My daughter is five and has quite the social life! She’s made many friends from various facets of her life and my life combined – school, church, sports and recovery meetings. She’s the type of child who writes an invite list to her birthday party that’s longer than her Christmas wishlist. Needless to say, she is asked to join friends for play dates on a pretty regular basis.
This is where Mommy becomes more of a detective than parent. This is when I bust out with my list of questions for the parent who’s house I’ve never been to. I have to consider everything about the structure of their home and it’s accessibility to me before I can even decide if we’re able to go or not. Are there stairs leading into their home? If so, are there hand rails? Is the house all on one level? Are there carpets? Rugs? Toys or clutter of any kind in the middle of the floors that I’d need to try to navigate around? Is there an animal that might jump on me, causing me to lose balance? Or could that animal be so small and fidgety that I trip over them or can’t process all their movements in order to walk around it? What’s the bathroom like? Is there somewhere I can hold onto while in the restroom?
Click here to read more at Modified Mama!
Great post! I think that most people can’t grasp all that goes into your thinking for a play date. This was a good read. Thanks for sharing!
I agree and it was one reason I wrote it – to share with my able-bodied peers what that simple question, “Wanna come over for a play date?” can bring up for me. Thank you so much for taking the time to read this and for your comments!!