1m2aSandbox

We had a hard week here last week: we had to say farewell to a beloved family pet on Friday, as well as face the first anniversary of the death of a very dear friend of mine and Brian’s. Friday night Brian and I did a concert we’ve been working on for almost a year, and at the end of the evening we were exhausted. I looked at the girls, running and happy with friends when just a couple hours before they’d been sobbing about our pet, and knew that Saturday was going to be hard.

So I cancelled the weekend. All of it.

Every year for Christmas, my girls get “experience” gifts from their grandparents: tickets to a few shows each year, accompanied by the family, of course. These shows are always children’s shows, and usually a musical written out of an existing book, such as Fancy Nancy or Martha Speaks or something like that. We absolutely love going to the shows, and the girls think that seeing the book come to life is incredibly cool.

This weekend, we had tickets to go see “Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day”. It’s been a favorite at our house, because it’s so darn relatable: Alexander starts off his day by waking up with gum in his hair and then accidentally stepping on a skateboard, and the day goes downhill from there. You can practically see the black cloud hanging over Alexander as the day goes on, and his mood gets fouler and fouler. As little pebbles are thrown at Alexander – no dessert in lunch, a teacher who doesn’t like his drawing of an invisible castle – those pebbles become an avalanche until all he can do is go to bed and hope that the next day will be better.

We’re coming up on that yearly event when the household goes into a panic and people are frantically rushing around, sorting through songs, debating dance costumes, and arguing with friends over lyric distribution.

Yes, it’s time for the annual school talent show.

We did a lot of fun things over spring break, and spent as much time as was humanly possible outside and being active. We did little hikes, and had several day-long playdates at local parks, and practically spent the entire weekend outdoors on the farm.

But my favorite outdoor time was our Big Bike Ride.

We’ve got a lot of great jogging paths right near our house, and you can get on one and stay on it for miles without having to cross a street or deal with cars. So one day we decided to pack some snacks, get on the bike, and ride to a favorite park.

A few miles away.

There’s an article circulating the internet about one Mom’s version of Independence Day: a few times a year, her family has a day where EVERYONE does EVERYTHING for him or herself.

This is very attractive to me.

This mom started her tradition – now something they do a few times a year, for several years and counting – when she realized that all the ways she serves her children may also be holding them back from natural independence. Shoe tying, water fetching, late-homework-bringing, all the things we do because we want our kids to have a good life, can sometimes be what keeps them from figuring stuff out for themselves.