Play Date

Today Elliott and I went to our first mom group play date. One of the teachers from school encouraged up to join an online group of North Pinellas moms who meet up around town for play dates with their young kids and babies. I thought this would be a nice way for us to get out and meet some other moms and kids and find some fun things to do together for the summer. We were supposed to meet at the Chestnut Park, but it's been rainy for the past few days, so we met at an indoor play space in Palm Harbor. It was just a room full of toys for the kids to play with and completely safe for crawling babies like Elliott. I set him down and off he went. I watched him make his way across the floor over to a toy that resembled his rocking horse Rody. He pulled himself up on push toys and walked around. I watched him pick up a toy wrench and bang it on the side of clubhouse as though he were working on it. He opened the cabinet doors of the play kitchen and climbed up the ladder of a small slide. I got real pleasure and joy from watching him, felt a sense of pride as I introduced myself as Elliott's mom. Glowed when the other moms told me how cute and sweet he was. We played in there for 3 hours and then came home, had an early bath, and ate dinner together. After that we played on the floor until it was time for him to fall asleep. As I rocked him tonight I told him how proud I was of him and how happy he makes me. And I know he understands.