Jonah Time: The Playdate

Having the older three in school means having daily time to focus on the Jonut.  I’ve been loving it (for the most part) and have been trying to keep the errand running, grocery shopping, chore doing to a minimum on most days.  Trying, but not always succeeding.

So we have about two and a half hours to eat, play, do stuff, or go somewhere and then he has about a two hour nap (HALLELUJAH) before it’s time to go pick up the kids from school.

One day at church, a friend and I were chatting and agreed to get our boys together to play sometime.  The plans were set and when the day finally arrived, it occurred to me that this was going to be Jonah’s very first playdate.  Ever.

Playdates for me have kind of evolved as my oldest kids have grown from gatherings more for the moms to get together while babies napped to getting our kids together for homeschool co-op learning to drop-off playdates so the other mom can go get stuff done.

So it’s been quite a few years since I’ve been part of a toddler playdate and only realized how utterly playdate-deprived our fourth child has been once I saw how much fun this boy had with a buddy around his age.  Not his size though.  His friend is six months younger, but a good many inches taller than him.  Sigh.  Like our last name.

They banged on drums, they toted Nerf guns around, they cooked pretend food, they played with toy cars, they ate, they jumped, they made silly faces, they even had a little cry-fest at the same time.

It was such a momentous occasion in the life of Jonah that I had to get a few pictures.

Witness…

I thought it was very polite of each boy to look at his friend’s mom’s camera and smile.  Good thing too, because…

It sorta went downhill from there.

The sillies were surely setting in at this point.

And there was no reeling them back now.

Cuz no one can resist a good game of peekaboo, you know.

Then they decided we needed some music to liven up the place.  Good thing pictures are quiet. 😉

Lookit how intensely in-your-face happy my boy is while his buddy is all “Dude, relax. It’s just a playdate, man.”

Killing me.

Seriously, the boy had so much fun with his buddy that he learned the word “buddy” that day and insisted that M’s name was actually “Buddy” whenever I tried to correct him.  He woke up from nap later that day asking for “Buddy” again.

Thank you, J and M for introducing my poor deprived son to the world of playdates.  He LOVED it.  And uh, sorry if our intense happiness was a bit… intense.  Please don’t be afraid of us because now Jonah knows playdates are a real thing and is hoping to do it again sometime.  We promise to be cool next time.  😀