Family Dates

Lately I've just been kind of missing blogging, so here I am. No idea if this will be a thing. Maybe it will.

You know how the busier you are, the more you get done? Or is that just me? I keep feeling like I'm wasting too much time on social media and need other things to occupy my mind. But at night even reading sometimes feels like too much energy. So, I decided I was going to do the #100dayproject and write every day. Which I've mostly been doing even if some days it's just a few minutes of writing. But, I feel so unmotivated to write for only myself. Thus, today I'm here. I suppose I may still be writing for myself here, ha. 

I've also been thinking maybe I should make it 100 Days of doing something for myself. Scrolling on Facebook doesn't count. I could write, work out, paint my nails... I probably wouldn't count reading since I already do that every day. I need something to motivate me to work out more. I've been averaging 2 days a week for years now. I don't count walking, but maybe I could make walks longer and then count them. I wonder if Jack would approve of that? I'm feeling very aware of my return to work in a few months and I have some things on my list to accomplish before that happens (both work related, and not). But a mix between "too much" time and children who never let me accomplish anything with any actual regularity make it so difficult.

One of my "goals" this year was to do one date (Eric and I) and one family date (us + kids) per month. We got off to a very rough start in January with a failed attempt to go bowling (the wait was 3 hours) so after that we decided we would bundle up and do outdoor dates to avoid overly crowded and germy locations. My original plan was to incorporate doing something fun with a restaurant, and that has happened some, but not all, of the times. Eric and I are on track to have at least one date a month (sometimes more!)... though we haven't had one yet in April so I need to get on that!

Here are the "family dates" that have been successful this year. Our first was to the outdoor ice skating rink in town:

In early February we managed to bundle up on a very cold day and go to the Great Meadow Wildlife Refuge in Concord. There is a small tower to climb, and the boys love to just throw rocks into water wherever we are. 

Following the wildlife refuge we headed to one of our favorite breweries: Battle Road Brew House in Maynard which we discovered last summer. 

We spent the rest of February in Florida, which I'm hoping to blog about soon. But in March we had to bundle again, this time to walk around Walden Pond. With all the wind we got that month, there was quite a lot of climbing over fallen trees but it was a beautiful day and a lot of fun exercise. 

A lot of sledding also happened in March, but I'm not sure if it's really considered a family date if all you have to do is step out your back door, ha ha.

I'm looking forward to the nicer weather because that always means easier planning for family adventures. But, it also has a be a bit more intentional since we tend to be a lot busier in the spring and summer months. Hope we can keep up once a month dates! 

What are your favorite family date ideas? If you are local, send recommendations my way- or even if you aren't, you never know when we will want to go on a trip ;) 

Also, shout out to my sister Caroline who fixed my blog so it doesn't have any crazy photobucket error messages anymore.