So in light of me feeling better, I thought I'd write about something funny instead of the usual "heavy" stuff.
So today I had 5 kiddos which makes my van Full (all are boys, except A). But we like to get out and go whenever we can. There was a park play date I was planning to go to...
Things didn't quite go according to plan so we ended up arriving at the park 15 minutes before it was "over." I figured it was a laid-back kind of thing, lots of families were supposed to be there, so my crew would just enjoy the park even after the others left. We had a picnic lunch and were set to go.
When we got there, I discovered there was only one other mom who came. Oops. They sat with us and chatted, and then had to get on with their day.
My kids finished their lunches and then begged me to take them on some walking trails. I had never been to this park before, but some friends were leaving the trails earlier and assured us that their 2 yo made it just fine. We should just stay to the left and it would just make a nice loop back around.
I figured, we're in the middle of the city, a 2 yo can make it, what can go wrong? So we headed out.
Well the first 20 minutes were enjoyable. It was shady, there were bridges over a creek. The kids dipped their hands in the water. We even saw an owl in a tree.
The unfortunate thing was that about 3 feet into the hike there were 4 forks. We went left (the lower left, I think). We stayed left-ish. But there were Tons of intersections and such that had at least 3 options. No maps. No "easy trail, this way" arrows. No "snail trail .10 of a mile that away" signs.
Finally I decided we should turn around. We took a break. I encouraged the children to sit, drink their water, and chill. What did they do? Played tag. Then we started walking...and walking...and walking. The kids were sweaty, tired, and whiny. We found the only other trail head and a map! It was THE WORST map EVER.
I took a picture of it with my phone in case I needed to refer back to it. According to that, we stay right... So we did. I even stayed so far right that I led us all up a steep embankment (I promise you, it looked just as worn as the paths we'd been following), only to find it was a dead end.
So the kids trekked back down. One was in flip-flops, one was in rain boots, one was in tennis shoes, one was in crocs, and one was in well-worn play shoes.
We wandered and wandered and wandered. And wandered. The kids were whiny. Their legs were tired. We were dripping with sweat.
There had been absolutely no other people on the trail, but I found myself thinking "if only we could find someone to point us in the right direction." And around the next bend (to the right. We were staying right!) there were 3 teen-age kids putting hammocks up. YAY!!!
I totally interrupted them and admitted my stupidity and begged for directions.
Turns out we were a stone's throw from our trail head. One of the kids started to give me directions, and then just said "here, I'll just show ya. I'm headed back that way."
And naturally the minute we arrived back at the park the kids had tons of energy and ran around like little lunatics (cute little lunatics) asking if we could stay around for a while to play.
After 40-ish minutes of wandering around in the woods, Miss Alexis went with "no."
So today I had 5 kiddos which makes my van Full (all are boys, except A). But we like to get out and go whenever we can. There was a park play date I was planning to go to...
Things didn't quite go according to plan so we ended up arriving at the park 15 minutes before it was "over." I figured it was a laid-back kind of thing, lots of families were supposed to be there, so my crew would just enjoy the park even after the others left. We had a picnic lunch and were set to go.
When we got there, I discovered there was only one other mom who came. Oops. They sat with us and chatted, and then had to get on with their day.
My kids finished their lunches and then begged me to take them on some walking trails. I had never been to this park before, but some friends were leaving the trails earlier and assured us that their 2 yo made it just fine. We should just stay to the left and it would just make a nice loop back around.
I figured, we're in the middle of the city, a 2 yo can make it, what can go wrong? So we headed out.
Well the first 20 minutes were enjoyable. It was shady, there were bridges over a creek. The kids dipped their hands in the water. We even saw an owl in a tree.
The unfortunate thing was that about 3 feet into the hike there were 4 forks. We went left (the lower left, I think). We stayed left-ish. But there were Tons of intersections and such that had at least 3 options. No maps. No "easy trail, this way" arrows. No "snail trail .10 of a mile that away" signs.
Finally I decided we should turn around. We took a break. I encouraged the children to sit, drink their water, and chill. What did they do? Played tag. Then we started walking...and walking...and walking. The kids were sweaty, tired, and whiny. We found the only other trail head and a map! It was THE WORST map EVER.
I took a picture of it with my phone in case I needed to refer back to it. According to that, we stay right... So we did. I even stayed so far right that I led us all up a steep embankment (I promise you, it looked just as worn as the paths we'd been following), only to find it was a dead end.
So the kids trekked back down. One was in flip-flops, one was in rain boots, one was in tennis shoes, one was in crocs, and one was in well-worn play shoes.
We wandered and wandered and wandered. And wandered. The kids were whiny. Their legs were tired. We were dripping with sweat.
There had been absolutely no other people on the trail, but I found myself thinking "if only we could find someone to point us in the right direction." And around the next bend (to the right. We were staying right!) there were 3 teen-age kids putting hammocks up. YAY!!!
I totally interrupted them and admitted my stupidity and begged for directions.
Turns out we were a stone's throw from our trail head. One of the kids started to give me directions, and then just said "here, I'll just show ya. I'm headed back that way."
And naturally the minute we arrived back at the park the kids had tons of energy and ran around like little lunatics (cute little lunatics) asking if we could stay around for a while to play.
After 40-ish minutes of wandering around in the woods, Miss Alexis went with "no."
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