It all fit (weekend report)

First, thank you so much to everyone who has joined the Best of Both Worlds Patreon community. We’ve got an ice breaker thread going over there and getting to know the people who signed up has been very exciting. Our first virtual meet-up will be September 28th at 8 p.m. eastern, so if you are planning to sign up, you might want to do so prior to then (though we welcome people whenever!)

This weekend went roughly according to plan, which is always good. On Friday, I helped the 11-year-old pack for his weekend scout camping trip. They were supposed to meet locally, then drive to the site about 45 minutes away, check in, and have the non-camping parents come home. I anticipated this might take more than the 2 hours that sounds like it should take, but I did think my husband would be home in time to pick up the 9-year-old and 6-year-old at a karate Friday night party at 9 p.m. Alas, he didn’t make it home until 10 p.m. (he had to help set up the tent and so forth…) Fortunately, I have a 14-year-old, who could stay with the sleeping baby while I went to get the other kids. The logistics of five kids are tough enough as it is. I am really glad they do not all need parental supervision at all times, and some are old enough to supervise others.

Saturday morning featured pancakes, a karate class, and a Target run because while my husband had purchased the wedding presents for the couple we were celebrating later in the day, he had not considered the wrapping paper question, as evidenced by a comment that went something like “Hey, could we just use the Christmas paper?” Fortunately, Target is close to karate, so I could go during class. There was a soccer game and then getting into the only black tie dress I own that still sort of fit (sigh). We drove to New Jersey for a very nice wedding in the couple’s backyard. They had gone all out with a huge stage and dancing platform and gold-foil wrapped palm trees. We drank mocktails only and hightailed it out at 8:45 p.m. because my husband and I had…

…the half-marathon in the morning! The Philadelphia Distance Run is the replacement for the old Rock ‘n Roll Philly half-marathon. I had been a bit worried about the logistics, but they had limited the field (we never saw a bib number over 4500) and so we could take Uber almost to the start and, having left the house at 6:56, we had already used the port-a-potties and were waiting in our corral at 7:21. The wave start went swiftly and we were never in crowds for the entire time. Indeed, there were a few moments in the last few miles where we couldn’t actually see more than another runner or two. The day was beautiful, but 13.1 miles is still a long way to run. We made it, but I was feeling it the rest of the day (and today, to be honest).

The rest of Sunday was a bit more relaxing. Our Sun AM sitter had taken our younger kids to go pick up the 11-year-old at camp. Fortunately, this went far better than the drop off, and we all came back to the house around the same time. I played with the baby for an hour and put him down for his nap around 12:20 and then just vegged. I started work on one of my autumn-themed puzzles (I bought three…it’s on the Fall Fun List! Don’t judge!). My husband went to Costco, which is his form of relaxation.

Then it was on to the kid activities. One child had a tennis lesson at 5. Another had a baseball game with practice starting at 4:30. There was a Cub Scout season start-up BBQ at a park. I took the 9-year-old and 6-year-old with me to the tennis lesson and we hit TJ Maxx to entertain ourselves. I recall being fascinated by that store at various points in my life, but this particular branch of it seemed quite…random. We wound up with a contraption that shoots tennis balls for the dog to catch. The Cub Scouts comped the kids with tickets for the ice cream truck, which means that we didn’t wind up eating dinner until close to 8 p.m. Sunday night.

The next weekend looks a little less logistically complex, so we might get some of our fall trips in. We shall see…

In other news: BOBW listeners may recall the episode with Lisa Canning from 2020. She is hosting an online event on entrepreneurship and motherhood called “The Possibility Mom Summit” from Sept 24-26, and I’ll be one of the people she’s interviewing. You can register here. We had a great conversation and…she is now expecting her 9th child. Wow!

Long-time readers know that I have both a monthly and weekly newsletter. I’m always looking for folks who are doing newsletters well that I can learn from. I’ve been enjoying Mary Laura Philpott’s newsletter, where she highlights a book, a link, a song, and a picture each time. You can sign up here.