Have you ever had one of those weekends where you were just having too much fun?

3 birthday parties, dinner with friends, a Dodger game on Sunday and brunch with the extended family.

Sometimes we group our “fun activities” in such a way that we are having so much fun, we are too exhausted to enjoy any of it.

Instead we are running from one event to another, doing a quick change in the car between Sarah’s Bat Mitzvah, our Spamalot matinee and Grandpa’s 80th birthday party at the newly renovated Annenburg Beach House.

The kids are fighting with each other, no one has managed to eat enough (even though everywhere we go is piled high with food,) and we just want to take a nap.

Sounds like fun, doesn’t it?  Not so much fun as, let’s see, how would I describe it?  Oh yes, a living hell!

So at the risk of sounding like the real mother I am – I refuse to over-schedule our family anymore. 

If we are buying tickets to a special event like a show or a baseball game, that’s it for that weekend.

I find that we all appreciate everything so much more if it isn’t crammed up against some other item on our weekend to-do list.

And we make sure our kids understand that it is special to attend an event and it ain’t cheap!  Once you buy tickets to anything for 5 people, you are feeling the pinch.

Let’s take a breath – fun is more fun, when there is less of it.