It’s a “real gully washer out there,” been “raining cats and dogs,” “coming down in sheets,” “all the worms are drowning” or “it’s time to start building another Ark.”
No matter how you say it, for the last two weeks we’ve had some kind of rain around here. I have mushrooms growing on top of mushrooms in my yard. (Not sure, but I think a large purple one just winked at me as I walked by.)
Now that summer break is finally here, one cry rises up across this fair county from all the parents who are at the end of their patience and proverbial ropes, “What do we do with our kids on rainy days?” Boy, do I have a lifeline to throw you.
After weeks of rain, all the recreational fields around here are underwater, the playgrounds are a muddy mess, and you’re just tired: tired of telling the kids to stop jumping on beds, front room chairs and couch; to get out from under the table; or to quit sliding down the stairs using that Amazon box.
It’s not like you can turn your house into an indoor playground. Or can you? It’s been done before; a long, long time ago on an old familiar street not so far away called Flamingo, four kids built a basement playroom like no other. But what my brothers and I built pales in comparison to what my granddaughters and I found last week.
Just around the corner and a little ways down the street, there lies a Shangri-la for kids, and it’s simply amazing. But it’s not free. What’s the price of entry into this all-day indoor play park?
Walk through the double doors and choose from thousands of games, puzzles, or toys in the front half of the store. Some are for younger children and require help from an adult to play with, most are educational, but all are fun.
If you have a house already full of discarded toys, you can pick a raw ceramic item, have fun painting it with your kids, or grandkids, and then pick it up in a few days after being fired in their on-site kiln. Currently we have one purple snail, two blue dolphins, a multicolored turtle, one orange and green dinosaur, and three butterflies. Each butterfly is missing one antenna. Don’t ask why.
Back on Flamingo, we also had a kiln in our basement playroom. It was Mom’s, and we were told never to touch it. And we didn’t. We used gloves when we placed Coke bottles, rocks, pennies, and an assortment of The Sister’s Barbie dolls in it.
Switching it on, walking away and ignoring the horrific smell while we played a game of eight ball on the pool table wasn’t one of the smartest things we did, but soon afterwards screaming for our parents to call the fire department sure was.
In our defense though, we all thought the horrific smell filling the basement was coming from Twin Brother Mark and not the melting Barbies.
If there are enough toys, ceramics, shadow books, and stuffed animals lying around your house and you don’t want anymore, then entry into the play park occupying the back half of the store will set you back less than a couple of Happy Meals. But unlike the toys you receive with your meal, all the toys of this indoor play park seem indestructible.
I watched Little One and Sweet Caroline, our two granddaughters, play for hours before they were worn out. The kids, not the toys – the toys all survived the encounter. But the indoor play park doesn’t just house a bunch of toys; it has much, much more to offer.
A basketball goal inside a trampoline? Impossible, you might say. Not at the indoor play park. But be warned. There is a downside to spending all day here with your kids. Like being in Neverland, children will never want to leave.
And why would they? The area is quite large, housing not just a trampoline, but also a birthday party/food area, multiple freestanding play stations, and five full-size playgrounds. Each playground has massive beam construction, slides galore, and rock climbing walls.
Our basement also had a climbing wall. Big Brother James nailed short 2x4s to the walls, and we climbed up and down for a week. That is, until Dad found it and tore it down, telling us never to do it again.
After the dismantling of our climbing wall, we made a tire swing by tying the rope to an exposed ceiling beam. The breaking point of that beam was Bubba Hanks and the four of us.
The indoor play park has not one but two tire swings and obviously a much higher breaking point than the one in our basement. When I got on, our granddaughters also piled on, and it held for spinning a good long time.
The play park even has trapezes. Except theirs didn’t break the first time a kid hung from it like the one in our basement. Guess I should’ve use a metal pipe instead of a pool stick.
During our visit to the play park, a multitasking mom sat in a small chair behind a swing pushing her infant son with her foot while she busily read text messages off her iPhone while also keeping a watchful eye on his big sister who was playing with the giant dollhouse in the corner.
A young dad leaned against the blackboard wall reading his work email and texting while waiting for a birthday party his daughter was attending to finish.
Plasma cars, modern day bumper cars, were busy as they carried five kids all over the one small patch of concrete floor that wasn’t covered with large interlocking multi-colored rubber squares that help provide a soft landing for the slides and swings.
Back in our basement at Flamingo, we also had soft things to land on — each other. But we didn’t have bumper cars to bump into each other – we used our bikes. I still feel bad about what happened to Twin Brother Mark’s toes. But in my defense, he really shouldn’t have been playing tag barefooted.
So how do you find this magical place? Well, you can wish upon a star, walk the yellow brick road of Oz, click ruby heels together, or fly up to the second star to the right and straight on ‘til morning, but whichever path you take all will lead to our town’s own Neverland.
No shoes? No socks? No problem. After all, it’s Shenanigans.
[Rick Ryckeley has been writing stories since 2001. To read more of Rick’s stories, visit his blog: storiesbyrick.wordpress.com.]
