A grown up decision

Last week before school one day, Ivan asked me if it would be okay for him to quit the swim team. My knee jerk reaction when one of my kids wants to quit an activity is "no", but I didn't say that this time, I just listened to his reason.
He told me that he feels like he has too much going on and he would like to stop doing something so that his Tuesdays and Thursdays aren't completely filled from morning to night.
Not in those words exactly, but pretty darn close.

This year has been a busy one for Ivan.
He seems to have more homework and book reports and classroom projects in his 4th grade class than even Hannah in 6th grade.
On top of that, he has swim team, karate and trombone...plus drama over the winter.

I love active kids, but it was beginning to be a bit much and Ivan is definitely the kind of guy that needs some unstructured time for his brain to fly free.

He enjoyed swim team...but he didn't love it.
He became a great swimmer and challenged himself at meets and practices.
All good stuff.

I told him OK.
I'm proud of his thoughtful decision and right away he felt the relief when he didn't have to shuffle from school to swim team...get dressed in 5 minutes and get to karate...only to be faced with dinner, homework and bed when he got home.

Now there's a bit more free time for him to use his imagination...and enter Lego design contests.
These are the important things in life as well you know...
...especially when your dream career is to be a designer for Lego!

He can get some fresh ideas soon when we take our trip!!