Are your weekends fun or practical? What is working for you?

[bisous]

I'm trying to makeover our weekends. Ours are mostly practical and very busy! What do you do? How do you prefer to spend your time? Do you need the weekends to get stuff done? Do you try to do certain things each weekend? (Family outing, personal time, entertain, start an organization project, attend religious services)

Would love to hear your weekend hacks! Provide any details about your family makeup and situation (i.e. I have teenagers and WOHM or I am a SAHM with twin toddlers, etc.) that might be relevant.

Thanks!

[SnuggleBuggles]

Do you have a full weekend or just a day? From your previous posts it seems like your Sundays are only about rest and family time. In that case, then you just have 1 day to get everything practical done vs a weekend to spread it out.


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[123LuckyMom]

I work outside of the home part time and from home part time, but I consider myself a SAHM because I don’t have full-time hours when I need to be at work. I drive the kids to their activities and the like. We have activities every day of the school week, but, except for baseball season, this year we’ve kept weekends free. Sundays are our favorite day. We have church in the morning, and then we always go do something fun, even if it’s just taking a road trip for a distant lunch spot. At night, we try to have a campfire (or fireplace fire during winter or bad weather.) We talk about our week, play each other music we love, and the kids do little performances for us. It’s a really nice ritual. It’s always easy on Sunday, because we have to get up and out in the morning, so we’re in outside-the-house mode. Saturdays are trickier. We’ve all been so exhausted that our inclination is to lounge all day and possibly accomplish some at-home tasks, but we usually don’t accomplish them after all. Often, DH will go to work for a few hours on Saturday morning, and once we’ve all been hanging around until 11am, the lazy bug has kicked in! The kids are fine, because they have lots of kids to play with on our street, so they go out, often still in pjs (or the neighborhood kids come to us) and play, but DH and I kind of vegetate. I’ve found that if we don’t have a plan before the start of the day, we don’t get anything done or participate in any activities. If we do make a plan, though, we do fun stuff on Saturdays, too. Cleaning and projects get neglected. We love to go day camping, hiking, canoeing, and there are also a whole bunch of museums around here we love. There are always concerts and participatory musical things. There’s lots and lots to do every weekend. It’s just what we feel up to. Usually it’s the kids resisting. They want to stay in pjs and lounge, and honestly, I’m usually happy to let that happen. Our weeks are so busy this year that it feels like we need a day with nowhere we need to be and nothing we need to do. We know we’ll do something fun on Sunday. Unfortunately, most of the special kid-oriented events are on Saturdays, so we often miss the festival-type stuff, but we make our own fun.


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[gymnbomb]

Ours are a mix. We are 2 parents who both work full time out of the house with a 1 year old and 4 year old. We do things like grocery shop, laundry, etc. but also try to do at least one more fun thing as a family. Sometimes we will split up for half a day too, when one of us will do something solo or take one kid somewhere and the others will do something else.


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[nfceagles]

I choose a 3rd option. Relax.

I’m a SAHM, but I’m a PTO President so I basically work PT-FT without the hassle of a paycheck. DH travels A LOT for work. So when weekends come around we like to do as little as possible. DH and DS mow the lawn during that season and we often have soccer games to take DS to. We have social gatherings sometimes too, but we avoid many of those except casual get togethers with our closest friends. We are NOT entertainers. We often eat out at casual places (think Moe’s) to avoid cooking. Otherwise we relax and do house projects if we’re feeling motivated and relax if not.


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[basil]

I think over the years I’ve lost the skill of relaxing.

We have music lessons for both kids and dance for DD Saturday mornings. We have swim lessons on sundays. I usually go to Costco and one other grocery store every weekend. We do laundry. We often have play dates or birthday parties for one or the other kid. 1-2x per month we end up having family over for dinner so I cook for 8-10 people. I try my best to get in a workout or a run outside. I try to spend about an hour to myself doing whatever - this last weekend daydreaming about the house.

ETA - 2 WOHP, kids are 4 and 7.

[wendibird22]

I would love to spend it having fun or relaxing.

DH and I both WOH FT. DDs are 9 and 11 and in activities that typically involve some type of weekend commitment. From late Aug until last weekend DD1 had soccer games on Saturday and DD2 had football games on Sunday. We spent what remained of the two afternoons doing grocery shopping, laundry, yard work, cleaning bathrooms, vacuuming, mopping, etc. This weekend it was a 3 hr basketball camp for DD1 one day and I had a brunch to go to the next, so still chaos. I HATE that we seem to spend a portion of every weekend yelling at the kids to get their rooms cleaned, laundry sorted and later put away when clean, and the play room picked up. I long to have a day to stay in my pj's, sip coffee, and watch junk on TV, or to go on an adventure with the kids. We have lost the ability to be spontaneous or have fun.

[smilequeen]

It depends on the kids' schedules. During the fall/winter we are usually really busy with sports on the weekends and tend to relax with what free time we do get. I am a SAHM with all my kids in school, so I get more practical stuff done during the week. My husband might have something he has to get done on the weekend because he travels more for work.

[jgenie]

I’m a SAHM to two (10 and 8). I spend my week taking care of all the practical things so we don’t have them eating our weekends. DH commutes into the city every day and travels so he likes to hang at home on the weekends just relaxing. Our boys aren’t sporty so we pretty much have our weekends free. My kids are close in age and get along well so the need for play dates isn’t big here. I love to be out hiking, festivals, book sales - pretty much whatever we can find that is low key. I will do laundry on Sundays and clean bathrooms if we’re home hanging out.

[essnce629]

Ours is a mix of both, but more fun/relaxing/entertainment. I'm a SAHM with boys in 4th and 10th grade. All my errands, grocery shopping, and the laundry I do is done during the week. We have a weekly housekeeper, gardener, and pool maintenance guy so no time is spent on the weekends deep cleaning or doing yard work. I sleep in super late both days (set my alarm for 11am) unless DS2 has an early soccer game on Saturdays. DH takes DS1 to his 8:30am Japanese class on Saturday mornings and then he's picked up 4 hours later. One soccer game and Japanese class are the only "scheduled" things on weekends. Sundays are usually completely free. We spend our free time lounging around the house or hanging out in the pool/jacuzzi mostly. DH works out in our garage gym and goes for a run both days. My kids have way too much screen time on weekends, but DS2 also usually spends a larg chunk of the weekend playing with our neighbor girl. DS2 and DH often attend LA Galaxy soccer games for fun on the weekends. DH will catch up on his own laundry and go grocery shopping for his work lunches on Sunday. Since we now have a live in babysitter (DS1!!!) DH and I usually go out for dinner and/or a movie on Saturday night.

For example, this weekend I slept in super late both days. DS1 went to Japanese Saturday morning and DS2's soccer game was at 1pm. I picked up DS1 from Japanese since DH was already volunteering at soccer (I refuse to volunteer for soccer since I volunteer at both kids' schools during the week). After soccer I worked on taking down a lot of our outside Halloween decorations. DS2 later went to a friend's house and spent the night. DH and I went out to dinner Saturday night. Sunday DH worked on taking down more of the outside Halloween decorations, then went to buy a suit. I went to Target to check out the Halloween clearance. Once home we went to the mall and ended up eating dinner there. I spent the night finishing up my research for my ballot. DH and I are both homebodies and can sit around at home doing nothing for hours!

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[anonomom]

3 kids, SAHM but I run an advocacy group and am on the PTA board, which together usually mean 20-30 hours of "work" a week. I work hard to get all of the practical stuff done during the week so that weekends are more relaxed. But we usually end up spending the weekend ferrying kids to activities/birthday parties anyway, or working on larger projects around the house.

I do feel like we never spend time having fun as a family any more. I think it's a function of having three kids in a variety of activities. For example, this weekend DD2 had a camping trip, DD1 had practice for 3 hours on Saturday morning and a birthday party on Sunday, while DS and DH had an outdoor activity all day Sunday. There was literally no point at which all of us were in the house and awake all at the same time, and that's fairly typical of late. And I've worked hard to limit the number of activities each kid is in!

[Kindra178]

Our weekends involve a mix of driving kids to travel and local sports, grocery shopping and going out to eat together to catch up. There are a few weekends in August, November and December where we will have no sports. We will go out of town or do family activities.


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[lizzywednesday]

SAHM to an elementary-age only child (who has ADHD) ... and we spend weekends in different ways depending on whether or not we have to go grocery shopping or attend a Scout event.

Shopping Saturdays are every 2 weeks; we go to the grocery store early (before 8am) because it's mostly empty and this helps my DD focus. It also means that our entire day isn't completely shot with shopping because, on a good day, we can finish everything by 10am.

If we have a Saturday Scout event, we might bump shopping to Sunday (again, early) but we rarely change it up.

We do not attend religious services regularly, so we have extra time to laze around or do other things if we want.

[smiles33]

We're both WOHP and I have a long commute. Even though I work from home one day/week (today!), I still spend 50+ hours away from home during the rest of the week. DH works 30 minutes away but he only works 4 days/week. Our DDs, 9 & 12, walk to and from school themselves since I leave the house at 6 am before anyone else is awake. DH sometimes drops them off if the weather is bad, but then they're at school 30 minutes early.

We limit the kids to one activity that takes places 2/week on weekday afternoon/evenings. My parents come once/week to drive them to their 2/week after-school activity. DH handles the other day. We try to keep our weekends completely unscheduled so we can do laundry, handle household errands/projects, and just decompress. We also often leave town to go to our vacation house 2 hours away to get "off the grid" and feel like it's a real getaway. Lately, that's been only 1/month but it really does feel like a mini-vacation.

I also outsource quite a bit. We order almost everything from Amazon so I rarely go to Target. DH does 50% of the cooking on the weekends or on his day when he's not at the office. I hired a personal chef to meet me at my office to cover the second half of the week. We also have weekly housekeeping and gardening service.

Once the kids are older, I imagine there will be more weekend activities. We'll stay in town if they want to do a playdate, but for now, we don't do any weekend activities like sports, dance, or piano that require an ongoing commitment.

[bisous]

Do you have a full weekend or just a day? From your previous posts it seems like your Sundays are only about rest and family time. In that case, then you just have 1 day to get everything practical done vs a weekend to spread it out.


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This is true! I try to plan it so that family time is restorative but it does take more planning. I know this isn't the case for all on the board but I'd love to hear from others who celebrate a "sabbath" day on the weekend and how they structure other needs on the weekend.

[bisous]

I work outside of the home part time and from home part time, but I consider myself a SAHM because I don’t have full-time hours when I need to be at work. I drive the kids to their activities and the like. We have activities every day of the school week, but, except for baseball season, this year we’ve kept weekends free. Sundays are our favorite day. We have church in the morning, and then we always go do something fun, even if it’s just taking a road trip for a distant lunch spot. At night, we try to have a campfire (or fireplace fire during winter or bad weather.) We talk about our week, play each other music we love, and the kids do little performances for us. It’s a really nice ritual. It’s always easy on Sunday, because we have to get up and out in the morning, so we’re in outside-the-house mode. Saturdays are trickier. We’ve all been so exhausted that our inclination is to lounge all day and possibly accomplish some at-home tasks, but we usually don’t accomplish them after all. Often, DH will go to work for a few hours on Saturday morning, and once we’ve all been hanging around until 11am, the lazy bug has kicked in! The kids are fine, because they have lots of kids to play with on our street, so they go out, often still in pjs (or the neighborhood kids come to us) and play, but DH and I kind of vegetate. I’ve found that if we don’t have a plan before the start of the day, we don’t get anything done or participate in any activities. If we do make a plan, though, we do fun stuff on Saturdays, too. Cleaning and projects get neglected. We love to go day camping, hiking, canoeing, and there are also a whole bunch of museums around here we love. There are always concerts and participatory musical things. There’s lots and lots to do every weekend. It’s just what we feel up to. Usually it’s the kids resisting. They want to stay in pjs and lounge, and honestly, I’m usually happy to let that happen. Our weeks are so busy this year that it feels like we need a day with nowhere we need to be and nothing we need to do. We know we’ll do something fun on Sunday. Unfortunately, most of the special kid-oriented events are on Saturdays, so we often miss the festival-type stuff, but we make our own fun.


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This is helpful and follows a similar pattern on Saturdays to what happens around here. I'm a planner. I want to be going all day. I tend to do too much--whether that is a fun event or chores and I find that most of my people--DH and most of the kids--prefer an easier pace. I think weekends work best when they take all the needs into effect. DH, DS1 and DS3 like to chill. DS2, DD and I like to go!

I love your idea of a campfire at night. That would be nice.

[bisous]

Ours are a mix. We are 2 parents who both work full time out of the house with a 1 year old and 4 year old. We do things like grocery shop, laundry, etc. but also try to do at least one more fun thing as a family. Sometimes we will split up for half a day too, when one of us will do something solo or take one kid somewhere and the others will do something else.


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Splitting up is crucial! I'm glad I'm not the only one who needs to get stuff done on Saturdays.

[bisous]

I choose a 3rd option. Relax.

I’m a SAHM, but I’m a PTO President so I basically work PT-FT without the hassle of a paycheck. DH travels A LOT for work. So when weekends come around we like to do as little as possible. DH and DS mow the lawn during that season and we often have soccer games to take DS to. We have social gatherings sometimes too, but we avoid many of those except casual get togethers with our closest friends. We are NOT entertainers. We often eat out at casual places (think Moe’s) to avoid cooking. Otherwise we relax and do house projects if we’re feeling motivated and relax if not.


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I think this is how DH would like to spend the weekends. He does like to entertain but he needs a lot of down time. Eating out is definitely my idea of connecting and getting out but unfortunately it isn't in the budget right now for us. Maybe DH and I need to reevaluate whether we can move that around a bit. Do you say no to a lot of social events? Do you offer an excuse usually or just decline?

[bisous]

I think over the years I’ve lost the skill of relaxing.

We have music lessons for both kids and dance for DD Saturday mornings. We have swim lessons on sundays. I usually go to Costco and one other grocery store every weekend. We do laundry. We often have play dates or birthday parties for one or the other kid. 1-2x per month we end up having family over for dinner so I cook for 8-10 people. I try my best to get in a workout or a run outside. I try to spend about an hour to myself doing whatever - this last weekend daydreaming about the house.

ETA - 2 WOHP, kids are 4 and 7.

Do you miss relaxing? Is this fulfilling for you?

[bisous]

I would love to spend it having fun or relaxing.

DH and I both WOH FT. DDs are 9 and 11 and in activities that typically involve some type of weekend commitment. From late Aug until last weekend DD1 had soccer games on Saturday and DD2 had football games on Sunday. We spent what remained of the two afternoons doing grocery shopping, laundry, yard work, cleaning bathrooms, vacuuming, mopping, etc. This weekend it was a 3 hr basketball camp for DD1 one day and I had a brunch to go to the next, so still chaos. I HATE that we seem to spend a portion of every weekend yelling at the kids to get their rooms cleaned, laundry sorted and later put away when clean, and the play room picked up. I long to have a day to stay in my pj's, sip coffee, and watch junk on TV, or to go on an adventure with the kids. We have lost the ability to be spontaneous or have fun.

Yep. Yelling at the kids to clean their rooms! Kid activities and sports do kind of set a structure for the weekends. I love what sports do for kids but it would also be nice to be free of them.

[bisous]

It depends on the kids' schedules. During the fall/winter we are usually really busy with sports on the weekends and tend to relax with what free time we do get. I am a SAHM with all my kids in school, so I get more practical stuff done during the week. My husband might have something he has to get done on the weekend because he travels more for work.

I'm trying to figure out if I can assume more weekend duties during the week. My kids just went to school full time for the first time in 15 years. But I'm also working more! So I have more time but not tons more.

[bisous]

I’m a SAHM to two (10 and 8). I spend my week taking care of all the practical things so we don’t have them eating our weekends. DH commutes into the city every day and travels so he likes to hang at home on the weekends just relaxing. Our boys aren’t sporty so we pretty much have our weekends free. My kids are close in age and get along well so the need for play dates isn’t big here. I love to be out hiking, festivals, book sales - pretty much whatever we can find that is low key. I will do laundry on Sundays and clean bathrooms if we’re home hanging out.

It is actually really refreshing to read this. Two of my kids--the two oldest--have done sports and I like it for them in some ways but it isn't necessarily their jam. Its nice to hear that other families feel just fine about letting that go. Sometimes I'm really tempted by that. That's definitely how DH is, doesn't love the whole sports thing and would be super happy to have more time on the weekends. DH also has a killer commute. When I factor into the equation what he'd like to do I have to remember that while I'm often home during the week--he never is.

[bisous]

Ours is a mix of both, but more fun/relaxing/entertainment. I'm a SAHM with boys in 4th and 10th grade. All my errands, grocery shopping, and the laundry I do is done during the week. We have a weekly housekeeper, gardener, and pool maintenance guy so no time is spent on the weekends deep cleaning or doing yard work. I sleep in super late both days (set my alarm for 11am) unless DS2 has an early soccer game on Saturdays. DH takes DS1 to his 8:30am Japanese class on Saturday mornings and then he's picked up 4 hours later. One soccer game and Japanese class are the only "scheduled" things on weekends. Sundays are usually completely free. We spend our free time lounging around the house or hanging out in the pool/jacuzzi mostly. DH works out in our garage gym and goes for a run both days. My kids have way too much screen time on weekends, but DS2 also usually spends a larg chunk of the weekend playing with our neighbor girl. DS2 and DH often attend LA Galaxy soccer games for fun on the weekends. DH will catch up on his own laundry and go grocery shopping for his work lunches on Sunday. Since we now have a live in babysitter (DS1!!!) DH and I usually go out for dinner and/or a movie on Saturday night.

For example, this weekend I slept in super late both days. DS1 went to Japanese Saturday morning and DS2's soccer game was at 1pm. I picked up DS1 from Japanese since DH was already volunteering at soccer (I refuse to volunteer for soccer since I volunteer at both kids' schools during the week). After soccer I worked on taking down a lot of our outside Halloween decorations. DS2 later went to a friend's house and spent the night. DH and I went out to dinner Saturday night. Sunday DH worked on taking down more of the outside Halloween decorations, then went to buy a suit. I went to Target to check out the Halloween clearance. Once home we went to the mall and ended up eating dinner there. I spent the night finishing up my research for my ballot. DH and I are both homebodies and can sit around at home doing nothing for hours!

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Love hearing about fellow homebodies. I can easily fit that pattern and DH is definitely a homebody. Do you find that at the end of the weekend you feel fulfilled and energized for the week?

[bisous]

3 kids, SAHM but I run an advocacy group and am on the PTA board, which together usually mean 20-30 hours of "work" a week. I work hard to get all of the practical stuff done during the week so that weekends are more relaxed. But we usually end up spending the weekend ferrying kids to activities/birthday parties anyway, or working on larger projects around the house.

I do feel like we never spend time having fun as a family any more. I think it's a function of having three kids in a variety of activities. For example, this weekend DD2 had a camping trip, DD1 had practice for 3 hours on Saturday morning and a birthday party on Sunday, while DS and DH had an outdoor activity all day Sunday. There was literally no point at which all of us were in the house and awake all at the same time, and that's fairly typical of late. And I've worked hard to limit the number of activities each kid is in!

Do you ever say no to the kid activities for balance in the family? I feel like sometimes it is the silliest thing that we tie ourselves in knots to try and fit in birthday parties for 5 yos but at the same time the kids have a great time and we like supporting the families. There are just so many ways to spend time. I guess it is just a game of trying to make each weekend make sense. I guess we're all pretty lucky on this board to have a variety of good ways to spend our time each weekend!

[bisous]

Our weekends involve a mix of driving kids to travel and local sports, grocery shopping and going out to eat together to catch up. There are a few weekends in August, November and December where we will have no sports. We will go out of town or do family activities.


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I know sports are huge for you guys. Do you find ways to make that an enjoyable family event? Would you ever consider dropping sports? How do you recharge if you are busy with kid stuff all weekend or is that actually energizing for you?

I ask because I kind of love so many things about kid sports but I worry about certain members of my family and needing their downtime. I've seen SO many positive things from having DS3 in sports this season (for example) but at the same time he's totally tired out and so is DH. Do you find that you recharge during the week?

[bisous]

SAHM to an elementary-age only child (who has ADHD) ... and we spend weekends in different ways depending on whether or not we have to go grocery shopping or attend a Scout event.

Shopping Saturdays are every 2 weeks; we go to the grocery store early (before 8am) because it's mostly empty and this helps my DD focus. It also means that our entire day isn't completely shot with shopping because, on a good day, we can finish everything by 10am.

If we have a Saturday Scout event, we might bump shopping to Sunday (again, early) but we rarely change it up.

We do not attend religious services regularly, so we have extra time to laze around or do other things if we want.

What do you do after you finish shopping or scouts? I have (some) ADHD kids too and I do feel like downtime is important for some of them. Do you enjoy your weekends? Do you finish all the chores since you are home?

[bisous]

We're both WOHP and I have a long commute. Even though I work from home one day/week (today!), I still spend 50+ hours away from home during the rest of the week. DH works 30 minutes away but he only works 4 days/week. Our DDs, 9 & 12, walk to and from school themselves since I leave the house at 6 am before anyone else is awake. DH sometimes drops them off if the weather is bad, but then they're at school 30 minutes early.

We limit the kids to one activity that takes places 2/week on weekday afternoon/evenings. My parents come once/week to drive them to their 2/week after-school activity. DH handles the other day. We try to keep our weekends completely unscheduled so we can do laundry, handle household errands/projects, and just decompress. We also often leave town to go to our vacation house 2 hours away to get "off the grid" and feel like it's a real getaway. Lately, that's been only 1/month but it really does feel like a mini-vacation.

I also outsource quite a bit. We order almost everything from Amazon so I rarely go to Target. DH does 50% of the cooking on the weekends or on his day when he's not at the office. I hired a personal chef to meet me at my office to cover the second half of the week. We also have weekly housekeeping and gardening service.

Once the kids are older, I imagine there will be more weekend activities. We'll stay in town if they want to do a playdate, but for now, we don't do any weekend activities like sports, dance, or piano that require an ongoing commitment.

You have a schedule just like DH! I like that you do a lot of work on weekends but that you also schedule away time (your second home). Maybe a way to mix it up is to reserve one weekend or so just for family stuff. We couldn't manage to get away completely but maybe we can reserve an entire Saturday for an adventure or something? My kids are not much older than yours and DS1 doesn't have a ton of weekend activities. DS2 (who is 11) has a lot more and it has always been that way. I think it is personality.

[jgenie]

It is actually really refreshing to read this. Two of my kids--the two oldest--have done sports and I like it for them in some ways but it isn't necessarily their jam. Its nice to hear that other families feel just fine about letting that go. Sometimes I'm really tempted by that. That's definitely how DH is, doesn't love the whole sports thing and would be super happy to have more time on the weekends. DH also has a killer commute. When I factor into the equation what he'd like to do I have to remember that while I'm often home during the week--he never is.

The bolded was tough for me to accept because I don’t want to spend our weekends in front of the TV. Like your DH my DH is gone much of the week so I’ve adjusted to spending more time at home not doing much of anything. DH is much happier when we’re home without commitments. We’re low screen here so most of our time at home is spent playing in the yard, reading, doing puzzles or playing games.

[bisous]

The bolded was tough for me to accept because I don’t want to spend our weekends in front of the TV. Like your DH my DH is gone much of the week so I’ve adjusted to spending more time at home not doing much of anything. DH is much happier when we’re home without commitments. We’re low screen here so most of our time at home is spent playing in the yard, reading, doing puzzles or playing games.

Mad respect to you on the low screens. We don’t do a ton during the week but if we have a weekend at home we fall into that. The way you spend your time sounds great!

[niccig]

I’m more the practical person let’s get all these items marked off the to do list, and DH wants the rest and relax weekend. Some weekends it’s more one than the other depending on what’s going g on. I do need some things to be done on weekends to make week easier - laundry, groceries, and I like to make a pot of oatmeal so breakfast is done.

I’d should start planning to do one thing from the to do list every weekend as I start to get stressed if too many weekends are resting as the jobs pile up. This doesn’t stress out DH, but it stresses me. I have longer breaks from work, so I try to do bigger jobs during those breaks Eg ckean our garage


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[♥ms.pacman♥]

I keep weekends free for family stuff like going to the zoo, to Crayola experience, science museum, going bowling, biking etc. Also DH and I get in exercise classes on both days. Unless we have a birthday party or play date scheduled we usually don’t have anything scheduled and I LOVE IT. I honestly hate the notion spending of my whole Saturday driving kids to activities. Since I work full time I want days off to relax and spend time woth the kids.

This does mean we have to cram activities in during the week - kids do swim lessons Monday evenings, DD has piano Tuesday afternoons. And dd used to have gymnastics Friday evenings. But it really works well for us. I love have weekend open and unscheduled.

That doesn’t mean though that we don’t do chores etc- I do all the laundry on weekends and we also do some meal prep and declittering etc.

[carolinamama]

Our weekends are usually busy, busy, busy! All 3 of my kids have found their way to competitive sports. Seriously, it seemed to just happen and since they have fun, stay active and out of trouble, we go with it. I keep telling myself that I will miss it when they are gone. We are usually driving to soccer games/tournaments or gym meets. There is some socialization built into it since the kids and parents get to know each other. And the kids play with neighbors more than organized playdates so that helps.

I also work some weekends, making everything even crazier! But I try to do most grocery shopping and errands during the week. I do laundry as needed rather than all on one day or specified time. Cleaning - I have a biweekly cleaning person and I try to avoid too much cleaning on weekends. My boys are getting old enough now to help out, although reluctantly. It does help some.

There is no right or wrong way to do it! And I suspect most of us are struggling to balance our lives. I know it is a constant challenge around here.

[JustMe]

I appreciate this thread as I am trying to figure this out myself. I have been reading through trying to figure out what positive things I can take.

We generally have a mix of things. As most of you know, I am a single mom with 2 kids. All 3 of us like down time/relaxing. Ds generally has a soccer game (sometimes in town which is not a big deal, but more often than not 2 hours away so that can use up most of a day). I try to tell the kids what chores we need to do and make sure they get done. They do vary by the week and season. Of course, then it depends upon what other activities are happening including friends' parties, etc. One thing I am realizing is that I could make sure to plan in a time for a fun together time almost every weekend, so I am going to look into that.

[baymom]

We’ve changed as a family a lot over the years. I was a SAHM for 8 years after our DS was born and then DD came a year and a half later. DH worked 70-80 hour weeks and it was just survival. I don’t have any clear memories of how we spent our weekends until the kids were toddlers. DH worked slightly more reasonable hours, but when weekends came, he was too exhausted to want to do much. He needed to unwind from the week. Meanwhile, I had cabin fever from being home with young children and always wanted to do day trips. Luckily I had a great Mom’s group so was able to get out with the kids and socialize with friends a lot during the week. I let my standards for cleaning fall a lot and did as little as possible in terms of cleaning, shopping and errands on weekends. We tried to just be together as a family weather it was doing things inside or outside the home.

Now, the kids are 12 & 14, I have been WOTH for 6 years. I’m a homebody by nature and when the weekend rolls around I’m happy to be home with a good book or baking/watching a movie/playing board games at home. Now I’m the one that wants to unwind from the week at home. But, I no longer have the luxury of getting ‘house’ things done during the week so have to make time for Costcp/laundry/ect over the weekend. Both kids play competitive soccer year round so our weekends revolve around games. All 4 of us are volunteer AYSO refs, so fall weekends are at the pitch all day. There are rarely free weekends anymore for weekends away or all day, day trips. While I do miss those years with open weekends, I love this phase, too. The kids also want to spend more time with friends then with DH & me, so aren’t even always interested in our weekend ideas. Still, we hold onto some traditions on weekends that I hope will be great memories for the kids. (making breakfast together, a long family walk, ect.)

[legaleagle]

Very interesting thread! Right now we have very few scheduled activities - Saturday morning dance class for DD (6), I also signed DS3 (3) up for a class at the same time to keep him occupied. DS2 (8) has OT Saturday afternoons. At least half the time the 3 big kids sleep over at my mom's, DS3 doesn't want to yet. We try to leave all 4 of them Saturday afternoons, have an early dinner out with just the 2 of us, then pick up DS3 and go home. We do family outings probably every 3rd weekend, we also get takeout with good friends who have 2 DC the same age as DS1&DS2 every few weeks, either our house or theirs. So low key in general - we try to keep activities limited as much as possible because we already feel stretched so thin with 4 kids and 2 working parents.

[mom2binsd]

I'm not sure short of cutting my kids activities out my weekends would change much. My kids are 12 and 15. They are with me most of the time, their dad lives in another town and they prefer to stay in our town vs going to his apartment, but I encourage them to go when their schedule permits. He needs to move closer (it's only 45 min but the kids dislike his place).

I'm a single parent, work full time outside the home and both kids play travel hockey, and DD swims on the high school team (Aug-Nov season, meets every Sat mostly) and she plays lacrosse in the spring. I occasionally work weekends for a few hours.

So our weekends are filled with lots of activity/fun, although a lot of driving on my part as we play in Chicago mostly which is two hours away. The hockey games are fun, and my social life is partly with our hockey families.

I grocery shop/do laundry/clean/yardwork etc when I can. The kids pitch in with many chores and we get things done as needed, but not on any specific schedule. My house is by no means perfectly clean but it is what it is.

There are times when I go out with friends/on a date on a weekend night/or occasionally on weeknight, but our lives revolve around the hockey schedule from Sept to March.

[schrocat]

Our weekends are practical. DH needs alot of down time and was miserable if I planned too much fun stuff on the weekends so we occasionally do fun stuff but not every weekend and we use the weekends to catch up on stuff. I let him sleep as late as I can.

I send the kids to swim lessons and swim team practice on my own. DH sends the oldest to his private piano and viola lessons on his own and catches up on reading while waiting. He occasionally takes some of the kids out for hikes and we do parents night out once or twice a month. It's very stressful bringing out all 4 kids out together so we've moved away from that after being battle scarred.

Every month we have swim meets and DH does that on his own or if he can't, I bring the kids. For concerts, either one of us brings the kid.

[marinkitty]

I have two teens and tween and our weekends have really evolved over time as the kids have been at different stages of development. Right now, they are a mix of kid-related activities, family time and adult-only time (this latter part is more recent now that the kids often have their own social plans in addition to their scheduled sports and other activities). When the kids were smaller we had a lot more family time and family-centered social stuff (dinners with another family with similar aged kids; neighborhood hanging out etc). I figure it's all just a season of life, so we don't try to hard to control what our kids are interested in - if it ends up being weekend heavy stuff that's fine for us as we can already see that we'll have more than enough time for ourselves before we know it. We already often will find ourselves with time to take a walk together, sit and chat over coffee or get out for happy hour or dinner without any kids - just part of the kids becoming more independent as they get older. We do try to always have Sunday dinner together - we used to go out but now we have been eating in. And we try for a family dinner as much as possible mid-week too, but that sometimes means eating in shifts for activities.

DD is into performing arts so she often has rehearsals on weekends and also sings in a choir and takes acting lessons. Her weeknights are already too busy with homework and rehearsals to fit everything in during the week, so things move to the weekend. And she has her own social plans too.

Older DS (8th grade) plays travel hockey and is often with friends on the weekends. He's also doing confirmation now and that falls on Sunday evenings, which has bitten into our usual Sunday family dinner out this year.

Younger DS plays travel soccer and hockey. He still needs more hands on management but his sports keep him busy as he has games for each on the weekends and usually a hockey practice too.

If we find ourselves with a quiet day - we try to maximize it with a fun family outing. But often at least one kid has something so then the others just take the day for more R&R than we usually have. We make a big family breakfast on the weekend mornings and we try to get to church (all or some of us) most weeks during the school year.

Because weekends are so busy, we maximize family-only time on school breaks, summer and vacations. We travel a lot - so that ends up being a lot of good quality time. And we've recently started taking the kids for one-parent, one-child trips as their school breaks don't always coincide anymore, nor their free weekends.

I try hard to get most errands and projects done during the week (SAHM) so that we don't have that cluttering up our weekends. But of course some errands and projects spill over or require more hands-on time from DH who is always unavailable during the week (long hours and lots of travel).

[JamiMac]

Our weekends are pretty busy, but really dependent on the time of the year. Baseball season we have tournaments, usually both days, club volleyball season we have tournaments both days. We work around this though, because they take up either the morning time, or evening time, but not both. My son also plays basketball and we have a game on the weekend. I don't mind the sports at all and certainly don't find it to hinder things. In fact, I love it and can foresee missing these days. These times are so fleeting and I know it! My oldest DD has already retired from all sports and works a part time job and drives herself everywhere.
Otherwise, we will also work in a date night most weekends or grill steaks at home instead and sit on the patio. We try to go to dinner as a family and also try to go to church on the weekend. When we don't have sports, DH and I will golf a few times a month on the weekend, and have that as a date also. The kids are always having sleepovers and that keeps us busy, too.

[mackmama]

We are all homebodies, but DC and I mainly like to recharge on weekends doing stuff that's more fun like playdates, lounging, bday parties, art projects, baking, get togethers with friends, etc whereas DH wants us to "accomplish and be productive."

[magnoliaparadise]

I appreciate this thread. I am going to go back and read all of it later.

We do mostly practical, and in that, I include classes they are in. Yes, the classes are 'fun', but they are also required so some of our days, like Sunday, get limited in free time by religious school, or Saturday by sports. We also do laundry and generally resting, which I think of as practical.

We also sometimes do fun, but honestly, I don't feel like we have much time to see people at this point because of all the kids' other commitments. Sometimes, we will try to get away for the weekend, but even that is hard because it means giving up so many of the sports that the kids would normally do and want and/or need to do.