Reinventing your Hobbies...with kids

Especially after your first child, your life becomes focused on your children. Hobbies that had previously filled your weekends and evenings, now get pushed aside with activities like "watching baby" or singing with baby or reading to baby (all important activities, don't get me wrong).

It is interesting how your interests and hobbies change over time, sometimes drastically. When you are single, you have your own interests and hobbies. After getting married, you merge some of those, but still keep some personal interests. Once you have kids, your joint interests become things to do with the family and your personal interests become your much needed alone time.

As I redefine myself as a mother, I have been trying to identify some of my former passions and hobbies and how I can incorporate them into a family event.

Sometimes we do a family run on the weekend. One of us takes the dog and the other pushes the baby in the running stroller and we go on a run...together. That is a perfect family outing to me. Other times, it is just me and the baby, as my husband sleeps in.

For Christmas, we got a bike trailer to pull our little one behind our bikes. My husband rides to work a couple days a week and has a nice road bike. Unfortunately, I have not ridden since I was pregnant, so I am anxious to have some nice family outings and get exercise.

There are plenty of accessible hiking trails in our area. When the little one was smaller, it was easier to take him in the baby backpack. Now he is getting heavier, so it is getting more challenging. He is not quite big enough to walk for very far, so we tend to look for paved trails where we can take a stroller.

One of my former activities was wine tasting. I loved to explore less popular wine regions and meet the owners. Obviously the tasting part is not appropriate for kids, but there are beautiful winery locations that are kid friendly and have space to run around. (I will let you know when I identify them).

All in all, it is a good idea to share your passions with your children. There may be ages when they are not big enough to appreciate the experience, so you may have to wait until they are older, but there should be creative ways you can continue to practice healthy activities.

Now who is up for a family run?