We have some pretty neat friends.  Because our church is family-integrated, we tend to have dads (moms, too) who are whole-heartedly devoted to the spiritual development of their kids, and most of the dads would consider their kids to be their hobby.  Neat, huh?

Recently we were enjoying a meal with Carl and Jennifer, parents of three young women ages 18, 13, and almost 9.  Carl was telling us about their evenings and how they have dedicated each night to a different activity together, making the most of the time.  As he put it, our families are on a ship and it is the dad’s job to be cruise director, making his ship the most attractive place for his kids to be.  Carl is quite the cruise director- a fun dad who cheers his girls on when they accomplish something and leads them into great adventures.

We, too, began to plan our evenings together.  All too often we found we just sort of fell apart after family worship and dinner clean-up had ended.  So here’s what we have for the summer:

Mondays- Music Night.  Either live performances from any or all of us or listening to classical, jazz, or good retro selections.

Tuesdays- Game Night/Swim Night.  And swimming is never just swimming- cannonball contests, “jump/dive” (the game where the person prepares to jump or dive and once they’ve left the diving board someone on the sidelines yells the command to either jump or dive and the jumper/diver must perform the task from mid air, often resulting in hilarious belly flops), breath-holding contests, etc.

Wednesdays- Letter Writing Night.  We have friends and family in far away places who can always use our encouragement.  This usually becomes quite the drawing/stickers/coloring night as well.

Thursdays- Reading Night.  Everyone grabs a book and heads to the living room to flop down somewhere comfy and read.  More fun than it sounds- You can imagine that often the book of choice is Calvin and Hobbes or The Far Side and so we share a good many laughs, too.

Fridays- Family Movie Night.  Self-explanatory, right?  We don’t always watch movies, but my husband has already blogged on this so I’ll let him tell it.

In addition, we save our exercising most days until the evening.  So a girl or two usually joins me for Slim in Six while the boys have some elaborate running plan.  Much more fun to be a girl around here   And before you ask, yes I will soon blog on exercise for the post-partum mom and why I love Slim in Six.