The twins love the park. Its loves them back most of the time but is a temperamental and moody companion. One minute its all excitement and sand, the next minute skinned knees and tears. Recently, though, the park has been a relentless heart-breaker — cold and uninviting. The twins, especially Claire, do not appreciate this seasonal interruption in their ongoing relationship with the park.
Fortunately Daddy discovered that they build little heated, indoor play areas in fast food restaurants. Who knew? Our favorite “indoor park” is Chick-fil-a. Pretty clean. Only one way in and out. A cool cow comes around now and then. Bonus. Claire talks about the cow constantly. McDonald’s by our place is also pretty good. Not quite as new or as clean but pretty good. Bottom line — the indoor park is a big hit.
Claire loves the indoor park and asks for it every time we get in the car. Will enjoys it but is not as brave as Claire. She leads him by the hand up the stairs to the slide. They come tumbling down with ear-to-ear gleeful smiles and squeals of unrestrained delight. Its a huge kick watching them. Every once in a while Will gets distracted from this exhilerating circuit and tries to wander off to play with the other toys. Claire patiently collects him and leads him back to the slide. I have a feeling that this will be the pattern their whole life. Claire will make sure that William stays on task. William will make sure that Claire laughs.
I generally get lots of comments on the twins. Mostly its the usual, “they are so adorable”. Moms and grandmothers tend to comment how “brave” a daddy I am to take them both by myself. It is not actually all that difficult but I do appreciate the praise. Good for the ego.
Its not all fun and games though.
This weekend we went to McDonald’s for breakfast and a half hour of screaming fun. Claire insisted that I accompany them for three trips through the play structure. It is just barely big enough to fit me and not with comfort. I go because I cannot resist her when she says “please daddy” and because I want to be the sort of fun dad that goes up in the play structure.
It was going pretty well until we took a break for breakfast. I handled the two of them expertly. Claire was on my lap. Will sat across from us. I managed to make sure they both ate, didn’t make a mess, etc. Superdad. I was sure that the moms in the room were impressed. When they both wanted milk at the same time, I knew that I needed to put on my best game. I held Claire on my lap and her cup in my left hand while I leaned over the table and held William’s cup with my right hand. Superdad had it all under control. My coffee was alone and neglected in the middle of the table, safely out of reach of both twins. I needed some coffee but without a free hand it wasn’t going to happen. I could have managed the milk thing all day. The problem actually came when Claire set her milk aside. I tried to feed her with my left hand while still leaning over the table to hold William’s cup with my right. Some how I managed to knock over Claire’s milk. Then reacting too late, I reflexively pulled my right had back from William knocking over my coffee. The trifecta came when William picked up his cup and deliberately dumped it out on the floor. The laughter started in the back left hand corner of the room and swept forward from there. Ultimately ripples of laughter involved the entire restaurant and peaked when William picked up his cup and dumped what little was left out in an encore performance.
Oh boy.
Tags: Twins
December 18, 2008 at 6:27 pm |
Dan, I hope you laughed too. I can still recall many moments like this with my own four boys. One time, we all walked into the packed pediatrician’s waiting room, and for some reason my two year-old stopped dead in front of me, and I fell over him (newborn in arms) and knocked the older two boys down with me. It was so ridiculous that, after determining that no one was hurt, I just sat on the floor laughing with them.
December 19, 2008 at 6:03 pm |
Very funny! Actually, I set my head on the table for a second and then did chuckle. I don’t embarass all that easily and the laughter was more of the sympathetic “I’ve been there” variety. Besides one of the joys of being in a restaurant is that someone else had to mop up the mess.