Ice Ice Babies

Uncle Kyle and Miss Sera were exceedingly brave last week. They volunteered to take the kids ice skating! L had been once before at a friend's birthday party and enjoyed it, but N had never been before and was an untried quantity and therefore a wildcard.

Both Kyle and Sera play hockey. (Yes! Sera plays hockey! Who'da thunk?) So they are quite proficient on the ice, and if needed, could deliver a check or bloody nose if things got out of hand. We went up to the rink at the top of Palos Verdes, shelled out the cold, hard cash, and cast them to the cold, hard ice to, um... sink or swim (metaphorically speaking).

There was much flopping and sprawling. You remember the scene from Bambi, right? L did OK if she could hang on to the side, but N was spending more time chilling his nose than his toes. Things might have gone poorly if Uncle Kyle hadn't come to the rescue with a rented skating seal! That was just the ticket. Even with the seal N still did a fantastic impression of Fred Flintstone reving up the Flinstone-mobile, but happiness and smiling were once again the theme of the day.

Yabba Dabba Doo!!!

I'll bet Uncle Kyle's hockey team never used this move!

Rest stop.

The kids skated for the full two hour window. Eventually the buzzer sounded and the skaters were called in off the ice.  Uncle Kyle grabbed N and took him for a final victory lap around the rink.  The little literalist who is my son was freaking out the entire time; he was convinced he was going to get into big trouble by being on the ice past the buzzer.

It didn't take N long after coming off the ice to find something to distract his attention. It worked for me, since he was perfectly content to "play" the game over and over again without adding a single quarter.

Game Over, dude!

L, however, showed clear signs of skater melancholy, lost in Zamboni dreams.