To wonder why we aren't one of "those" families

[Mypetsnails]

Sort of lighthearted. This is going to sound SO daft. But do you ever notice the families who seem, well, better at family-ing than everyone else?

We went to a thing at a National Trust place at the weekend. Took a picnic and sat on the big green. Right beside us there was this family that had a three sided shelter type thing which they'd popped their baby and picnic in to protect them from the sun. They'd brought tennis racquets and these gorgeous kids and their equally beautiful parents were taking it in turns to whack a ball around/sit in the shelter thing. They had a picnic cool bag the size of my kitchen, no idea what they brought but it was probably nicer than my tragic cheese sandwiches

Then there's the beach. We're trying to stop our towels blowing away, and the alpha family have a wall of windbreaks, a body board, and a barbecue.

DD is actually friends with a child from such a family, and they also have a really organised hallway with special named slots and storage systems for all the children's outdoor things. Plus the mum has a boot storage thing with a first aid kit, plasters, and spare clothes in it.

There's obviously nothing stopping me buying little shelters, bodyboards, and shoe storage for my hallway, but it's more that it wouldn't occur to me? And I don't know why? I used to play at a tennis club twice a week, why on earth don't WE bring racquets with us?

Does anyone know what I mean? I was a very solitary only child, and my parents didn't do a lot of child friendly things with me, so maybe it's a bit of a hangover from that - I remember feeling that my family and home was very different from other people's but when I tried to express why to my mum, I said "they have big tins for their biscuits and we just put ours into the cupboard"

I would like to be like one of those families.

I guess once you've got all the stuff and are really organised, it's just not that time consuming.

I however am too haphazard and lazy.

I don't think that there is a right or wrong here - super-organised families aren't "less fun" and less-organised families aren't "less good". Ultimately I think it comes down to the personality of the parents. I am super-organised - not just in family life, but in every aspect of my life (I have a colour-coded spreadsheet for everything). So from the organisation point of view we are "that family" (though definitely not from the perfectly behaved kids point of view!). My parents are also pretty organised, so it is definitely the norm for me.

DH's parents are the opposite, which I find a struggle! They live abroad, and when we went to visit them once MIL had booked a short beach break in a different town in the country in which they live. When we arrived in that town she realised that she had never actually written down the name of the hotel at which we had a booking - so we drove around from hotel to hotel asking if we had a reservation there!

Know exactly what you mean. My parents are like that but I feel like I'm constantly flying by the seat of my pants and I never have time to get myself that organised.

We might come across as one of 'those' families - we have a foldable wagon that we use to transport kids/toys/chairs/picnic to our desired spot. It's one trip from the car and safer as kids can't run off in car parks. Once we go somewhere for the day, we're set for the whole day. BUT I'm a natural planner, xmas presents bought in 70% off sales 6 months before and birthday parties booked 9 months in advance kind of planner.

I had PTSD & PND and 'planning' was the thing that helped me get over it, so I've now fallen into it all the time.

It's not smugness as kids can still be twats and wasps will ruin anyone's day, organised or otherwise!

@LakieLady

I know the sort of families you describe. The thing is, quite often these are the families that take over a space and make it “theirs”, which can be quite irritating.

When families turn up at our local beach with barbecues, stacks of windbreakers and lots of equipment, it means everyone else has to fit around them and all their stuff. The people with tennis rackets at a National Trust place are making sure that everyone else has to keep out their way while they have picturesque fun.

This reminds me of the time that we decided to do a bbq in the park with the bits and bobs in the freezer. Dd asked to invite our neighbour, fine I said. It was a tiny bbq with literally 3 chicken drumsticks, a sausage here and a chop there. We arrived at the park, set up our holey tartan blanket and nearly died when the neighbours parents pulled up and thanked us for the invite. I was furious with dd for not telling me she invited them too, they are those family and whilst we were squashed onto the blanket they opened the boot of their car and pulled out loads of camping gear, complete with cutlery. We were planning to eat with our hands and they sat on their chairs, with linen napkins looking down on us peasants on the ground using our hands whilst they were treating it as a gourmet meal

@cardamoncoffee. That's hilarious actually sounds like a sitcom!

I’m one of those 🙈 I like to be super organized and if I’m doing something I do it right. I have all the right gear as otherwise I couldn’t be organized. Even my attic and shed are in organised, labeled sections. I was konmari folding before I even knew what it was!
A few top tops are
BAGS! I use them for everything so for example going to the beach I have;
A bag with beach toys
A bag with towels and swimwear (and a spare plastic bag for when they are wet)
A picnic basket with food and picnic mat
Another bag with spare clothes
Fold out chairs.

Also, take your time,make sure you put everything back in it’s place throughout the day so that you have a less manic time packing the car back together at the end of the day.

In terms of looking put together clothes wise the trick is to Buy “outfits” not items. I would never buy my dc a random t shirt (unless I was absolutely sure it matched 2 other items) I usually buy outfits and stick to similar palettes so the can be mix matched if needed!

he says that as paid up National Trust members, with the parking sticker and all, we need bow our heads to nobody
@Mypetsnails
But does he have the NT hat with the ties?

@Youngandfree But where do you keep the bags?

I so badly wanted to be that family. We weren't. Kids all grown up now and they turned out just fine.
They are very good at making their own fun too. I suspect that if they have children, they will be much more organised than their mother

Our days out at the beach look like we are sponsored by aldi bags for life! We dont own a wind break even though I say we must buy one everytime we go to the beach. We always forget something (normally the picnic blanket), we are not organised for these big days out at all.

We have times of being 'that' family. We have a bag packed permanently int he summers. Dh packs it and keeps it under the stairs when we arrive back from somewhere - so we can grab and go.

This is after 18 years together - dd is autistic and has learning difficulties so we are military precision planned. We can keep it up for a few hours - then it starts to degenerate very quickly. We have learnt the signs the hard way so pack and leave before melt down. If you were next to us on the beach you would not know.

And I draw the line at rounders.

^^

Here here

@W0rriedMum in the garage

I have a section for the beach and it has three shelves. On the shelves are boxes and in the boxes are the bags ready to go.
The beach toys are in a plastic woven beach bag and the get washed, dried and put back ready to go again.
Next to that is the beach towels and swimwear bag (with stuff in)
Underneath is the picnic basket and mat
At the bottom is the chairs in their canvas bags. The spare clothing bag is the only one i would need to actually pack. Well that and the food.

It's because that family probably spend far more time doing outdoorsy stuff than you do. My parents were like this, but are unorganised in other ways.

Dc played in a paddling pool in a park in his pants and t shirt last week, got dry on a friend's towel, then put shorts on (commando) and I found a pyjama top for him in the boot of the car. McDonald's on the way home. We are not "that" family but we have loads of fun & are very close

I found the wet t shirt & pants this morning as I was tidying up cleaner comes on a Wednesday and I wanted her to be able to hoover up 🤣🤣

Definitely amazon prime mum not Pinterest mum too!!

Anyone can be “that family” by hopping on Amazon and buying what is recommended.

It’s not as difficult and as expensive as it used to be.

We have also learnt what we need and worked a few things out for ourselves with a bit of planning.

Pretty much 90% of being that family was Amazon and charity shops/borrowed from family.

We know a couple of families like this and my DC prefer to turn up to the beach without a towel and swimwear than live the "perfect" lives of these families.

Neither parents look after the children. One has a fleet of nannies and childminders and the others are in ft boarding school 10 minutes from where they live.

The parents can be organised for days out or holidays because they don't have to deal with the day to day of family life.

The one who has nannies doesn't live in the same country as their children.

We were that sort of family, but I can think of plenty of times that, even with the best planning and preparation, it all went wrong. The weather used to be a determining factor and someone would always trip and cut their shin, or be stung by a wasp, or feel ill on the day, or eat a handful of sand or try to swallow pebbles all the time, or a bus wouldn't turn up which was pivotal to arrangements. Sometimes, one of the children would just get a sulk on and there was nothing you could do to lift it.

Making memories?

My daughter, when she was 5 ,doesn't remember anything about her glorious holiday in Tuscany, other than she fell out of the child seat on her dad's bike and cut her leg, and a kindly Carabinieri took her on his moped to the nearest hospital.

We tried so hard to be 'that family' too.

DD is just watching one of these families on youtube.
I could never be that organised. I do try!
My youngest child has additional needs and would probably pull the whole thing down on top of us.

I am edging my way towards being on of those sort of families but only because my children are older now (9 and 7) and I have worked out what we need for the beach and keep it in the car.

I have a wind break, a mallet which I bought last year, which made me feel like a proper grown up, a picnic blanket and a bag with two micro towels and talc in. We have another bag with a few buckets and spades. That is all we need for the beach. It means we can decide to just go to the beach, about 45 minutes away, and be out of the house in 15 mins or so whereas before it would take hours of faffing.

Keeping the things in the car has been the key for me.

In other areas we are not that family though. I know a family where at the fist hint of sun, they all don sunhats and sunglasses. At the first hint of rain they are all in raincoats and children in waterproof bottoms etc...we are not there yet...the other day all three of us dashed out of the house to catch a train and realised we had no coats/jackets/cardigans etc...we coped.

I know what you mean. We are absolutely not that family, and my parents weren't either - it's a running family joke that the '[our surname] family is never knowingly prepared'.

In my experience those families are often big families (at least three children, often more) and I wonder whether at that point (we only have one, tiny, DC, so wouldn't know) it's a bit more 'do or die' with organisation - that blundering through like I do just doesn't work?

The other thing all the ones I personally know have in common is that the mum a) is a SAHM and b) used to have a job that required hyper-organisation (not necessarily super high powered, but with organisation as a must, e.g. PA). I definitely think there's some transferrable skills going on there!