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For a lot of us, this coming week is also the first one in a while -- and for a while -- with no youth sports commitments after dark.
Although many spring sports already have started, the early darkness -- which didn't affect the winter indoor practice -- sends kids home early for at least this week ahead.
This is the first week, probably since the holiday season, when your family life can be normal. Or should I say abnormal? For us youth sports families, "normal" means scheduling our entire lives around practices and games.
This week, it will be nice to be abnormal.
Your family can actually eat dinner together -- and at dinner time. Everyone can sit down to a home-cooked meal without having to take wrappers off the food first. Don't worry, the local fast food joints will survive and those crumbs and greasy fingerprints will be back on your car seats before you know it.
Homework can be done at home while sitting at a desk or table. Your kids will be amazed how much neater their handwriting is when they aren't using a bleacher seat, a magazine in the front seat of the car or the sideline of a basketball court as a desk.
Your family's pre-bedtime routine can actually be normal for a week. Showers can be taken without shortcuts, even if it means the water bill goes back up again.
If you have younger children who don't play sports, they'll actually remember what it's like not spending every night at a practice or game that's not even theirs. And here's an idea: Maybe do something special one night for them and make the older kids tag along and be the bored ones for a change.
Next weekend's changing of the clocks is the first sign that the warmer spring weather is just around the corner. But before springing into the next youth sports season, take the time to live a normal life again. Even if normal is really abnormal ... and just for a week.
