Thank goodness today’s scheduled group Mommy Camp was cancelled because I am exhausted and I have to work the Macy’s Fireworks VIP audience tonight.
We decided on the way home from Coney Island yesterday afternoon that we did not need to get up early today and rush to the Painted Pot to decorate knickknacks in yet another fun-filled activity during our Mommy Camp Summer-Kick-Off Week.
On Monday we met at noon to see the 12:30 showing of Wall*E at Cobble Hill Cinema, afterwards we had pizza in a restaurant and spent the rest of the afternoon with water balloons (some of us until after 6pm) at Peirrepont Playground on the Promenade in Brooklyn Heights. On Tuesday we Met at Melody Lanes Bowling Alley at 10am (I ducked out to meet the cleaning lady at my apartment–she never showed–so I made phone calls about clown stuff and paid bills–she is here now with her mother–how embarrassing for me) and returned to meet the group again at Pierrepont Playground where we stayed until after 6pm. Then I brought My Kid and her friend home for a sleepover. We walked to Ft. Green from Brooklyn Heights through Fulton Mall, stopping at Cookies to buy cheap plastic walkie talkies CUZ WE NEEEEEED THEM FOR OUR SLEEPOVER!. At home we made tacos. The girls had fun cutting up tomatoes and lettuce with plastic knives. Then at 9:30 we went outside and walked to Fort Greene Park looking for fireflies. Two were captured. Many never made it into the jar, then one of the two prisoners escaped. The other was granted clemency and freed. The girls desperately needed a bath and so they had one. They were asleep by 11:30. But we had to get up early because I had a 9am appointment in Brooklyn Heights. I was late. The kids played Ninetendo in the waiting room. Then we met up with the others and took the train and a bus to Chelsea Piers to go ice skating. But, none of us had checked in advanced and the rink was closed to the public. So we went, as scheduled to the water playground next to Chelsea Piers and then (as a quick Plan B) to Dave and Busters in Times Square where everyone ate greasy food and the adults drank overpriced tropical drinks and spent too much on games for the kids. Afterwards we returned My Kid’s friend to her apartment where her mom had been home all day with a sick 4-year-old, a baby, and less than 24 hours to pack camping gear and clothes for a family of 5 before a flight to Colorado the next day. My Kid and I again walked home from Brooklyn Heights through Fulton Mall. (Meanwhile Enthusiastic Mom took her son to a baseball game at Yankee Stadium and they got home at midnight) I think we ate Chinese take-out. I think we watched “So You Think You Can Dance” on TV. I was beginning to wonder if the week of fun would ever end. Nope not yet. Next on the schedule–Thursday morning we met on the Q train for a trip to Coney Island; Astroland unlimited ride bracelets, Nathan’s cheese fries. Sand and Sea. And the inevitable melt-down. My Kid was too short to ride the pirate ship but her friend was tall enough. So My Kid got to play some games and win some MORE stuffed animals to add to the clutter in our apartment.
Enthusiastic Mom had e-mailed us a spread-sheet schedule of the week’s planned activities. The kids were all supposed to wear the same colored shirt each day (so they would look like a group just like real day camp kids) which they took seriously. Monday was white, Tuesday was red, Wednesday was blue, Thursday was yellow. We discussed changing plans, but unfortunately our kids are old enough to read and in fact had been studying the schedule. The children would not allow us to deviate much from what had been printed. (Thank goodness they were also exhausted by Thursday night so we could cancel today–which isn’t really a day of nothing since it is the 4th of July and that involves at the very least schlepping out somewhere to stand with a crowd to watch the fireworks and then schlepping home in the dark and possibly rain.) That’s why we still had to go to Astroland at Coney Island even though we had spent the previous afternoon at Dave and Busters in Times Square. They are effectively the same thing from a spending money for nothing point of view.
All in all it was a good week. But, I will be glad to get back to My Kid’s version of Mommy Camp which is much more like homeschooling with reading and writing, math and science, and art (what can I do that’s what My Kid said she wanted…) But, we’ll be going to Montana for two weeks and accompanying My Husband on a business trip to Toronto in August so I don’t know how many days of this brand of low-key educational mommy camp she will actually get.