I think it's a very normal thing for parents to worry about
the development of their children. There's probably thousands of articles on
the internet studying that exact phenomenon. Interestingly enough, that's not
something that seems to subside as time rolls on. Instead, as Bethany and I
recently learned in a parenting class, the rules of the game continue to change
and evolve.
The good thing for us though is that we're currently in a
stage of life where the rules and/or questions are relatively simple. Instead
of having to deal with the stressful topics like dating, driving, and drugs, we
instead get to worry about more trivial things. Stuff like wondering if our
child respects us. Or if she has a well-balanced diet. Or whether or not our
child is good at playing with others. It's that last one that rings true for me
today.
As a stay-at-home dad, I'm not lying when I say it's easy to
feel like a man on an island. For starters, I don't have any close male friends
choosing the same path. Yes, I'm friends with plenty of stay-at-home moms.
However, I wonder if there's a certain degree of awkwardness calling them up
and asking for a play date (There's probably a better way to phrase that
sentence but I don't care). I know that I could always drop Ellie off with any
of them and let her play for a few hours with their kids. However, I have a
fear of taking advantage of those offers way too often and becoming a burden. As Bethany eloquently put it, I definitely struggle with asking for help.
In spite of all that, one thing that is important to me is that Ellie gets the
opportunity to go and do things as often as possible. For a toddler, I'm sure
there's nothing worse in the world than being stuck at home all day, every day.
Fortunately, I'm becoming more and more comfortable with dragging two kids out
of the house on little adventures. In the past couple of weeks alone, we've
been on a zoo trip, a play-date at my sister-in-law's house, a few park trips,
and story time at the library. Today, we had another little adventure of our
own as we made a pilgrimage to The Grove at Zona Rosa.
I realize that with the cooler weather, today would have
provided perfect park conditions. However, the overnight rains likely means that
all of the park equipment was still wet. Seeing as how the last thing Ellie
wants is a wet bottom, I decided an indoor playground made more sense. I always
assumed The Grove opened for the day around 10 when shops began to open. With
the aid of a quick internet search this morning, I learned The Grove instead
opens for playtime at 8 am. With that knowledge in mind, I loaded up the kids
and headed towards Zona Rosa as soon as Ethan woke up from his first nap around
8:15.
The first thing you should know about The Grove at 8:30 in
the morning is that it is completely vacant except for you and your children.
Let's face facts; not many people are going to want to be at a shopping center
before any stores are open. In fact, the only other folks in the building were
part of the cleaning crew. Ellie didn't mind in the least. She was able to play
on the equipment for as long as she wanted without having to watch out for
other kids. She was even able to go down the slide as many times in a row as
she wanted.
As for Ethan, he's still a little young for playing at The
Grove. However, he had a stellar time just watching Ellie play as he enjoyed a
mid-morning feeding. It was actually really cute watching his head dart back
and forth as his little eyes followed Ellie around the room. All I could do was
affectionately pat his little head and say nine simple words: "Your day to
play will come soon, little man." #DaddyWrite
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