Fall Activities.

Each season, I try not to overextend ourselves with activities and each season, I re-realize — I think that type of busyness is just the season of our lives right now. 🙂 We talked about letting the kids each pick two things: to try, to play, to take, to do. The problem is three kids each doing two things means that our time after school is mostly spent changing into uniforms, waiting in parking lots and on fields, and driving all over for cheer competitions!

Cub Scouts:

They each chose one consistent activity that won’t change during the year. Javi’s is Cub Scouts! He moved up from a Tiger to a Wolf (see the red hat, and red neckerchief!) His pack meets once a month (the Den meets a bit more frequently) and there’s also a few opportunities for volunteering each month. Right now, he’s selling popcorn! He’s been standing outside a local coffee shop on Sunday mornings trying to sell his share.

Ninja:

This Fall, the sport he chose was Ninja. We really tried to push soccer or baseball because those are the two sports being offered through town — and we have all the gear already. But he wasn’t feeling either of those things. But he’s been loving ninja class. It’s basically an hour of running around, crawling, climbing and hanging off things. We had an unfortunate incident of losing a shoe inside the rock wall (his fault, no doubt), but RIP to his $80 Puma sneakers.

Cheer:

Lola’s seasonal sport is… Cheer, again! She loved it so much last season and this season is no different. This year Cheer is a bit more competitive than last year and it’s also a little more strict. She has practice twice a week, and then cheers for the town football games on Sunday mornings. In September, that felt nice. Now that it’s October, it’s really cold at 7:30AM on Sunday mornings! She also participates in two competitions. The first one was in September and her team placed third! The next one is in two weeks and we’ll see what happens!

Field Hockey:

In a surprising turn of events, Lola wanted to try out field hockey. Our town offers a short season (only 6 weeks, once a week each Sunday) for kindergarten girls and so we signed her up. So technically, she is doing three things. (Always the way with this middle child!) But the commitment is no pressure, they bring all the gear and the field is right next to a great playground so Javi and Eva have no problem going to “support her” (IE: not watch her a bit and run around on the playground for an hour each weekend!) She’s really good at field hockey and says she wants to do the “real thing” next year.

Dance:

Then there’s Dance! Lola and Eva are both doing dance as their consistent activity throughout the year. I’m very proud of myself for signing them up at the exact same day and time so there’s only one drop off and pick up! It also means that we get some solo time with Javi for two hours each week which he is loving. They are in different age groups but are both doing tap, ballet, jazz and hip hop, and gymnastics. They are always so happy to go and so tired when they get home. It’s perfect!

Unfortunately for Eva, there wasn’t a second activity she wanted to try! Well, that isn’t totally true — she really wanted to join a paint class and play soccer! But I couldn’t find classes or teams for her age! I looked and looked!

Ninja, field hockey and cheer wrap up in two to three weeks (I’m a little excited for a change!) And the kids are already talking about what they will do next. They’ve been talking about ice skating, basketball, and swimming. Sean and I have been talking about how to pay for ice skating, basketball and swimming. ha!