Exhausted Parentals
Hola Wild Boy friends, and a hearty welcome to you this final weekend before back to school! Here in la Casa we have been cramming everything we possibly can into our last remaining days of freedom and frankly, we're exhausted. Not the boys, obviously. Me and the cop. Here's the thing, we were blessed with two healthy boys. We fully appreciate that. But our boys will willingly sit down and hold still MAYBE 20 minutes at a go, and then they need to be moving.
For every one of you right now thinking (or who has EVER in the past told me something like) "Oh my gosh you're so lucky - my kids always want to be on the tv/computer/video games/phone/insert tech gadget of your choice here," please understand that sometimes when you say that I kind of want to punch you in the throat. But that's just the exhaustion speaking, I'm sure. Because this week I decided that I would take the boys to the night slides at a water slide park with some friends after work one night.
Holy hell, what was I thinking? Eight kids and four moms (none of us twenty-somethings, by the way, which is the what makes us so awesome), at a water park from 6-10 pm? How did I EVER think I could manage this?
Actually, I kind of know what I was thinking. I was basing this on my experiences with water slides as a child. Every summer our family would get together for a giant family picnic at a park that had two water slides. One was open, one was covered. You'd walk up a giant ramp, and sit on your butt on a slide that was like a twisty version of the one of the ones at the county fair. Pretty tame, totally manageable, and all in all a pleasant memory.
Flash forward 30 years to when I'm attempting to parent. Water slides are no longer ANYTHING like I remember. First off, nobody sits on their butt anymore for anything. They use tubes, and very few of the slides are for one person either. So these tubes are designed for four people, roughly the size of a queen sized air mattress, and weigh well over 30 pounds. This makes them incredibly awkward to try to carry up the eight flights of stairs that EVERY slide seems to necessitate. Obviously, most groups have several people helping. But not us...we had three moms (because the one smart enough to bring her baby immediately volunteered to stay with the littlest ones in the kid area that had NO stairs or giant tubes...she's brilliant) each hauling a tube while six kids ran around us tripping us up and occasionally falling against us and pinning us between giant tubes and stair rails, peering over six stories up and contemplating whether we'd live if we landed ON the tube when we fell.
Then we got on the slides themselves, all with names like the Riptide, the Stormrider, Thunder Falls, and the Six Chuter. They hire brilliant people to name these, because if mom's named them they'd be more accurate and way less crowded. They'd be called things like "The Giant Toilet Bowl," "The One That's Going to Slingshot You Up the Side to Pukesville," and "Good Thing Nobody Can Tell That You Peed Yourself." Don't get me wrong - it was totally fun, but I'm pretty sure I aged another decade, not just from the slides but from the revelation you have to weigh in before you go ON EVERY SLIDE...holy humble pie! Wait, no, no pie for me ever again...
When all was said and done, the kids had a great time and the moms got the workout to end all workouts. The Wild Boys and I made it home and to bed around one. I'm still recovering.
But do you think the Wild Boys were exhausted? Nope. They got a few hours of sleep, went on to a full day at daycare, then both had soccer practice. After a week like that we thought they'd be pooped, but yesterday they convinced the cop to indulge in nine holes of golf because they didn't have anything planned...and LORD FORBID a day goes by we don't have anything planned...
They. Never. Get. Tired.
I've tried everything. I know, it's a blessing. But right now a nap would seem like a blessing too, just saying. Anyhow, time for me to sign off. I know that's the case because if I sit here too long they take up position on the stairs and use a nerf sniper rifle to shoot me from a safe distance then scramble away before I catch them... until next time!
For every one of you right now thinking (or who has EVER in the past told me something like) "Oh my gosh you're so lucky - my kids always want to be on the tv/computer/video games/phone/insert tech gadget of your choice here," please understand that sometimes when you say that I kind of want to punch you in the throat. But that's just the exhaustion speaking, I'm sure. Because this week I decided that I would take the boys to the night slides at a water slide park with some friends after work one night.
Holy hell, what was I thinking? Eight kids and four moms (none of us twenty-somethings, by the way, which is the what makes us so awesome), at a water park from 6-10 pm? How did I EVER think I could manage this?
Actually, I kind of know what I was thinking. I was basing this on my experiences with water slides as a child. Every summer our family would get together for a giant family picnic at a park that had two water slides. One was open, one was covered. You'd walk up a giant ramp, and sit on your butt on a slide that was like a twisty version of the one of the ones at the county fair. Pretty tame, totally manageable, and all in all a pleasant memory.
Flash forward 30 years to when I'm attempting to parent. Water slides are no longer ANYTHING like I remember. First off, nobody sits on their butt anymore for anything. They use tubes, and very few of the slides are for one person either. So these tubes are designed for four people, roughly the size of a queen sized air mattress, and weigh well over 30 pounds. This makes them incredibly awkward to try to carry up the eight flights of stairs that EVERY slide seems to necessitate. Obviously, most groups have several people helping. But not us...we had three moms (because the one smart enough to bring her baby immediately volunteered to stay with the littlest ones in the kid area that had NO stairs or giant tubes...she's brilliant) each hauling a tube while six kids ran around us tripping us up and occasionally falling against us and pinning us between giant tubes and stair rails, peering over six stories up and contemplating whether we'd live if we landed ON the tube when we fell.
Then we got on the slides themselves, all with names like the Riptide, the Stormrider, Thunder Falls, and the Six Chuter. They hire brilliant people to name these, because if mom's named them they'd be more accurate and way less crowded. They'd be called things like "The Giant Toilet Bowl," "The One That's Going to Slingshot You Up the Side to Pukesville," and "Good Thing Nobody Can Tell That You Peed Yourself." Don't get me wrong - it was totally fun, but I'm pretty sure I aged another decade, not just from the slides but from the revelation you have to weigh in before you go ON EVERY SLIDE...holy humble pie! Wait, no, no pie for me ever again...
When all was said and done, the kids had a great time and the moms got the workout to end all workouts. The Wild Boys and I made it home and to bed around one. I'm still recovering.
But do you think the Wild Boys were exhausted? Nope. They got a few hours of sleep, went on to a full day at daycare, then both had soccer practice. After a week like that we thought they'd be pooped, but yesterday they convinced the cop to indulge in nine holes of golf because they didn't have anything planned...and LORD FORBID a day goes by we don't have anything planned...
They. Never. Get. Tired.
I've tried everything. I know, it's a blessing. But right now a nap would seem like a blessing too, just saying. Anyhow, time for me to sign off. I know that's the case because if I sit here too long they take up position on the stairs and use a nerf sniper rifle to shoot me from a safe distance then scramble away before I catch them... until next time!
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