A Mother’s Day Q&A
This year, Mother’s Day falls on Sunday, May 8th. All across the country people gather together to honor the wonderful women who not only gave us life, but taught us how to move through it. We asked two of our instructors, Jenny Worthington and Coral Draper, to give their perspective on motherhood, kids, and fitness.
JENNY WORTHINGTON
How many kids do you have and how old are they?
“I have two tiny humans; one is 12 and the other is 15. They both play softball, so I have one catcher and one pitcher, so they can practice together. And what’s hilarious is that my 12 year old is only 2 inches shorter than my 15 year old and so we took a family photo and we are all like stair steps. Yeah, it’s super cute.”
What are some fun ways you and your kids stay active together?
“We do a lot of softball. I also train my kids, which is kinda cool. They have to be in a good mood for that, because I tell them what to do all the time. We like to bike ride and we also do bowling together from time to time. I grew up and my parents were in a bowling league, so it’s kinda funny. I have a dog named Molly and so we walk Molly. She’s a beagle. We walk her into the trail, which means she usually walks us down and we kinda pull her back.”
What is your favorite part about being a mom?
“To be able to teach relationships and authenticity to someone, to teach empathy and understanding, and to be able to watch them grow up and apply what they’ve learned at home between Mike and I. It’s just a beautiful thing. I am very authentic with the kids, so when I mess up I tell them. This is what I did, and then I’ll ask what I could have done better. Then we apply that even to my own life and to theirs. It’s super fun to see them grow up to be these beautiful tiny humans. They do AWANAs at Lakeway Church, which is run by one of our members Sarah E., and she always tells me these beautiful stories about how my kids are so helpful and how they are so good with the kids. And it just makes my heart sing. We took an RV trip and we were in the RV for a week in very close quarters and all of my 15 year old’s friends said “That must have been awful!” and she said “I like my family. My family’s cool!” I’m so thankful I understand relationships and am able to teach them.”
CORAL DRAPER
How many kids do you have and how old are they?
“I have 2 children, I have a 5 year old girl Tessa and a 7 year old son Finn. Tessa’s my girly girl, but she’s also athletic and does dance and gymnastics. She’s like my doer. Finn is my little brainiac, he loves researching animal stuff and he’s super into math. He plays soccer and he’s starting swim, so we’re just super busy doing a million things. But they’re back to back, so even though they’re 23 months apart the way their birthdays work out, she’s in Kindergarten and he’s in 1st grade. I have these dreams of them being in high school and they’ll be friends, and he’ll look out for his little sister.”
What are some fun ways you and your kids stay active together?
“So, we try to get outside as much as possible. We find that everyone is in a better mood when we just take it outside. And so whether it’s chasing around our cul-de-sac on scooters or bicycles, or going on the swing, or taking a hike in our neighborhood trails. All of us love to swim. And then keeping them active in group sports is important, which was something I didn’t have a lot of exposure to as a child. I see Tessa in gymnastics starting to learn how to strengthen her core and hold her body weight up on the little uneven bars, and practicing her little cartwheels, she’s starting to get little shoulder muscles popping up. It’s so cool. In general, it’s trying to find movement every day. We don’t do a lot of screens. It ends up being better for their minds, well-being, and attitude. When the kids are home and we’re home, it’s either we are playing with them or we have them play with each other or play dates with other families. And squeeze that in between all the swim meets and dance recitals, it’s crazy.”
What is your favorite part about being a mom?
“It’s allowed me to be less egotistical and selfish. I think naturally, we as humans have to be self-serving for a lot of the time to keep ourselves alive and happy. Like you have to take in your needs, and I was raised mostly as an only child so I felt like the world revolved around me. I really needed to get out of that mindset, and having children is like ripping off the band-aid. You are not important, not that you’re not important, but this little being needs you and you will sacrifice anything to take care of them, nurture them, raise them, and feed them, and make them into a good little person. It was a nice rude awakening to just have this more empathetic view towards people because you have to. Plus, it’s fun to see little carbon copies of yourself. My children are both blonde hair, blue-eyes, and when I see them I’m like ‘You’re so cute, because you look like me!’ which is sorta, egotistical, whoops. It keeps you young, life is really serious at times and this age is so golden because they still wanna play, they still wanna joke around, they still wanna giggle. They just want to have fun and everything is so light. It’s really joyful to embrace all of it.”