Reflections on the Basketball Season (and Sports Activities in General)

My two younger girls have been playing basketball for the last few months with the rec center. After their final games on Saturday, we celebrated the season with a late lunch/ early dinner at Sycamore with frozen root beer floats, cheeseburgers, and two big baskets of fries- curly and regular. 

This was the first time the girls had ever played basketball (or any organized sport for that matter). That's not because we don't value sports, but like most every other family, we have limited time and money, so we had to make choices and order our priorities based on what we prefer and value most. 

We know families that make sports a priority and apparently, really enjoy doing so, but sports activities usually proved to be far too expensive in our reckoning and/ or they were usually going to require too big of a time commitment during the week and on weekends for our sensibilities. 

We wanted to spend most evenings at the dinner table or fireside. 

We didn't want to be most of the time shuffling here and there in the evenings, eating convenience foods instead of home cooked meals. 

Note: I can't manage to cook and do a bunch of evening activities. I know some people have their kids in sports and still manage to cook and they have my respect and admiration. I know some moms just go through the drive through and live with that, but that's also not me. 

But the rec center had an affordable basketball program with a reasonable time commitment, so it was a perfect fit for our family's limitations, priorities, and sensibilities. 

We still had to stretch ourselves out of our comfort zones a little to make it a priority. 

There were evenings when I wanted to skip practice and stay cozy at home, but we never did. 

It was just a season, so we made it a priority for the time and got to (almost) every practice (I think we only missed one) and we were at every game. 

Both the girls learned a lot, got a ton of hearty exercise, made friends, bonded with their coaches, and want to play again next year. 

The youngest is continuing with basketball lessons once a week now that the season is over, because those are available for her age group and at a time of day and price that works for us.  

I am very thankful to find a way to add sports to their lives without feeling too overwhelmed financially or time-wise.