The Joy of Discovery
Before Madeline was born, one of the things I most looked forward to about being a parent was all the times of sharing with her new discoveries and experiences. Today we had a lot of that as we took Madeline on her first trip to the park this spring. The high temp. was about 72 here in Ames today, and even though it was windy it was still beautiful outside. We walked to a park that’s about four blocks from here and gave Madeline her first ride in a real swing. She loved it, of course. She laughed and giggled as Tony pushed her and I stood in front and tried to give her “high fives” or grab her feet.
Then we let her crawl around in the grass. She did try and put a lot of the grass, leaves and twigs in her mouth, but we managed to keep her from eating most of it. We spotted a small lady bug (well, probably it was really one of those asian lady beetles), and showed it to Madeline, who promptly tried to get it in her mouth. She succeeded at one point, but we rescued it and set it free to live another day. I’m sure it has a great story to tell its friends. 
Madeline also enjoyed watching people play softball and basketball in the park.
All in all, it was a great experience. I think Madeline is really going to like summer! Hopefully by the time the warm weather is here to stay she’ll even be able to walk a little…I think she’ll enjoy the park even more then.