Blurring The Lines Of Our Routine - Part V
08.2.2010 Amusement Parks, Delayed Naps, and Driving During Bedtime
The day after Harper had cupcakes for dinner, we showed up to Kiddie Park just as they were opening the gates. Kiddie Park is a 1920s era amusement park nestled into plenty of shady trees at the edge of Brackenridge Park off Broadway and Mulberry in somewhat central San Antonio.
The rides are old school, none of this BPA-free plastic stuff with shock absorbing foam, no five-point harnesses for your protection, nobody employed specifically to wipe down toys and snot all day long like they do at the Houston Children’s Museum. If your family has been in the San Antonio area for generations, chances are my kids’ behinds were planted in the same exact welded metal bomber that your grandparents might have flown...
...or navigated boats with creepy names reminiscent of those MAD trading cards so popular in the mid 1980s, like "Adventurous Amber":
You should know: this was not a spontaneous outing.
Several weeks before, I had planned that we would go there Sunday morning on our way back to Houston. That we’d get there with the car already packed, have a couple hours of fun, eat lunch, and get home to Houston by the time the open house at our home was over (yes, that means what you think it means, and it’s a whole other post). Yes, we’d be jacking with their naps, but they’d hopefully be so exhausted from the heat that they’d sleep at least thirty minutes and Diego could carry us the rest of the way.
But after thinking about it further, we didn’t want to have a visibly packed car just sitting there tempting any wayward behavior from passers by. Hell if we were going to drive back without the technological opiate that is a portable DVD player, or without the portable beds we recently bought (that Harper isn’t taking too well to), or Raffy. Please don’t take Raffy! So we decided we’d just have to go back to my mom’s house after a morning of fun and decide what we’d do from there.
And fun we had! After Mateo rode “my Thomas” five or six times in a row, sometimes the only kid on the ride, he took a break for a snack. After that, we stood by the gate and he just admired his Thomas and kept talking about it, but didn’t want to ride it just then. All of a sudden, he changed his mind, just as the attendant was opening the gate to let a few kids in – a gate that was on the opposite side of where we were standing. I saw a spry mom (grandmother?) shoving her kiddos along, and when I noticed her boys’ t-shirts had “Train Conductor” and the other had a train appliqué, I could feel a surge of adrenaline rushing through my body. I knew if we went to the line, Mateo wouldn’t get on his Thomas. So I lifted all 32 pounds of Mateo up and over the gate so he could get on his train.
Oh, yes.
I did.
We’ll just cross that whole experience off the teachable moments list. And anyway, those kids were like, I don’t know, five and seven. Two year olds trump.
The kids had a fabulous time! The park wasn’t too big, so even when we weren’t near their cousins, we were never too far away. And the lines were practically non-existent.
There was even a school bus! Mateo was SO excited. I originally thought the Mexican Santa Claus was being grandfatherly, but it turns out he worked there. Probably since it opened. He was coaxing the kids into the seats on the right side of the bus, so I asked him “Why does the side matter?” as he buckled them in, Mateo looking like his life was finally complete.
CENTRIFUGAL FORCE, he said.
With that, he asked that I stand back, he placed his hands behind the bus and – I’m not even kidding – gave it a running start. It was awesome, and Mateo and Harper loved it!
But by the third super fast and rickety revolution, the novelty had worn off.
So we stuck to the gentle stuff, like the carousel, after that.
Right around the time we would typically be putting them down for a nap, we were piling into the car to head across the street to Good Time Charlie’s for burgers. There was a precarious thirty minute wait, but everyone did better than expected. Adults included, no doubt in part due to the fact that my sister was genius enough to bring play-doh, and that my mom had mad play-doh kitty making skills.
We got back to my mom’s house around 2:00 and it was decision time: pack the car and leave and hope they’d nap a bit in the car? Stay and try and take naps knowing naps had been for shit while we’d been in town and then leave? Try and nap and then play for an hour and then leave? And here’s where it got really crazy: at Jennifer’s suggestion, we decided we’d try and do naps, but then not leave until around 6:00 p.m. and hope they’d go to sleep in the car when it got dark.
SHUT! UP!
Napping was as expected. Which is to say that I slept for 45 minutes only after joining Harper on the bed in the guest room and that Jennifer got 10 minutes of sleep because Mateo kept bouncing from the big bed (in another room) to his toddler bed, back and forth, never sleeping at all.
My mom played with the kids while we packed up the car. Then we bathed the kids and put on their pajamas that way all we’d have to do is change them into their nighttime diapers when we got home. Theoretically. We let them watch Clifford for about an hour (much quieter than Diego), stopped at Buc-ee’s for a diaper change, stopped again fifteen minutes later for another diaper change, and around 8:00 turned the DVD player off telling the kids Clifford was going to his house to say prayers with his mommy and go night-night.
They weren’t too pleased and complained a bit, but after fifteen minutes of a (free!) White Noise App echoing throughout the vehicle and dusk taking over the sky, they were out cold.
Then came the challenge of staying awake and getting us home. And that’s why we’ll never be the people that can drive in the middle of the night.
When we did finally get home (9:30ish?), the transition to the bed wasn’t too bad: Mateo didn’t want his diaper changed, Harper wanted to say prayers twice (a delay tactic she’s been using to keep me in her room). We might just travel this way again provided we can keep ourselves awake.
Reader Comments (5)
Kiddie Park looks like the carnivals of old--very fun! Also? Cupcakes for dinner is making me not feel so bad that my kids ate cinnamon and sugar pretzels for lunch yesterday. ;)
We JUST had the kids' 3rd birthday party at Kiddie Park. It was awesome and we will go back for sure. My mom went there as a kid so it is cool to have that history. How funny was Santa pushing the bus...I was definitely taken aback the first time he did that.
Hope the open house went well!
I have *loved* all of these stories! And now I totally want to take my kids on adventures like these. Love the old school amusement park!
Totally encourage an old school amusement park visit. To make our experience even more awesome? A Groupon landed in my inbox two days before and we got 4 all-day wrist bands for the kids (adults are free), for 50% OFF! Which means we'll be going back the next time we are in SA. Or at least the time after that.
@Wombat Central - yeah, it wasn't without large amounts of self-restraint on my part, I will admit. Those were like her 4th and 5th cupcakes EVER. And it was a Birthday Party! Plus? Grandma was going to watch over their sleep that night while we went out to dinner.
Oh my gosh, I almost spat my coffee out when I saw the photo of Mateo on the bus(after the novelty had worn off). I'm sorry to laugh at your son's unhappiness but damn, that was funny. First photo=happy, happy, happy. Second photo= IAMSONOTHAPPY!!! :-( Your blog continues to put a smile on my face.