Dads and Kids Playdate

My friend Jason and I had been trying to find a time to get Joshua and his daughter Hadley together for a playdate. We had tentatively planned to go swimming last Thursday, but the weather didn't allow it. But we both had time tonight, so we met at Chick-fil-A for dinner. They are closed on Sundays, so they had a Father's Day promotion today for dads to get free shakes, which was a nice surprise for me (and for Joshua, since I shared).

We then went to the park by our house.  I brought some play equipment, including our tee ball set and some other balls.  Joshua and Hadley took turns using the bat to hit the balls around the grassy area.

Here Joshua contemplates the power of his plastic weapon and also prepares to hit a pitch.

We then moved over to the playground area, where Joshua climbed to the top of the rock-climbing thing that's not actually a rock, which he hasn't done before.  He also climbed on top of the pretend rock thing, which also isn't actually a rock, but it does look like one.  And he was able to make the purple spiral thing (I apparently have no idea what anything at this playground is really called) spin on his own without needing help, which pleased him.

Hadley and Joshua had fun playing together.  Joshua also gave her some tips on the finer points of one of his areas of expertise: rock throwing.

Joshua then noticed a "flag" in a nearby tree, though it was actually a kite.  Jason decided we should try to throw some of the balls at it to try to knock it down.  I've done this plenty in my life, though not so much recently and not with kites specifically, and I know how it goes.  One ball gets stuck, so you use another ball to get that one out, and it might get stuck, and at some point you have multiple balls stuck, but you eventually recover them all.  And lo and behold, one of the balls got stuck.  It was the blue grippy one that Joanna and Kirk gave us, and I could see it was wedged pretty tightly.  When we started throwing the balls, I knew what my backup plan was to guarantee we wouldn't lose any balls, and sure enough, it was time to execute it.  So...  I climbed the tree.  Up and up I went, until I was high enough to reach the ball and throw it down.  Then, I did what any sane person would do: attempt to take pictures while in the tree.  I successfully did that without dropping my phone or my entire body, and I then climbed back down.  I actually really like climbing trees, so it was mostly enjoyable and kind of nice that I had a built-in excuse to do so, and I'm pretty sure it was the first time in a few years since the last time I had a good excuse.

Jason and Hadley had to leave, but I wanted some time to play with just Joshua, so he and I spent another 45 minutes or so by ourselves, which was really nice.  Tomorrow is Father's Day, so I'm already in the mood for that, and I'm thankful to not only have time with just my children, but also to be able to spend time with my best friends and their children on occasion as well.