Notes from the Trolley Station

Oct. 8, 2008

Field Day

Recently, Keegan and I were putting away some tires. Naturally, the easiest way to do this was to roll them across the yard and down our very small hill. Naturally, this led to a race. We had 6 tires, so that meant three races. We both struggled to keep our tires going in a straight line, and with giggles and laughter, sent them rolling down the little hill to crash on the grass. What fun! This led to Keegan's fantastic idea of hosting a field day. We called a few friends, who were all excited to participate. There was no prep work. When everyone arrived, we pulled out the tires, a couple beat up pumpkins, some boards, and some logs. The kids set to work designing their own obstacle course, which included a wobbly balance beam, tires to step through, logs to weave around, and a frisbee to toss into an empty garbage can. Of course, Sam, our labrador puppy provided an additional obstacle as he would steal any frisbee that didn't land in the trash can. Fortunately, we've collected a large pile of frisbees. We also had pumpkin rolling races. The pumpkins were little, so we tried a race with pushing them and another race with kicking them. Since there were 6 kids, it worked well to team up in pairs and have a relay. Again, Sam provided an additional obstacle as he usually spied one pumpkin to claim as his own. Next came the tire rolling races, again done in a relay style. This led to many other tire-based activities - roll a kid in a tire, stack the tires around a kid, bumper tires (like bumper cars), tire flinging (spin and throw), and just plain old fun. We took a break to eat some apples and cherry tomatoes from the garden, then the kids discovered the stilts and can walkers (two cans with a long rope tied through each to help the walker take a step with each foot on a can) that Keegan and Daddy had recently made as part of a Cub Scout project. Everyone gave the stilts a try but only one kid had any luck. The cans became a favorite, but since there was only one set, there could be no races with them. We had allowed two hours for the field day and this seemed to be plenty of time. It allowed 20 minutes or so for everyone to arrive and to build the obstacle course, about 40 minutes for races, then an hour for free play using the materials on hand. This was definitely an activity we'll do again!

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