And on this farm he had a twisty slide, EIEIO

Yesterday Will enjoyed his first ever field trip, with Owen and I accompanying. His field trip shirt was so big it looked like an oversized dress – with hem below the knees and a head hole nearly big enough to slide off his shoulders. That’s what you get when you’re 10th percentile on the 3-year-old stature chart (although most of his classmates were pretty near drowning in their shirts too).

Pre-school field trips can be pretty simple. We went to a park, played on a playground and fed some geese, then stopped by McDonald’s for lunch and more McDonald’s-style playground time before going home. Luckily Owen slept for nearly the whole hot time.

At the playground, Will’s teacher gathers all the kids for a photo. Only Will is missing – playing in a tunnel slide, where he is having too much fun to stop for photos. So I abandon sleeping Owen and go to the slide to try to convince Will that he needs to come out for the photo while he yells out “No!” defiantly and climbs up the slide – surely against the rules. He comes back down and I capture stubborn boy and carry him for the photo, his legs just beginning to do a little protest flutter kick against me as I prepare for one of his tantrums to ensue. Luckily there’s a spot for him right next to his good friend Creight, so his legs go still and he sits down quite content.

The whole little scene made me nearly shaky – silly how wrapped up my own ego gets in Will’s public behavior. I start thinking he’s a walking-talking example of why I’m a bad parent. (And who knows, maybe he is.)

Of course it was the stop at McDonald’s, where we almost never go, that was the most exotic part of the fieldtrip for Will. He gobbled up his chicken nuggets and French fries (I stole as many as I could to keep him from consuming the whole bag) and then complained of a tummy ache on the way home. Sally Fallon (of yesterday’s post) wouldn’t have called that fried lunch “good fat” -- but so it goes.

This is how Will began the long summary of his adventures for Rob when he got home:

“I went to the park and I gone to Old McDonald’s to eat some lunch, and there was a big ol’ twisty slide, and you have to duck your head under there and you slide down.” Since he first learned the name behind the golden arches it’s been Old McDonald’s to Will (although I’ve actually never pointed out the arches since I’d rather be able to drive past various franchises without Will even noticing their existence). It’s not exactly eating on the farm but at least it makes the place sound a little more charming than it actually is.