Dylan the Flirt
Yesterday Dylan and I went to the mall to meet up with the Mom's group for lunch. After dining on some chick-fil-a I decided to do something I've sworn many, many, many times I would never do. I took Dylan into the children's play area.
When I found out I was pregnant the mall became a scary place to me. Suddenly I didn't really notice the cute clothes in the window (not that I could buy them anymore anyway) or the great sales at my favorite stores. All I noticed were the hundreds of overly stressed, overly tired moms pushing multiple whiny children in strollers, trying everything they could to keep them happy as they schlepped them from one store to the next... or even weirder, just power walked around the mall. And then eventually I'd wander past the worst part of it all... the children's play area. It's always swarming with little kids. Climbing, running, crying, screaming, shouting kids. The whole thing just stressed me out. I promised myself I would never succumb to it. Instead I'd be the mean mom who never let her kid play in the fun part of the mall. My baby may not like it, but my sanity depended on it. But it's funny how things change once you actual become a mom. At lunch one of the other mom's even made the comment "we're one of those moms now" ...how true, how true.
But now, living on the other side , I can totally understand the need for it all. We went to the mall for lunch after several days of being cooped up inside our little townhouse thanks to all the rain (and I was suffering through a cold at the same time). It was nice to have somewhere we could go to get out of the house and socialize. After sitting in a high chair through lunch (about an hour) I knew that if Dylan didn't get out and crawl for a little bit he'd be really cranky on the ride home, plus he wouldn't get out enough energy between his naps, so he probably wouldn't take a very good afternoon nap, which would mean that he'd be really cranky around dinner time, which would mean that he wouldn't eat very well at dinner, which is really not good right now since we are trying very actively to get him to gain weight. So I knew what I had to do. Fortunately a few other brave souls brought their babies to the play area too, so I didn't have to face the craziness alone.
It was crazy, but not as bad as I expected. There were kids running all over the place, nearly crawling on top of Dylan at times, but he didn't seem to mind, and as long as no one stepped on his fingers or knocked him over, I didn't mind either. And Dylan LOVED playing there. I think he really enjoyed watching all the other kids, but he especially connected to a little 6 year old girl. I'm not sure what her name was, but she totally turned in to Dylan's play time girlfriend while we were there. She played hide and seek with him, held his hand when he went down the slide, gave him hugs, made him laugh. He was so smitten. And I found it completely adorable.
So just one more example of how clueless I was about what it would be like to be a mom. Dylan didn't even have to ask to go to the play area, I willingly took him. And we both had a great time. who knew I'd like being "one of those moms"?
When I found out I was pregnant the mall became a scary place to me. Suddenly I didn't really notice the cute clothes in the window (not that I could buy them anymore anyway) or the great sales at my favorite stores. All I noticed were the hundreds of overly stressed, overly tired moms pushing multiple whiny children in strollers, trying everything they could to keep them happy as they schlepped them from one store to the next... or even weirder, just power walked around the mall. And then eventually I'd wander past the worst part of it all... the children's play area. It's always swarming with little kids. Climbing, running, crying, screaming, shouting kids. The whole thing just stressed me out. I promised myself I would never succumb to it. Instead I'd be the mean mom who never let her kid play in the fun part of the mall. My baby may not like it, but my sanity depended on it. But it's funny how things change once you actual become a mom. At lunch one of the other mom's even made the comment "we're one of those moms now" ...how true, how true.
But now, living on the other side , I can totally understand the need for it all. We went to the mall for lunch after several days of being cooped up inside our little townhouse thanks to all the rain (and I was suffering through a cold at the same time). It was nice to have somewhere we could go to get out of the house and socialize. After sitting in a high chair through lunch (about an hour) I knew that if Dylan didn't get out and crawl for a little bit he'd be really cranky on the ride home, plus he wouldn't get out enough energy between his naps, so he probably wouldn't take a very good afternoon nap, which would mean that he'd be really cranky around dinner time, which would mean that he wouldn't eat very well at dinner, which is really not good right now since we are trying very actively to get him to gain weight. So I knew what I had to do. Fortunately a few other brave souls brought their babies to the play area too, so I didn't have to face the craziness alone.
It was crazy, but not as bad as I expected. There were kids running all over the place, nearly crawling on top of Dylan at times, but he didn't seem to mind, and as long as no one stepped on his fingers or knocked him over, I didn't mind either. And Dylan LOVED playing there. I think he really enjoyed watching all the other kids, but he especially connected to a little 6 year old girl. I'm not sure what her name was, but she totally turned in to Dylan's play time girlfriend while we were there. She played hide and seek with him, held his hand when he went down the slide, gave him hugs, made him laugh. He was so smitten. And I found it completely adorable.
So just one more example of how clueless I was about what it would be like to be a mom. Dylan didn't even have to ask to go to the play area, I willingly took him. And we both had a great time. who knew I'd like being "one of those moms"?
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