On the Altar of Sports and Activities

 

I signed Jack (our oldest child) up for baseball when he was about six years old, because that’s what I thought you’re “supposed” to do. Just getting to the first practice was daunting and eye opening. At this point, Jack was the oldest of four kids, so you can imagine waking kids up from naps, packing peanut and butter and jelly sandwiches (because, of course, practice was right at dinnertime), and trying to bring something to keep the three younger kids occupied during the practice. It was chaos. My husband came straight from work and met us at the baseball fields. For an hour or so, we wrangled the kids, helping them eat “dinner,” while keeping them from falling off the metal bleachers, chasing them around to keep them within eyesight, and helping them to the bathroom when needed. I’m sure I was potty training one kid and nursing another. You get the idea. While Jack did a great job that baseball season and showed potential, everything in my heart was saying, “NO WAY.” So, we never registered him for baseball again. Ever.

That may sound like laziness on our part, or maybe we were to blame for the craziness. After all, we chose to have so many kids so quickly. Regardless, I remember making a conscious decision after that experience—we would not sacrifice the culture of our family, as well as time, energy, and money on the altar of sports and activities. When the timing was right for these things in our kids’ lives, we would know it and they would be sacrifices we would not regret. Little did I know, I had unknowingly created a filter for our family to make future decisions through. So instead of registering Jack for the next session of baseball, we threw a baseball in the front yard with all of our kids. We were in the comfort of our own fenced in yard. Snacks and bathrooms were readily available. Dinner wasn’t rushed through or missed. Neighbor kids would see us and join us. It was peaceful and it felt so right. We were building our family by doing this, not trying desperately to keep it together.

We didn’t sign our kids up for swim lessons either. Instead? We visited the neighborhood pool often, where we played and splashed around, building loads of memories with our kids. They all fondly remember swimming through our legs and playing “the color game” where we would hold them in our arms and ask them a color. If it wasn’t the color we had chosen in our minds, we would dunk them. Then there were the in-water handstand contests, the underwater tea parties, and the most cherished memory of all—being launched off my husband’s shoulders. I don’t even remember “teaching” them how to swim. They just absorbed the ability from being at the pool so much. No paying money and spending precious time loading kids up and sitting at swim lessons. But, years later, when we moved to our new neighborhood, we discovered they had a swim team. The season was one month long, as the kids got older they could ride their bikes to swim practice, and meets became a hub for friends and neighbors to spend time together.  Our kids were on the same team and were together for meets. The timing was right.

Then, there were piano lessons. From age five, Jack told us he was going to be a drummer someday. We wanted him to have a couple of years of piano to build a musical foundation before starting into drumming and we were back at the same dilemma- time, money, and chaos. How would we do this? I talked to some well-respected musicians and piano teachers and heard the same thing over and over again. While starting piano at five is fine and good, the best age to start is age nine or ten, when they are really reading well. They will make up for “lost time” so quickly with these developmental skills in place. So, we waited. Around age nine, my sister-in-law found an at-home DVD piano course. It was intended for adults, but we wondered if investing $80 in this and giving it a shot might be worth it. Let me tell you, it was. Jack completed the two-year program. It was then that we found a piano teacher who would come to our home and was affordable. Double win. He took lessons from her for a year, and then we discovered a high school aged kid who could teach drum lessons for ten dollars per lesson. I never felt like we were sacrificing more time, money, or energy than we should.

We did end up finding a great solution for our whole family as some activities evolved on Thursday nights at our church. My husband was the technical director of the church and had rehearsals on Thursday nights. A karate ministry started, and we enrolled Jack. Later Joey and Jeremiah began karate when they were old enough. I started a dance ministry program on Thursdays as well and Jillian, Jenna, and Jane all participated as each of them became old enough. Would we have picked these things as our top priority? Karate, definitely not. Dance, perhaps (that is a WHOLE other story). The total cost for these activities for our six kids for several years was next to nothing. The time investment was one night a week for part of each year. All of us at the same place at the same time. There was even childcare available for before and after these activities and for the kids who weren’t old enough to participate until my husband and I were done with our responsibilities for the night. Thursday night childcare became one of THE main events of the night, however, as the kids developed friendships with other kids and grew to adore the workers.  

You might say, “We don’t have opportunities like this.” But the filter that ultimately led to this Thursday night full of activities was, “I will not run our family ragged, split us apart, or cost us precious money, time, or energy.” As these things started to evolve on Thursdays, I knew it was the right choice for our family, and to this day, I stand by this filter.

Besides these Thursday night activities and the month long neighborhood swim team, we never participated in organized sports until Jack was in eighth grade. His friend invited him to try out for a new homeschool soccer league in the area. Soccer? What is soccer? Jack and I both did gymnastics, played baseball or softball, and sang. Soccer was a foreign territory. But we were willing to give it a shot, because Jack would be with a good friend, we could carpool, it was really affordable, and it was with like-minded people we trusted. Did I mention that there would never be games or practices on Sundays? Not skipping worship and opportunities to serve at church made this very attractive. But was Jack “late” in the game when it came to soccer? Probably. Did it matter? It depends on how you look at it. What I saw was a determined kid who came home and researched soccer. He practiced outside at home. He was eager and hungry to learn. He quickly became a valuable player on the team and continued to play on the same team for six seasons, becoming one of the top players. He developed lifelong friendships, gained skills he is still using today as a young adult, and entry into this particular soccer team provided us with a whole new “family” of friends, as we have had six out of seven kids participate (one is an avid dancer—more on that later). More than a decade later, we are still all-in with this homeschool soccer team. Our kids practice on the same nights together. Their games are almost always at the same location on the same day. When one kid is done playing, he or she watches and cheers on their siblings in subsequent games. They practice at home together, recap amazing plays while lingering in our kitchen, and encourage each other after devastating defeats. They have been there to see all of it. Each of our kids played on the same team as one or more siblings at some point. We travel to out of state soccer tournaments together and enjoy one to three hotel stays a year. And we have the majority of our family with us. It is a win in our eyes for so many reasons. Would we have chosen soccer if we were aiming at a different goal? Very likely not. But soccer was what was in front of us, helping us to accomplish our goal of family first.

Even so, soccer was the first real dent into family dinnertime and being at home together in the evenings. To this day, by the end of soccer season, we wonder if this is the best thing for our family. We reevaluate. We remind ourselves that it is only three months out of the year. It does MORE to bring our family together than it does to separate us. That is the real litmus test when evaluating soccer for our family. The costs end up leveraging more benefits for us as a whole. Because of the common bond, the common love for the sport, and the common family friendships, our older kids who have aged out of the team are still incredibly interested and invested. They often block off their calendars in order to make it to local games and they have even come to state and national tournaments that are two to eight hours away.

A similar “cost” to our family nights at home came in the form of a dance opportunity for our oldest daughter, Jillian. She participated in the dance ministry I was running at church from age four to fourteen. This allowed her free dance classes for one to two hours each Thursday about eight months out of the year. I and the other teachers could see Jillian’s talent emerging and my heart longed to be able to foster that more. I knew the options, however. Studios are expensive. They wear costumes I didn’t want my daughter to wear. Maybe the younger years were fine, but where was it all headed? As I looked at the costumes and the dance moves performed by older girls, I knew I did not want to put Jillian in that environment. And what about all the competitions? The costume fees, recital fees, hotel stays, competition fees and associated costs. We couldn’t afford it. Even if we could, is that where we would want to “invest” our money? It just wasn’t. So we waited. God knew the desires of my heart. He knew the talent just waiting to burst out of Jillian. And then the most upside down, unexpected thing happened that propelled all of this forward- my husband lost his job. The summer of 2015 our world came crashing down on us when my husband was let go from his job at our church, which he had held for thirteen years. Additionally, losing his job ended up meaning that we were losing our church as well. He had been a member there since he was a teenager. We were incredibly invested. Our life centered around this church. But God. He took care of our family. Jack seamlessly found a new job. But Jillian no longer had a place to dance. Another church took her under their wing and let her dance there. She focused on stretching for a year. Then she ended up at a nearby dance camp the summer of 2017. It was a studio I didn’t even know existed and it was different. This studio didn’t participate in competitions. Instead, it focused on shows. Costumes were handmade by the director and were free for the girls to wear for performances. While the studio was not focused on worshipping Jesus through dance, it was high quality dance training without the questionable content, music, and choreography, and she was at an age where she could successfully navigate these situations if they arose. So, we did what we could afford- we signed her up for one ballet class a week. Seeing her talent early in her first semester, Jillian was asked to join their pre-professional program starting second semester. I was no longer spending huge amounts of time running the large dance ministry (as a volunteer) and former employers got wind of my availability and called me. Jobs landed in my lap, and I started work at a dance studio and a gymnastics facility. Literally weeks before Jillian was set to start the studio’s pre-professional program in January 2018, we had all the money we needed for Jillian to start formal training. She trained all through high school at this studio. While it was a break in our family time each night, we knew it was time for her to pursue dance at this level. It also was five minutes away from home and a friend in the neighborhood joined at the same time, so carpooling was an option until she could drive. It fit. I had the same question with Jillian as I had with Jack and soccer- was she late to the game? The answer? Probably. What did I observe? A determined girl who came home and practiced and worked incredibly hard in class. A girl not burnt out, but highly driven. A girl not nursing overuse injuries but soaring.

So where did this all lead? We seemingly held our kids back when it came to sports and activities. We chose family first. We looked at our time, money, energy, and capacity at each season to evaluate what was best for our family. Did they miss out on scholarships? Maybe. Very likely. Did they miss out on becoming the very best they could be at just the right sport or activity for them? Maybe. But how many kids actually get a scholarship for sports or for dance? How often do they not crumble under the pressure of keeping up in order to keep the scholarship? How often do they not forfeit that scholarship due to injury? What if they weren’t college bound anyway?

What did they not miss out on? A whole lot. While nothing ever formally came of baseball, I can tell you that many summer nights several of our kids and my husband wander outside after dinner to throw a ball. The mitts are one of the first things packed in the trunk for vacations. Jude (our youngest) has played a couple of recreational sessions of baseball. The older kids have looked forward to driving him to practice and they love watching his games. And soccer? Some are still playing for that same team. We have more than a decade-long relationships with other families who are involved. Our older kids who have graduated from the team have gone on to register for indoor soccer teams in which our kids play together (this is where our oldest son met his wife!). They have played pick-up soccer on Saturdays outdoors… together. A soccer ball is also one of the first things tossed into the trunk when it comes time for a trip or vacation. This has also given way to summer days filled with pickleball, Spikeball, ultimate frisbee, and a myriad of other opportunities to play in an informal way. Our garage looks like Play It Again Sports and then it all transfers to our trunk for vacation.

As for dance? Jillian made it all the way to a professional Christian dance company—one that runs conventions around part of the country. I had started taking dancers from the dance ministry I ran to the Chicago location way back in 2013, which is how we found out about the program. My sister and I just celebrated ten years of Chicago convention weekends together, where we have laughed, hurt (adults attempting to keep dancing!), and grown spiritually, as their focus is all about Jesus. My husband and I have enjoyed trips to Orlando together the last few years to watch our daughter dance with this company. The timing, the money, and the season for our family were all right for this kind of thing when it all started happening for Jillian.

What about music? Besides the two years of a piano teacher coming to our home and the year of drum lessons given by a high schooler, we have had no more formal music training amongst our kids. But our family’s natural love for music has turned into an incredible amount of bonding over music. From spitting out every word to Hamilton together, to belting Wicked and Dear Evan Hansen and The Greatest Showman, to seeing my kids scramble to purchase concert tickets and then make whole trips out of some of these concerts, music has brought our family together. Jack plays drums, piano and every guitar known to man at a high level. He has become a professional song writer and music producer. Jillian leads worship with her voice. With the advent of YouTube and an older brother who has figured out guitar and piano to help guide, Joey learned piano and guitar to a level where leads worship at our large church. And Jude? He just started that same $80 DVD piano course (we had to find a DVD player for it!). He sits down at the piano often and shows lots of promise. Our kids share a love of music in all forms.

Do my kids wish they had done more? I’ll have to ask them, but I’m pretty sure they would say, no. The skills they have will provide lifelong opportunities for relationships, side jobs, and careers. We have had very few injuries and no burn out. The foundation that was built by them playing together in their younger years created bonds that carried them well when they did start diversifying in later years. I woke up this past Sunday morning while I was in Chicago getting ready to watch Jillian’s last day of convention tour after four years in their program with a message on my heart for young families: You don’t have to sacrifice your family for your kids to do incredible things. There will be “gaps” according to what the world has made of sports and activities, but God is absolutely able to fill those gaps. Look realistically at your family’s time, money, energy, and capacity. Revaluate at each season. Look at opportunities around you that fit through the filter you have set for your family’s values and priorities. Take time to think through and pray through what you want for your family. You will know when the time is right to sacrifice. You’ll know deep down that it is right. Trust God and put your family first. Trust me, you won’t regret it.