Get Outta The House!

Thinking of doing another scavenger hunt with the boy. We’ve been cooped up in the house for days now, only going out a little bit here and there to get some fresh air and sunshine when it was possible.

I did a little yard work Sunday—hauled the nine bags of leaves the yard guys have left at the house around to the back corner where my lasagna garden will be next spring—and then Harrison and I played outside for a bit. We kicked the soccer ball around for a while and then I showed him how to play H-O-R-S-E, the last vestigial trace of any knowledge I got from PE in high school. Harrison’s got a mini-basketball goal and we used the soccer ball as our basketball. He didn’t care—he was excited to be outside, doing something and playing a game. He wasn’t excited about losing any of the rounds—he won two and I won two—but he’s never really excited about losing, so that’s no surprise.

I’m such an inside girl, it never occurs to me that he would want to go outside. When I do think about it, it seems obvious—how stupid that I could overlook such a thing. How could a five-year-old not want to go outside and play?

The only time I’m interested in being outside is in Spring when I’m putting my garden beds together or in fall when the air is crispy. Summer is such agony for me with the heat and the, well, heat. Winter cold doesn’t bother me, but the wet that usually accompanies it—not snow, but just East Texas rain—is miserable. It’s the kind of weather that is best experienced on the couch with a cup of cocoa and a book or perhaps while falling asleep in a warm bed.

So if the weather cooperates tomorrow, I think we’re definitely going to go outside and get some air. It will give him something to do besides pester me to read the latest Magic Tree House book (yeah, I love the books, yeah, I’m excited about reading them with him but good golly! I’m sick of that being all I read!). He might even like it as much as when I let him play on the internet (www.kidoz.com is awesome, y’all!).