Ever since one of the Girl Scout moms and I had a conversation about parks the other day, I have been nostalgic.
I have been taking the kids to the park more since the weather is warming up. Something I haven’t been able to do in the past because I worked and when I was first staying at home, Dominik was too little.
Anyway, we were talking about how we missed the things that made the park fun for us as kids. The silly little animals on springs that you could get and ‘ride’, the creaky old merry-go-round, the swing sets…..
If that last one surprised you, it sure did me too. They have done extensive remodeling on our parks in my town over the last few years and apparently not only did we lose merry-go-rounds and monkey bar domes, but swing sets didn’t make the cut either.
So the the remodel of the park across the street took us from a full playground with several areas and things to play on down to three things. A sand volleyball area, a soccer field and what as kids we called a ‘big toy’.
The big toy has three slides and is similar to the picture above though much taller. It has one tire swing off to the side and that is it.
My kids go to the park and after 30 minutes they are done. Why? Because we have a small version of the big toy in our backyard. And….at least ours has swings attached and sand to play in.
If there aren’t many other kids there when we are, there is nothing to do, you can’t play soccer or sand volleyball with a mom, a 4 yr old and an 8 yr old.
It makes me sad that they won’t have memories of climbing the pole to ring the bell, riding the silly bear with the circus hat trying to get the nose to touch the ground or having swinging contests to see who can get the highest.
The worst is the feeling that my kids will not know the camaraderie and excitement of getting a whole bunch of kids on the merry-go-round and taking turns spinning it.
Ten of you holding on for your dear lives with one leg down, all pushing off like we were rowing a boat…faster and faster.
Or the satisfaction of talking a ‘big kid’ into spinning you as fast as they can and you hold on as tight as you can, feeling like you were going to throw up and loving every second of it.
Don’t be surprised if you see a post this summer that we are installing a merry-go-round in our backyard, lol. Never put anything past me.
