PSF- Tired to Tears

Hosted by Cecily and MamaGeek
The boys had off of school yesterday. We spent the morning waking up slowly and lazing around for a bit. It was kind of nice actually. For a little while, anyway. Then it was pure craziness.

The boys were screaming and wrestling, throwing each other off of furniture, tackling each other, throwing my pillows around nearly knocking over my lamp at least twice, jumping off the stairs, and chasing around the dining room table. Clearly they had energy to spare, and I knew I had to get them out of the house before bones were broken or my house was destroyed in their wake.

We threw on our play clothes and headed out the door to one of our favorite parks. When we got to the park I sensed that a trip to the park would not cut it today. It seemed to me that the boys had so much energy and simple trips down the slide and hanging from the monkey bars was not going to tire them. I looked to my left and remembered all the fun I'd had playing there when I was a kid. It had been there all along, but the boys had never experienced this part of the park.

It is what the locals refer to as "The Bowl". In the winter kids grab their sleds, toboggans, and inner tubes and head out to tackle the hills. In spring the two rival public high schools meet there to drop the rivalry for one day and share the Bowl for a joint graduation ceremony. In summer it is used for kiddie football and soccer games. And in fall it is fun to go to The Bowl just to soak in the scenery.
I called the boys to me and had them follow me over to The Bowl. I showed them the three tiers of hills and told them how fun it is to run and roll all the way down. At first I think they were a little intimidated by the sheer size and steepness of the hills.
And I think Ben wanted to see me go down the hill first before he would give it a try.

So I ran all the way to the bottom and shouted for them to join me. It didn't take much coaxing. They were off and running.
They didn't make it very far before falling on their faces at the bottom of the first hill. But they immediately got up and wanted to try it again.

I decided to show them an easier way down the hill and had a bit of fun in the process. Joey took this pic of me demonstrating the roll.

That seemed to be the preferred way to travel once they got the hang of it.

After rolling down the hills another hundred or so times the boys decided to run laps around the bottom of The Bowl.

Look at Tommy go. Can you see that little red dot by the stairs? That's my Tommy!

After the laps we headed up the opposite side of the hill to take a peak at the lake.

We looked over the cliff at the beautiful water and listened to the gentle waves wash up on the sand. I even let the boys sit and catch their breath for a minute.

It was getting very close to lunch at this point so we decided to head back. But on the way the boys spotted the perfect little collection of trees. "It's a fort, mom!" They quickly busied themselves with collecting pine cones and big sticks. Two of their favorite things.

Alas, it really was time to get going. We all held hands and ran all the way back down The Bowl, only to have to walk across the field and go back up the other side. By this point Ben was tired to tears. His little feet just couldn't take it anymore. I had been carrying him on and off (whew! what a workout!) but at this point he wouldn't even let me put him down anymore.

Once we got back up the hills the boys were allowed one more breather. I am so nice that way.

On the way back to the car we passed the park, so of course we had to stop.

They did some spinning and some climbing.

Even some sliding. But now it really was time to go.

By the time we got home (two and a half hours after we had left) and I'd made their sandwiches all three of my troopers were bawling into their milk. They were sobbing through their entire lunch telling me they just wanted to go to bed and that they weren't hungry. You know my boys are tired when they don't even want to eat. They finished their sandwiches (which is all they could manage the energy for) and slipped into their beds without a word, happy to rest their weary bones.
Oh, the silence in the house was pure bliss. Mission accomplished.