick, my first grader is grouchy and my little one, she is the key here. She fell asleep, for the night, at 4:30 pm!! Wake up Mamma, something's not right here. Did we get outside? Hmm, technically yes, we had our walk to and from school pick up. But there was no fun outside time. No joyous adventure time. I'm too tired to be creative, and they are just too tired.

So my older daughter and I sit on the couch and snuggle and talk about our plan. She agrees that we are doing too much and she understands that her little sister is getting too tired. She agrees to go back to riding the school bus home and we pick one after school activity. Ahh, I feel better already. She is asleep an hour earlier than normal and we even have time to write a story for her teacher about eating "sand witches." "It has to be funny Mamma," she says with a twinkle in her eye. Thank you for the reminder my dearest.