I went to Washington D.C. on Saturday for a professional event. My husband is perfectly capable of dealing with the kids when I’m not around, but due to some events being rescheduled because of weather on previous weekends, we wound up with a situation where all three kids needed to be somewhere different at 1 p.m. on Saturday. They all really wanted to do these activities, too. While my husband has many talents, being in 3 places at once is not one of them.
But the logistics wound up working fine. A lot of other families turned out to be willing to help us out. The 3-year-old wanted to go to a friend’s birthday party (there were pony rides!). The birthday girl’s family picked her up at our house at 12:15. Then my husband took the two boys over to the 7-year-old’s soccer game (warm up time: 12:30). He left him with his coach and the other families there, then drove the 5-year-old to his practice/game (starting at 1). One of his good friends does soccer at the same time, and that family kept an eye on the 5-year-old during the game, and then took him over to their house afterwards for a playdate. After the 1 p.m. drop-off of the 5-year-old, my husband went back to the 7-year-old’s game. Then he took him to his end-of-season pizza party afterwards, and got home in time to meet the 3-year-old, who was dropped off around 4. Then they all went to get the 5-year-old at the end of his playdate, around 4:30.
No one got stranded. Everyone got to do the thing he/she wanted to do, and even got some extra fun (like the 5-year-old’s playdate!) out of it. It’s fun to see how the kids are growing up and getting their own lives. Of course, we shall see how the logistics will work when we have 4 kids who need to be at different places at the same time…
Everyone got to do what they wanted … except Daddy lol! He collapsed on the couch with a beer and a game after they went to bed, I’ll bet.
As for getting 4 kids to their activities, the good news is that by the time little Quatro is playing soccer, Uno will be 10 and it’s just easier to drop him off with the coach and a “see ya in an hour”.
The real challenge comes when they are all in high school and middle school, all getting picked up or dropped off at 5:30 from sport, club, arts, across town, and Quatro can’t be left stranded because he’s still too young, and oh, what about dinner? Invest in a good crockpot or a personal chef!
@Nother Barb – he taped the Texas A&M game, and they won a close one over Auburn, so all was right with his world too! I came home at 11:30 and he had me watch the highlights.
Oh man, that makes me tired just to read it! Glad it all worked out – it’s really great when you’ve lived somewhere long enough to find friends and people who can help!
@ARC – it’s one of the nice things about putting down roots. There are people willing to help!
Another reason life gets easier after the era of big bulky car seats.