Bedtime and evening activities.

[thefreckledmama]

Hi.  I am currently on the path to transitioning our lifestyle and daily schedule to being more inline with Waldorf, and I have a question regarding bedtime and activities.  Right now, my children (9, 7, 3, 1) go to bed right around 7.  Our church has Wednesday night activities-Bible study for the adults, a Christian scouting program for the 2 older kids, and the little ones are in the nursery.  These activities begin at 7, and we usually end up returning home sometime between 8:30 and 9.   

We homeschool and live in a fairly rural area, so there are no close neighbors with children for mine to play with.  Church Wednesday night and Sunday morning are the two guaranteed times they have each week to run and play with other children.  That being said, we live on a farm, and there's no shortage of opportunities to run and play in general-just not necessarily with children from other families.

I'm unsure what to do regarding maintaining the rhythm of our week and bedtime, versus participating in the Wednesday night activities which we all find spiritually enriching.  

I'm curious as to what other parents do regarding optional regularly scheduled activities which disrupt the otherwise regular rhythm of your week-especially when it comes to spiritual activities?

[aiyasmama]

Community is so important, I definitely would not give up on these activities.  Even though it throws off bedtime that night, you DO still have a strong rhythm of bedtime at 7 every night except late on church night.