On Saturday morning, I took the kids to a little nearby park that is basically a creek going through a strip of grass in the middle of a neighborhood. I came across it on a walk one day and immediately thought it would be a great little place for the kids to play on a warm day. The kids did, in fact, have a lot of fun climbing around on the rocks and playing in the water.
After snack time, Alice learned a valuable lesson: how hard and annoying it is to put wet water shoes back on! I was a bit grumpy that morning, which is usually when the kids learn the most lessons. I didn't want to try and get the shoes back on, so I made her do it. She whined and complained, but eventually succeeded, and will hopefully think twice before she takes them off mid-play next time.
After snack, we walked down to the other end of the creek and found a tunnel to play in. The kids, as you can see, had great fun. Simon is pretending to be a train (because trains go through tunnels).
Alice left the tunnel shortly after this. I thought she was just going to play on the water or climb the rocks, but when I turned around the check on her, I saw her running at full gallop back to the other end of the stream where we had been playing earlier. I shouted for her to stop running and come back, but she either didn't hear me, or pretended not to. So I grabbed Simon, climbed up out of the creek area (which was actually quite tricky right in that spot) and did my mad-mom march (still carrying Simon) until I caught up with Alice. I scolded her, told her she had to get out of the creek right then and couldn't play in it anymore, and that she would have no videos that night (her severest punishment). Then I told her the story of the boy falling into the gorilla pen at the zoo. Alice has been a "runner" from the very beginning and we've been trying to teach her over the years to not run off. Before going anywhere we talk about it; and yet she'll still do it from time to time.
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| Alice sits on the bank, accepting her punishment to not play in the water anymore because she ran off. |
