Give Them Something To Do

Mary, art

Rachel, horseback riding

Children need things to do. Each of us need a balance of work, play and rest. Early on, we thought that if each child had an activity to do that was enough. Then we decided that music wasn't going to be an option so we added that. Multiply an activity and music lessons by the number of school age girls and things began to get out of hand.

There are so many options out there for children - every sport, musical instrument and arts galore. We kind of got stuck in a rut with basketball, but have had a few other options over the years. Some of the girls have tried more activities than others because of where our family was at the time practically (finances, extra hours in the day, number of drivers in the house.)

Hannah, soccer

Doubling up activities and lessons helped ease the schedule a little. Carpooling would have helped on many occasions but it didn't come along very often.  We had to make hard decisions to not participate in things we really wanted to and  had to make the heart breaking decision to completely pull out of an activity because it interfered with church.

Lydia, piano

Sarah, basketball

Are there regrets? Of course, but don't we all?

These are a few pictures of the girls doing some of the things that they loved to do at the time. Are these the things they will make a career out of? Probably not, but they learned some valuable lessons from them. And our family has been enriched because of them.