Social Director

I feel like just about everyday I get a chance to learn a new part of being a parent. I guess that's what happens as children grow older and more independent. Nonetheless, it never fails to surprise me that we've entered a new stage. I guess I feel like once and a while it would be nice to stay with the status quo, but no one ever said parenting was an easily understood role.

They make it all sound so easy though.

Pardon the whine.

Today's new role is that of cruise director and social planner. Suddenly I'm learning that my boys want to have social lives. Sparky is playing in a weekend basketball league and Catfish has been invited to several playdates of late. I'm having to check my schedule and write their plans into the family calendar. I knew a day would come where they had their own plans and agendas, but like so many other things, I just wasn't expecting it already.

Its really not anything troublesome. They're growing up a bit and want (naturally) to expand their circle of friends and so the least I can do is encourage and support them. But its another realization that they are getting older and more independent. That the stages I swore we'd never get out of (namely teething and not sleeping through the night) really are passing as quickly as all the ladies in the supermarket promised they would.

And that its not just my will going on in this houshold. Afterall, until now, if we had an activity in the afternoons, its because I signed them up for something, or I wanted to get together with friends to let the kids play. But now the boys have ideas; what they want to do comes into the equation.

Its a lesson for me in letting go. Now I can learn to include activities that are their ideas and include their gifts (balanced, of course, with a healthy dose of unscheduled free time). But the lesson is learned. I can't dictate over the whole family anymore, and really its nice to not have to anymore. The decisions are guided by my husband and I, but as a true family, we will all get to have a say in how we spend our free time.