Adventures with Carter, Playground Edition

I should have posted this last week, but I sort of forgot these pictures were on my phone until mid-week, and it's been a heck of a week in general due to a controversial situation at work.  I worked late on Thursday and the rest of the week was just sort of exhausting.  So now I'm a week behind...but oh, well.

Last weekend I decided to make good on a promise to Carter to take him to a new playground.  I saw it last month when I stopped at our school district's community education office to sign Jacob up for the afterschool program.  The facility is at a former school, on the other side of the complex from where we went to our family counseling through the district a couple years ago.  The playground looked like it had some fun stuff to climb, which I knew Carter would enjoy.  We had a nice day and a free afternoon, so off we went.  And sure enough, Carter really enjoyed it!

One of the slides was so high and steep!  Carter called it a "roller coaster slide" and went down it more times than I could count!  He even stopped holding on, so he could get the full effect!  There were a large number of scuff marks at the bottom, so from what I can assume kids have been using their shoes to slow themselves down near the bottom!

There were so many places to climb!  This one was a little tight for me--I survived unscathed, but once was enough--but Carter loved that it was like a secret hideout tunnel!

There was one climbing structure that looked a little daunting, but Carter climbed across it from end to end!

And he posed for a picture!

I did it myself (playgrounds seem to be a proving ground for me these days--I also proved I could still hang myself upside-down that day!), and it was hard.  He did so good!

Watch out, here comes the tiger!

We had so much fun that he wanted to stop at one more on our way home, the one we went to with him when Jacob was at his lacrosse training camp and he had Mommy and Daddy all to himself.  We didn't have a lot of time, but we did have fun and got a little nature lesson, too.  There's a wooded area near the school (which I realized will officially be Carter's school a year from now--yikes!) and I saw no less than eight squirrels running around like maniacs at one point.  We saw one nearby chewing on the nuts that had fallen off the trees and were able to see what was left behind after the squirrel got the nut out of the shell.  It turned out that they were hickory nuts, which I don't think I've ever really come across before.  It was cool to see, though.

After that adventure, it was back to another week.  Now that the school year has started, Carter's teachers have gotten more serious about the educational aspects of their room.  They're starting a new curriculum and with it comes a bit of homework.  Luckily they're mostly easy assignments--bring in a book, wear a color, bring something that starts with the letter of the week.  Some take a little more effort, like drawing a picture or making a collage.  He only needs to do half of them to get a prize at the end of the month, so we do all of the easy ones and usually skip the collages.  Conceptually it's still a lot for a four-year-old, and if I had magazines around it would be much easier.  But I don't, so I'm not going to break the bank when I know we have the rest covered.  Again, he's four, so most of the effort will be mine anyway.  God knows we went through enough stress with Jacob and the collage he had to do!  I don't mind the rest of these, though, as it gives us something to work on together, which is more productive than just watching TV.

Two weeks ago we had the cutest moment where we were trying to teach him how to draw a birthday cake.  He needed a little coaching but ultimately did it all himself, and it was so cute!  He was so proud of his work and couldn't wait to show his teachers the next day.  It completely melted my heart to see him looking so victorious.  Then last week he had to either draw two leaves or glue two to a piece of paper.  So, we went out in the evening, just as it was starting to get dark, in search of leaves.  Carter was excited to use his Lightning McQueen big wheel, since he knew there was a spot in the back where we could stash the leaves until we were done!  Cute, right?  We picked up a couple a house or two down, but I knew there was a house around the corner with a tree dropping red leaves, so we took a little journey to get there.  He rode, I walked.  We got to enjoy a gorgeous sky along the way.

We also saw from a distance five deer running out from behind a house next to where we were going and run across the street, presumably to go hang out on the golf course nearby.  We picked up a handful of leaves that were to our liking, even though we only needed two, then went home to glue them on paper.  We had a giant purple one, a few red ones, one that was half yellow-half green in a perfect mottled pattern, and one reddish one from our yard that was a different shape than the rest, which were maple leaves.    

My view when he's on his Big Wheel...he's fast!

He was a really good boy for the whole thing, and we really enjoyed our little adventure.  He's always up for something fun, and I really appreciate that about him.  Lately I've been feeling like we need to get out more and do things, and he's such a good little buddy for that stuff.  We had another fun adventure this weekend, which I'll blog about soon.

Last week the big boys reintroduced Carter to a long-time favorite activity in our house--using the various hockey rinks and lots of different hockey guys to create epic games.  Jacob still needs to have a little more patience and there's sometimes a little contention about whose guys are whose, but for the most part it made for some fun playtimes over the week.  The living room is still full of rinks--the main rink and practice rinks--and so many guys.  Chaos, but I'll let it slide if they play like this...

Carter is really getting to be a much more fun kid as he gets older.  Most of the time I still want to freeze him in this perfect stage of little big kid who still unapologetically adores his mama and isn't afraid to show it, but as he gets older he's that much more fun to hang out with.  Even Jacob is slowly seeing the benefits in having him around, even if he doesn't always show it in the best way.  I'm so thankful for the little ball of joy he is most of the time, because God knows we need it around here.  I prayed for the perfect kid to complete our family, and I really do think we got him.