Hey Palmetto Parents,

We had a great long weekend with an easy Saturday and a full Sunday and Monday. We had the opportunity to check out The Wizard of Oz at the Dock Street Theater and wow I was floored with the professionalism of this play. It is totally worth it! Tell them we sent you their way.

This week is looking full as well. Check out Charleston Museum’s Siege Sunday’s for family events once a month of select Sundays. Take a look at each theme below.

If museums are not your family’s thing, there are so many different events this weekend including Dancing on the Cooper, the Citadel vs. Charleston Southern football game, a Retro market, and Second Sunday.

Take a stop at one of Charleston’s favorite Asian restaurants, Jackrabbit Filly. If you haven’t tried them yet, make it a date night for this weekend!

Lastly we end this week’s newsletter with some advice for families starting fall sports this season.

Have the best week!

‼️Coming soon‼️

A boutique coworking space directly in Hutchinson Square! If you work from home and have been looking for a desk right in the heart of Summerville, look no further. Hutchinson Yard, Summerville’s newest neighborhood workspace, is opening next month!

Memberships are first come first serve, and spots are limited. If you’re interested in learning more, fill out this short interest form and they’ll be in touch.

If you’re looking for a fun way to sneak a little history into your family’s fall weekends, The Charleston Museum is continuing its Family Revolutionary Sundays series throughout 2026 in honor of the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.

These family-friendly programs take place once a month and explore different people, events and themes from the Revolutionary War. Each program includes a class or guided tour plus a hands-on craft or activity, making it much more than just a history lesson for kids.

Here are the remaining programs to put on your calendar:

Family Revolutionary Sunday: Siege!

This Sunday, September 13 from 2-3pm step back into Charleston’s Revolutionary War history. Families will learn about the Siege of Charleston, the longest formal siege of the Revolution, including how Charleston defended itself, how the British eventually overcame those defenses, and even how to fire a cannon!

Family Revolutionary Sunday: Espionage!
Learn about the spies of the Revolutionary War and try out some of their secret techniques, including invisible ink and cipher wheels. This event will be held 10/11 from 2-3pm. This is a fun one for kids who love anything involving secret codes, mysteries and spy games!

Family Revolutionary Sunday: Indigenous Allies
Discover the important role Indigenous Americans played during the Revolutionary War. This event is 11/08 from 2-3pm. Families will learn about those who fought on both sides, why they made those choices and what happened to Indigenous communities after the war.

Family Revolutionary Sunday: Surrender!
As 2026 comes to a close, so does the Revolutionary Sundays series. This final program looks at how the British were finally defeated and the aftermath of Cornwallis’s surrender in Charleston. This event is Sunday 12/13 from 2-3pm.

All Revolutionary Sunday programs are FREE for Museum members or FREE with admission to The Charleston Museum. Each one is designed to be interactive and family-friendly, so it’s an easy one to add to a Sunday afternoon.

📍 The Charleston Museum
Free for members or included with museum admission
843-722-2996 ext. 236

Saturday, September 12 | Music Farm

Ready for a little trip down memory lane? Retroland Market is bringing all things nostalgic to the Music Farm on Saturday, with vintage fashion, toys, VHS tapes, collectibles, knickknacks and plenty of childhood throwbacks. The market features 14 curated Charleston vendors, plus a retro photo setup for the perfect Instagram moment. There will also be a coffee truck, brunch options and plenty to browse.

There are three 90-minute time slots: 10am, 12pm and 2pm, making this an easy activity to squeeze into your Saturday.

📍 Music Farm | 🎟️ Tickets required

Saturday, September 12 | Johnson Hagood Stadium

It's football season in Charleston! Head to Johnson Hagood Stadium Saturday evening as The Citadel takes on Charleston Southern. Kickoff is at 6pm, making this a fun option for families with older kids who want to experience a true Charleston football Saturday.

Grab some dinner beforehand, wear your school colors and make a night of it. There's just something about watching college football under the lights that makes September feel like fall, even when Charleston's weather hasn't quite gotten the memo!

📍 Johnson Hagood Stadium | 🕕 6 PM

Friday, September 11 | Mount Pleasant Pier

Kick off the weekend with one of Charleston's prettiest evening traditions. Dancing on the Cooper takes over the end of the Mount Pleasant Pier Friday night with live music, dancing and views of Charleston Harbor.

Gates open at 7pm, and the event runs until 10pm. Advance tickets are $10 per person and children 3 and under are free. Bring the whole family—or make this one a date night and let someone else handle bedtime!

📍 Mount Pleasant Pier | 🕖 7–10 PM | 🎟️ $10 in advance

Sunday, September 13 | Downtown Charleston

One of our favorite Charleston traditions is back! On the second Sunday of every month, King Street closes to through traffic from Queen Street to Calhoun Street, giving pedestrians five whole hours to stroll, shop, eat and explore without dodging cars.

Local shops spill out onto the sidewalks, artists and vendors set up along the street, and restaurants and businesses get in on the fun. It's the perfect excuse to wander downtown with the kids, grab lunch and do a little shopping—or simply enjoy Charleston at a much slower pace.

📍 King Street, Queen to Calhoun | 🕛 12–5 PM | FREE

I shared a little bit about this in our intro last week, but one of my favorite things to do this past year is to get some group date time when we have family or friends in town. I love having my kids with me, but it’s nice when we get some much needed adult time and my in law’s last visit was no different.

Recently, we had tickets to a concert at Credit One Stadium, and naturally, we waited way too long to make dinner reservations anywhere remotely close to the stadium. So we decided to risk it and headed over to Park Circle to try our luck at Jackrabbit Filly.

The verdict? The parking, food and timing worked out perfectly. Sometimes giving into your type B lifestyle habits work out for the better.

Jackrabbit Filly has been in its East Montague location for a while now, and the restaurant's vibe matches the food perfectly. It's funky, cool, colorful and unmistakably Charleston. The food is where this place really shines. Think heritage-driven New Chinese American cooking with big, unexpected flavors.

Every bite feels like a little food explosion.

And I love that Jackrabbit Filly somehow manages to be both things: casual enough that you can bring your kids, but special enough that it feels completely worth getting a sitter and spending a couple of hours actually focusing on your food, your drink and the people sitting across from you.

We showed up around 5:45 on a Saturday night, fully prepared to hear that we were out of luck. Instead, we put our names on the list as walk-ins and were told it would be about a 45-minute wait. Not bad at all.

We ordered the pork dumplings, the sweet butter cornbread, tuna tartare, potato and leek pierogi, sichaun hot karaage, and dan dan noodles. They also brought us complimentary kimchi, which was SO good. Everything hit that perfect combination of salty, sweet, savory, spicy and just generally what is happening in my mouth right now?

And for my fellow parents: there is plenty of street parking around the restaurant, and the bathrooms have baby changing stations. These may sound like tiny details, but when you're dining out with kids, those are the kinds of things that make a difference!

We ended up sitting down, eating, laughing and enjoying ourselves enough that we arrived at the concert just in time to catch the opener's last few songs.

They are open for lunch Wednesday - Thursday 11am - 2:30pm, Golden Hour (bar seating) from 3pm-5pm and dinner is from Wednesday - Thursday 5pm-9pm and weekend dinner Friday and Saturday from 5pm-9pm. Click here for their reservation link.

There is something so fun about taking a night that could have been complicated—last-minute dinner reservations, a concert across town, a babysitter and a late night—and just going with it. Sometimes those are the nights that end up being the most memorable.

And if you're looking for a place to splurge on a date night, a girls' night, a double date, or even just a really good dinner with your kids, Jackrabbit Filly is one of those Charleston spots where you can trust that dinner is going to be an experience.

Just maybe make the reservation ahead of time.

Fall sports are officially here, which is very exciting and super cute. But can also come with some attitude challenges for even the most athletic kids.

This fall, my husband and I are both coaching soccer. He's coaching our son's team, and I'm coaching our daughter's team. It has been so much fun watching our kids experience something that we get to be a part of in a special yet different way.

So as we head into another season of practices, cleats, water bottles and Saturday morning games, here are three things I'm trying to keep in mind.

You don't need to turn your backyard into a professional training facility.

Just 15 minutes of extra practice once or twice a week can make a noticeable difference. Kick the ball around. Practice dribbling. Take a few shots on goal. Work on passing. Whatever your child's sport is, find something they actually enjoy doing and make it part of your normal week.

And it's not just about getting better physically. Those little backyard practices can build stamina, confidence and emotional resilience.

Your child learns that it's okay to struggle with something, try again and eventually get it right. They learn that improvement doesn't happen overnight. And because you're doing it in a low-pressure environment, it can feel more like play than practice.

Fifteen minutes. That's it. You don't need a second full practice at home.

I love the idea of giving a child one realistic goal for the season rather than making the goal "be the best."

And the goal should depend completely on your child.

If you have a competitive kid who already loves the sport, make the goal tactical: Try to aim for the top-left corner of the soccer goal. Complete three passes before taking a shot. Use your left foot twice during the game.

But if your child is brand new to a sport and simply showing up is a huge act of courage, the goal might look completely different.

Maybe it's standing for the entire practice instead of sitting down when they're nervous. Maybe it's raising their hand when the coach asks who wants to go first. Or talking to one new teammate. It could be simply staying on the field for the entire drill.

Those things can look tiny to an adult, but to a five-year-old who is nervous, they can be HUGE.

The goal isn't necessarily to make your child a better athlete. Sometimes the goal is to help them become a little more confident.

This might be the easiest one to forget once the season gets going.

We're parents. We want our kids to do well. We want them to listen to their coaches, improve their skills and maybe even win a game or two.

But the reason we signed them up in the first place was probably because we wanted them to have fun.

Our kids are going to have plenty of opportunities throughout their lives to be evaluated, compete, perform and be told where they need to improve. Sports can be one of the places where they simply get to run around with their friends, learn something new and feel proud of themselves.

I'm trying to remind myself of that this season, especially because I'm coaching my daughter.

When I told her that I was going to be her soccer coach this fall, her immediate reaction was basically, “Wait…YOU are coaching me?!” And she was genuinely disappointed that it wasn't Dad.

She had an idea in her head of what soccer was going to look like, and apparently that picture involved Dad standing on the sidelines, not Mom.

But it did make me realize that coaching my daughter is going to be a new dynamic in our mother-daughter relationship. There will be moments when I have to correct her, moments when she doesn't listen to me, moments when she may be frustrated with me and moments when I have to separate Coach Mom from Mom Mom.

And instead of avoiding that, I'm actually excited to work through it.

Because maybe there's something really special about getting to show your daughter that Mom can be someone who encourages her, challenges her, teaches her something new and cheers the absolute loudest when she finally gets it.

So here's to a new fall sports season: a little extra practice, one realistic goal and a whole lot of fun.

And if your family calendar is already completely insane because of practices, games and activities…just know you're not alone. We're right there with you.

Have the best week!

Love, Jenna