Today I had my niece for a few hours while my brother and sister in law were at work. Normally Grayson is at nursery on a Friday, but they're still on Christmas shut down till Monday.
I decided to save sitting in and letting them wreck my sort of tidy and clean house, I would take them to the soft play.
Now we have a few soft play places round where I live, none are particularly great, but there is a little one in the high street where I live and it's little, cheap and most importantly, it's clean – and they keep on top on the cleaning while you are there.
We got there about 10ish, was fairly busy already. Wasn't too bad. Paid for the kids, got them settled and then bought myself a small coffee. Trying to cut down on the caffeine seeing as that's all I'm fuelled by since becoming a mother to my two wonderful little pickles.
I sat and observed, dealt with some work bits on my phone, then went back to observing. Before I get judged and cut down, I do play with my children in the soft play. If I'm there on my own with Kellan or Grayson, then I will follow them around and do what they would like me to do. If they have their friends, each other or their cousins there then they would rather play with them then me, and yes, I then do sit and have a hot cup of coffee and have a little scroll and a nose through my Facebook.
The new mum – the little group of new mums, with their wonderful bundles of joy, who are only a few months old. They all sit there with their coffees and coo over their bundles and chat about their busy days and sleepless nights.
The observer (me) – if my kids have each other, or a friend at the soft play together, I tend too watch. I watch them run around until their red in the face and sweaty. I then end up watching the other kids and how their little minds and imagination must be running wild. I used to love soft play as a kid, not so much now I'm an adult, but you know, my kids enjoy it.
The hands on mum – The mums who run around with their kids and play with them, they barely have time to drink their hot drinks. They are sitting in the ball pit passing them balls and chase them around the soft play.
The sitters/groups – you have the groups of mums who sit there, their kids running wild and doing anything to get their attention while they are in deep conversation about all sorts of weird and wonderful things. I was sitting next to one of these tables today.
Now, I'm not a perfect mum, but when I'm at these places I try to have my eyes on my kids at all times. One of the reasons why I like this soft play I went today as it's small enough to see where they are, at all times. Grayson and Sienna were going up and down the slide, all of a sudden there was this child who must of been no older than 18 months old. She was climbing on tables, she was disappearing into the big play area on her own, and then she was trying to climb up the slides. The same slides that my two were about to go down. So like a ninja, I noticed my two coming down, this bubba going up, so I ran and grabbed this bubs before grabbing my own son, so I could move her out of the way so she didn't get hurt. I made sure everyone was ok, and headed back to my table.
The little'un continued to do this a few times, the mum was aware of what they were doing but didn't do nothing about it. I gave her a little look and she said "oh yea, I saw you grab the bubba and move them before" I must of looked at her a bit dumbstruck because I didn't know why she didn't get up and move her away before bubs got hurt? Maybe she thought the little'un would be ok? I dunno.
Anyway, I ordered the kids lunch, the soft play just got busier and busier, more and more kids running a round – just a bit too much. We left about 12:30. Kids were tired, I wanted to sit and have five minutes of quiet time before it was time to get Kellan.
Sorry to ramble, do you enjoy soft play?