What does your child do at the playground?

brachysira · May 2014

Do you let your child climb playstructures on their own? Do they want to? Does your baby like to swing? M was so into playgrounds last year, but this year she just wants to get snacks out of the stroller the whole time. Bummer.

holly321 · May 2014

We haven't taken Ds to the park yet. But we have a big play set at home. He loves to swing and yells when we try to take him out.

jesuisfatiguee · May 2014

DS isn't walking, so I only take him to the park on rare occasions to swing. The park near my house is a little dirty for a crawler. Trash on the ground and stuff.

ericalee27 · May 2014

DS2 is really into the playground. Loves swinging, loves climbing, and wants to slide (I also spot him on the side). He is definitely modeling DS1, he wants to do all the same things he does.

Poppy523 · May 2014

We swing a lot. DD likes to climb, but I also follow close behind. Once she gets to a platform I run around the bottom trying to stand at whichever opening she is threatening to jump from. It is a blast!

jesuisfatiguee · May 2014

luxannie said:

The first time I took DS, he sat on the sand, bent at the waist and came up with a mouthful of sand.

Bahahahahahaha! This sounds like my DS. He tries to eat rocks and acorns all the time.

kbates85 · May 2014

LJ likes to swing for a few minutes. Other then that he just walks around and sometimes plays with the mulch. He's not a climber.

jdilorenzo · May 2014

MJ likes to swing. She likes to climb up the slide and then slide down. I follow close behind her because I don't trust her. She likes to try everything.

mediaperuana · May 2014

JJ mostly swings, but he's just started climbing on the playset a bit. i don't let him do it if there are "big" kids who might run him over, and i go up with him just to be safe because there are openings where he could fall out if he wasn't paying attention. he doesn't actually like the slide, but there's a steering wheel thing, and one of those giant tic-tac-toes up there.

DublinMama · May 2014

Um, runs around and climbs on everything like a GD howler monkey. You have to be onhimlikethis every second or suddenly he's at the top of the slide waving at you and getting ready to go down head first. The park is a panic attack enclosed in fencing for me.

wifeofadam · May 2014

Swing, slide, and follow her older siblings around. She's not much of a climber yet, though.

tamarar5 · May 2014

My child eats sand.

Or slide. Or jump off the openings that are out of my reach. I pretty much can't take him to the park alone anymore because I just can't keep up.

Moty2013 · May 2014

Can I just say this is why I love you ladies. I am a long time lurker, infrequent commenter, never poster because someone will eventually always ask the questions i have if I just wait. I was wondering this because I take ds to the park every morning. And I walk right next to him as he climbs up the structures and run to the opening each time he switches sides. I started to feel like this was "helicopter" behavior when I saw a 16 month old girl climb all the way up to the top of the big kid structure and slide down all by her self. Her dad was at a park bench not even near the structure. He had 3 kids so I thought maybe this is experienced parent park playing and that I need to loosen up. I'm glad the rest of you are still doing the same as me. He can climb all the structures by himself and go down the baby slide by himself. Yesterday he climbed inside this fire truck thing all by himself and it was one of those moments I felt like my heart might burst from the look of pride on his face. he had been wanting to do that and working at it since he seen his 12 month old friend do it last week

Drea926 · May 2014

DS loved the swing last year, but this year he'd rather explore. Our playground has a bunch of donated cars, pushers, trucks, Cozy Coupes, etc and he loves to play with those. He likes the sandbox. He toddles around watching the other kids. I do typically shadow him though since he's also a rock, acorn, mulch eater. :P

mishka29 · May 2014

DD loves the swing! But once she met the slide she went nuts...now she goes down the slide on her own. Its super cute to watch her lean forward to start down the slide. Then she got a bucket and shovel...now she loves to sit in the sand and shovel dirt into her bucket.

kleigh926 · May 2014

DH took DD to the park on Monday while I was working and apparently she had the best time ever. Her favorite thing was crawling back and forth through the tunnels and peeking out at DH through the little windows in the sides. She also loved going down the slides, and she loves to swing. She loves to play in the mulch too. And not just the mulch, but dig deep down into the dirt underneath so that her fingernails get all disgusting.

brachysira · May 2014

Well, this is all very reassuring. We went to the park with some 2 year-olds today and they climbed up the structures, slid down, played together, and were generally acting nicely. M stuck close, tried to steal toys from little babies, was attracted to a sign with a 5 on it, tried to get into everyone else's stroller and get their stuff, wanted to get into our bag and get out snacks on multiple occasions, and wanted someone else's phone.

She requested to be put in a swing, but wanted down immediately (common this year), and climbed up some steep stairs to the play structure only to try to come down them, which was impossible, and ended with me falling on my pregnant behind. She has always liked to go down slides--I just choose short ones and place her at the top while I am standing on the ground and then hold her hands as she goes down. However, she now wants to climb up slides, but needs help and is mad if I don't help. I definitely cannot trust her on play structures herself--she has no sense of height and falling. We got her a small stand-alone slide at home and she climbs that herself with great confidence, but also immediately fell off the top within seconds of us setting it up, so now this is only a highly supervised activity.

At other park visits, she usually sticks to picking dandelions or playing with other stuff on the ground. Even at baby playgrounds, she does not want to go through the tubes and stuff and is usually not interested in playing with the equipment at all unless I initiate it and go with her. It makes it seem like we should just stick to the yard--at least I can be pretty sure that she will find safe items.

All of this also makes for bad moms' group interaction--those with little babies just put them on blankets and visit and those with older kids just stand to the side and chat. I was 100% antisocial as I followed M around the fields and tried to reason with her about not needing toys that the little babies had. We will of course try again and again. I think she's getting a tooth and I'm sure she'll be a little more chill at future dates. However, this does make me think we really don't need to start gymnastics classes or go to the bounce house. She will be fine with baby songs and running around in the yard for a while longer.

TarheelMama202 · May 2014

Bahahaha. Apparently when DH picked DS up from daycare today, his teacher asked: "Do you guys take him to the park a lot? Because he kept trying to go down the slide head-first or backwards today."

brachysira · May 2014

expatmama said:

We have a ton of great parks right by our house, so we do go a lot. But it is a problem that DS2 does not walk yet, because there is some limited stuff he can do. That said, while he cannot walk, he likes to climb stairs.

Mostly he likes to eat at the park: sand and rocks. I spend most of the time trying to convince him to spit out what ever he has just stuck in his mouth. I used to think the new parks were boring, but now I love the rubber matting on the ground because at least he cannot try to eat that. We spend a lot of time at the park with the rubber ground for just that purpose. Gravel park designers you are evil.

Otherwise DS2 is all about the slide. But the slides at our local park are too high and not made for two people, so I just sit him halfway up and hold on to him as he goes down. One of these days I will let go, but haven't yet because they are pretty big. He is OK on the swing.

But really he is happiest trying to eat.

Thankfully we live in an area where there are always lots of kids out playing, so DS1 usually finds someone to play with and can go off and do his own thing. He also likes the sand and a pulley system in the park you can move sand with.

Yeah, 99% of the parks around here have wood chips. But library storytime and the moms' groups moms clued me in a few months ago--there are two parks with rubber surfaces. A universal issue at this age, apparently. Although M is slightly better at not eating wood chips now. Yay.

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