Mother's Day for the Soccer Mom

Mother's Day.  What are your plans?  I don't have any, that I know of. And since my husband isn't a planner, I'm confident there aren't "secret plans" in the works.

I can tell you that I really hope to get the hell out town and go somewhere. The tyranny of our soccer Saturdays has got me down. Frankly, I don't know how other parents handle having multiple kids in competitive league sports. My own kids just play recreational soccer, which means that in 2 weeks, we'll be finished with games and practices for 3 months, until "Fall" season starts up in late August.

But kids in league/club/competitive teams play all year. No stopping. Like the Energizer Bunny, the sport keeps going and going and going, with constant practices, camps, games, tournaments, charity games, etc. I have no worries that Lily will play competitive sports  any time soon, but Tucker....he's pretty darn good at soccer, and he likes it a lot, and he's young.  He's already been recruited once to play competitive, and we said no at the time.  But that threat looms out there, in the future. Should we choose to go there. It's a big, big commitment. (Financially, too.)  I don't want to think about it yet.

My point is that, with kids in competitive league sports, your weekends pretty much get dictated for you. And your job as a parent is to be a good sport and support them and consider the other team parents like a 2nd family and shut up and drive them around. No offense, but that sounds...horrible.  Call me selfish, but I prefer to have our weekends free as a family, to go here, or there, to wander someplace new, or visit favorite getaways.

In light of Mother's Day, here are a couple of old, old slide photos of getaways with me and my mom. She doesn't know I have a blog, so I don't think it's quite fair to put her face out there on the 'net.  But she's pretty much in shadow in both of these shots, yet not so much in shadow that you can't appreciate her rockin' early-'70s style.

Here we are, down in Baja, probably in the fishing village of San Felipe.  My grandpa used to take our family down there every spring. Those trips are some of very earliest memories, and definitely my earliest memories of being at the ocean. 

And here we are, somewhere in the Eastern Sierras. The slide reel says "Mammoth," but there are some Yosemite shots in there, too.

Two ladies in hats. And, are you pausing to marvel at my awesome tic-tac-toe pants?  Yeah.

Finally, here's a shot of me welcoming my grandma to our house. That's my grandpa's awesome camper, and I think they're coming over to help prep and pack for our trip down to Baja. The sight of that camper invokes such nostalgia AND such wanderlust, that I can't even handle it.

Truly, I don't care about going to a fancy, overpriced brunch for Mother's Day.  But I really hope my husband has topped off the tank and is ready to get outta town. Hint, hint, honey. (Hey, at least I'm not linking to expensive jewelry on my Pinterest boards.) 

Have a good weekend. Soccer on Saturday, but who knows where Sunday may take us...