Saturday, July 26, 2014

The Brown Playground

It seems I never have enough time to get caught up on blogs.  Busy summer days lead to busy summer evenings.  It's all been wonderful.  But it occurrs to me, we really are wrapping up the last days of summer.  On Tuesday, I took Sam to Broadripple park.  And ever since, Chris has been begging to go. I told him we got eaten alive, because I hadn't packed my bug spray.  And he still wants to go every day after ICC camp.  On Thursday, he said to me, "Mommy?  I like ICC camp.  I'm good at singing.  How did you know I would be?"  I knew he liked singing, but I didn't know he would be this good at it.  But it seems to mature him.  And I like that.  And I love how much he's loving it.
Along the same lines of maturity, when he asked so very nicely if he could go to the park.  I said after ICC camp, we had to go home for lunch.  Chris said to me, If you pack a picnic lunch, we could go to the park.  Hmm.  Very logical, and even I couldn't resist.  So, when I went to pick him up, I had packed some snacks, and we ate them on the road to the park.  But not Broadripple, because I wanted Jake (and I) to nap, I wanted one of the parks closer to town.  Plus I had fill up gas on the way.  So Chris and Sam picked Blastoff park.  But when we arrived, that park was closed.  And they'd been so good.  I couldn't have that.  So I decided to 'reward' them by taking them to their school, and letting them play on the playground there, without the whole class, kind of a precursor playground playdate before school starts.   They loved it.


All my sweetboys make a mad dash toward the new playground. 
The Dog Dash money last year helped totally revamp and rebuild this playground.  
And they did a great job! 


There's a great ramp up, so that even Jacob could walk up and play. 


The big boys have some fun on a mini rock wall, it's like walking up a rock path. 
I didn't have to worry about them falling and hurting themselves...except Jake. 
See him going up the ramp to be by his brothers?  He's a maniac.  


The big boys had fun on these spinny seats. 
Chris had clearly ridden on these before, when he asked me for a push.  But being off balance made Sam nervous, he was pretty content just to sit there.  Mommy was pretty content too, because I got to hear the high school marching band drum line doing a cadence for practice just across the way.  I love hearing a band practice now, it reminds me of fall, telling me that the start of school is not far away. :) 


While the big brothers play on equipment too big for the littlest, he tried to follow, but mostly he just called to us.  I can't say he was yelling, because there was smiling, he was happy, just as happy to explore and get around as the big kids.  He really is Batman. 


The big boys show us how this twirly thing works, you hang on tight and get spun.  Last year, I saw Chris and his teacher do this with a bunch of other kids.  I didn't think I could too.  I did.  But not for long.  I clearly am not a 12 year old. .. my arms are like that of an 80 year old.  But the boys love when I can play with them a bit, me too, and so I gotta try. 


Now, being that this was an elementary park, there were no baby seats.  
But there were Special Needs swings.  So I took a bet and put Jacob in there.  And the harness was so big it blocked him in there.  so then I pushed the big boys too, and for a moment they were all swinging happily. 


They crack me up when they are all on a swingset at the same time.  
Though it's really hard to get a decent picture of them like that. ;) 


The big boys climb on the honeycomb.  
I'm not sure if that's what it is called.  But that's what I called it.  
Jake was getting a little tired.  Can you see him by the slide through the honeycomb?


So then Jake and I made moves for the car, and the big kids didn't want to leave.  
They realized in an empty park, they were kings of the mountain.  Understandable.  But it doesn't last.  
Summer is ending.  The drums were beating, telling us that summer is coming to an end.  The boys keep growing, and they aren't always going to want me to take them to a playground...just because. The boys don't hear it.  They just know that they got to go to an empty playground and not fight any other kids, and that was fun for them.  I like to take these special moments, even if they aren't for very long amounts of time.  I enjoy the tiny playdates as much as the big ones.  I don't take them enough.  But this summer, I've gotten better.  We all have.  We are all taking more time to be better, to be better with each other, and to just have fun. 

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