My husband travels for his work, and sometimes that can mean several days by myself with the kids. When they were little babies I found I could handle being at home all day without going anywhere other than the backyard. Now, I NEED to get out of the house with the kids, usually every day. They get very restless at home, particularly in the winter when it's not as easy to spend a lot of time outside. They still want a lot of my time and attention, and I can take only so much physical activity at a time before they exhaust me.
That's why on this particular fall day in the second week of November, I was so thankful it wasn't that cold outside so we could take advantage of a park day.
We were originally going to go to this place a few minutes from our house that has huge inflatables to bounce on. But, after dropping off some books at the library, the kids decided to stay at the library to read books and play with the Legos for a while.
Afterwards, I decided I really didn't feel like going home to make lunch for them, so I surprised them by pulling up to McDonald's. They were so excited!
Like so many other parents I suppose, the main reason I like going there (not that it's that often) is so the kids can play on the slides and climbing equipment. Jared NEEDS to do something very physical every day, and often Alexa does, too. There was another boy at the restaurant their age, so they played with him, too. It was so wonderful to sit and read for a bit while they played.
Like I said, when Steve is gone for several days, it can be hard being around the kids for so long. They sleep for about ten hours during the night, and do not take naps, so that usually means fourteen hours straight with the kids, and most of the time it's with them demanding my attention. I'm a pretty introverted person and love being able to read and write in silence, so it's been hard to get used to hardly ever having time for that any more. I seriously don't know how single parents do it.
After 45 minutes of play at McDonald's, we stopped at a nearby park. We were the only ones there. They had a wonderful time slidding, swinging, and climbing for about another hour. It was just a nice free-flow day where we didn't have anything scheuled and could just come and go whenever we wanted. Days like today make me so glad we can have this unschooling lifestyle.
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