This time of year always puts me in a pondering sort of pensive state. Especially in regards to our family life at home. Summer time feels naturally slow and it is a time when we naturally spend much time together without a lot of distraction. Fall however, the family connection must be more intentional and dare I say it even scheduled in.

With kiddos back in school there are lots more birthday parties and school functions and play date requests - all this on top of the 8 hour day in school. If we signed on for everything we’d be running around non-stop dropping one kid off here and another there while one of us attended one meeting or committee or another.

In order to avoid such a state of living, we have set some loose rules in place for how we want it all to look and feel.

• When asked to be on a board or committee, we never answer right away. We take the question home and discuss and weigh out our commitment to the cause and the sustainability of the decision to join. Is it twice a week at dinner time? Does the committee actually get stuff done or are they just fans of meetings? Does it work for us?
• When invited to a party, again we take it home. Are they a friend or just an acquaintance? Do we EVER play with this person? If we had a party would they be on our list? It may sound crass but honestly I feel that modern day parties are sometimes a mass collection of whoever they can think of to invite. Not necessarily an invite out of a deep connection. Or even a mild connection. Also we ask, what will this look like for the rest of the family? In other words, does it work for us?
• School activities seem to happen on a very regular basis. Fairs, carnivals, dinners out, etc. Sure we’re fans of building community but we have to ask ourselves before we attend, are we up for a public outing? Should we focus that night on building community or building family connection or maybe even on getting more sleep? Are we fit for public consumption or are we too distracted? Too overwhelmed? Too tired? Too disconnected?
• Playdates are a regular request. We have limited these to one or two a week depending on what’s happening at home and school. And we try to schedule them ahead of time just for ease of family structure.
• Weekends are too short and I’ve often said three days would serve family life way better. There’d be a day for family incubation, a day for socializing and a day for chores and errands. But they’re not, they’re only 2 days usually so we guard them very intently. We TRY to make sure that every weekend we have one day with nothing on the schedule. It feels way more spacious to all of us if we have a day to do with what we want: hang in the yard, go for a day trip, get stuff done, etc. It doesn’t ALWAYS work but mostly it does.

I guess the question that dictates most of what we do and dont’ do is “Does it work for us as a family?” That one question alone has a LOT of information in it and we often find great satisfaction in the answers.