As parents, we want our children to try as many activities as possible. We try all the sports, dance, gymnastics, horse riding, swimming, music lesson, etc. After a while, your child tells you the activities they enjoy the most. For my oldest daughter, it’s dance AND soccer.
Dance is a school year activity. She also added Nutcracker to her agenda last winter. Soccer usually only lasts about six weeks for each season, fall and spring. Our youngest daughter is also in dance and this year has added competition dance to the list.
Things Are Changing
This year, we have had a couple of our teammates from soccer leave. Their departure after years of being on the team is completely understandable, especially at this age (10-11 years old). It seems we are at the time in life where kids tend to choose the activity or activities they want to focus on.
I have had this discussion with my daughter for the past couple of years. I am fine if she wants to continue recreational dance and soccer but at some point, if she wants to focus on one, we will have to push the other to the side. Her heart will pull her one way or the other.
I say this because as parents, we only have so much time. We are only able to do so much financially. We only have so much sanity. We all wish our kids could be involved in all the things, but a lot of times it’s just not possible.
Divide and Conquer
When you have multiple children and multiple activities, everyone has to play a part. For instance, I am usually the one in charge of dance schedules and classes. My husband is in charge of soccer. He’s also the assistant coach so that helps.
The girls know that they may have to sit in the car with me to wait for the other to get out of dance class. My younger daughter may have to go sit at soccer practice from time to time. My mom helps with school pickup and dance class drop off once a week. We also carpool when available for dance classes. It literally takes a village, but everyone knows if this wasn’t the case, they wouldn’t be able to have the chance to be as involved.
My house would never run as smoothly (I use the term loosely) as it does if it wasn’t for our trusted dry-erase calendar. Each kid has their own color marker. Activities and tests are listed for anyone to see the schedule. It has been a true lifesaver.
I love that we are able to give our children these opportunities. I’m happy we have found some sort of groove to make it all happen. I also know that as exhausting as it may be today, when they are grown we’re going to miss the days of homework in the car and running from one place to another after school … maybe.
