Meeting Playmates

I can't remember too much about being a 4 year old. My earliest real memory took place when I was 3 years old so I'm sure I have some 4 year old memories in there somewhere, I just don't know where or what they are. I can remember bits and pieces of being in nursery school...now called preschool...but not a lot. I definitely don't remember how I made friends at this age.

This evening, Joshua and I went to Jump Zone. For those of you who don't know, we had Joshua's 4th birthday party at Jump Zone and this is first time we have been since then. Most of the jumpy places in the area are only open during daytime hours during the week and are reserved for private parties on the weekends. I'm not sure why they think that children of working parents aren't interested in jumping...Luckily, Jump Zone has recently started having Family Fun Nights on Mondays and Thursdays so they are open from 5-8.

Anyway, we arrived at 5:03 and were the first ones there. Slowly others trickled in. The first to arrive was an older group of kids, maybe 6 years old. Someone was having a birthday party so all the kids were around the same age and knew each other. Joshua sees the group of 4 running around from slide to slide so Joshua starts running around right after them just like he was a part of their group. He had no idea he wasn't a member and they had no clue he was following them around. But, he felt like he belonged and he was having fun. I've seen him do this in other public settings too...he sees a group of kids running around together having fun and he just starts running around with them. Sometimes they interact with him and he really does join their group and sometimes they don't. Do all kids find playmates like this? Did I find playmates this way?

Joshua played several games of air hockey with some kids. He did pretty good considering it's only the second time he has ever played. One of the older boys played against him and did really well at hitting easy and letting Joshua score some. I later noticed that the boy's father is the owner of Jump Zone so I'm sure he gets plenty of practice playing against younger kids. Another older kid didn't take it easy on Joshua and kept slamming the puck. But then, Joshua played against a younger kid and that quickly built his ego back up. After playing against this one girl, they decided to hook up and jump some together. She initiated it by asking Joshua if he wanted to slide with her and he said ok. They were really cute...she gave him a big hug and told him bye when it was time for her to leave.

I really enjoy seeing Joshua making friends out of strangers, talking to kids, interacting with people. I'm glad he is growing out of his clingy stage.