There's No Such Thing as a "Free Weekend"

When I looked at the calendar about a week ago I noticed that this past weekend was relatively free. We had one thing written in on Saturday, and it was literally free; meaning it was an event that had no fee associated with it. It was a play performed by the Piwacket Theatre for Children. They put on a silly version of Treasure Island that the kids laughed about for most of the rest of the day. I love free family fun.

As expected, however, the weekend did not remain free. Not in either sense of the word. It got busier and more expensive as we inched closer on the calendar. We received an invite for a Friday night Happy Hour to celebrate my brother-in-law’s birthday. It was at his house so it was free; however, it also required us to hire a babysitter, which was not free. It was a fun evening, though, and in my opinion worth every penny of babysitting money for an evening of adult interaction.

It also turned out that Sunday was the meeting day for a group we recently joined. It’s called G.I.F.T. (Getting Interracial Families Together.) G.I.F.T. is a social group for families of mixed race, whether by marriage, birth or adoption. They have fun monthly outings for the whole family and just started a monthly “Parent Chat” just for the adults. It’s a great way for our kids to see other families that look like ours, and for my husband and me to talk to other parents of transracially adopted children. We met at a place that was something like a mild version of Chuck E. Cheese. They had a huge climbing area, an arcade area, even a bowling alley, and they surprisingly charged no admission. That’s right…it was free (except for the arcade games, of course.) However, we met up with the group right before dinnertime, and the kids were not shy about expressing their hunger as we were leaving. Since we were about 35 minutes from our house, we decided to stop somewhere to eat on the way home. This dinner was decidedly not free.

So, as you can see, try as we might we can’t really have a free weekend. Not one without event or appointment; not one without spending money. But I guess that’s only to be expected around here. I hope your weekend was good!!