An Evening At The Park

Last night we wanted to get out of the house and decided to go to a play ground. We went to the playground at the early childhood development center where they have lots of playground equipment appropriate for Alyce's age. We left for the playground after Alyce's nap and dinner putting us there a little before 7:00.

Alyce must have seen something when we pulled into the parking lot because she started squealing with delight even before we stopped the car. Once across the parking lot she practically ran to the playground.

I did most of the playing with Alyce because Mom was feeling tired and a little sick. Alyce rode every slide on the playground about about a million times and never seemed to tire of them. Alyce also walked across the some stepping stones, and we spent some time pretending to drive a red jeep.

As the evening wore on we knew that we were going to be leaving soon so we tried some advice to make a transition to a new activity easier on Alyce. Five minutes before we left we told Alyce that she had 3 more trips on the slide then it was time to go. Of course she responded with her stereotypical "No." We gave her additional reminders every time she went down the slide until the last time. When we told her it was the last time on the slide she climbed up the slide and then started to procrastinate. Eventually she did make it down the slide and we had to stand firm to our earlier statement on it being time to leave. Naturally Alyce wasn't very happy with that decision, but rather than throw a tantrum she got little unhappy and picked up a hand full of bark mulch.

Deciding to cut our losses we let Alyce carry her bark all the way back to the car. When we got the car Alyce dropped the mulch onto the ground, waved bye to it, and said bye-bye. Such a polite little girl.