Rainbow Bridges

So, California has this crazy thing called Winter Break, colloquially called "ski week" by the locals. It always catches me completely by surprised, so we found ourselves this week all at home (minus Joseph) with nothing to do. I have a really hard time sitting around all day, especially in a small house with four young children, so on Tuesday I decided to venture out and see what we could find. We were lucky to have a sunny day, as it has been raining most days for the past couple of months. Great for the drought, but a little tricky for finding free entertainment.

Anyway, on Tuesday we headed out to the Rainbow Bridge Park in Palo Alto. It is a lot like the Park for All Abilities in Austin, built to accommodate the needs of all children. When we first arrived, the kids raced to a dinky little playground that was within view from the car. They played there for a long time, talking about how it was the best playground ever and that they never wanted to leave. (We really hadn't been to a park in a long time.) All the while I was saying, "I think there's an even better playground just across the field over there" but they were happy.

Elinor is a climber. She has been working for a long while to become the "master of strong." I think she's pretty close.

I finally put my foot down and we headed to the real reason we had driven out to Palo Alto, and it was totally worth it. This playground was amazing! There were always new things for the kids to find and discover. They could have stayed there for hours.

There was this big hill in the middle for all the slides to run down.

I do not enjoy these kinds of toys, but Caleb and the other kids had no problem with it! Caleb spent a long time here pushing any kid (or adult) who wanted to ride.

 

We totally need one of these in our backyard.

 I got hungry though and we left. We grabbed a quick lunch at Chipotle and then headed home.

It was super nice to get out of the house. This little crew of kids is so fun! It is so nice to not have diapers and to have them all able to more or less eat independently! I am not far enough out of that stage yet to not fully appreciate these small luxuries.