View Full Version : so have the rules changed or WHAT?
welfareloser
05-09-2002, 05:14 PM
okay, so when i was a kid, ppl climbed up slides. so i'm at the par with my kid, and every other friggin mom who ahs a kid that tries to climb up a slide is screaming at her kid "you do NOT climb UP a slide! you go UP the stairs and DOWN the slide!"
:confused:
well, yeah, that was the original intent, and theat's how it gets used most of the time because it's easiest, but does that make it so wrong? i mean, really, they might as well be yelling "think INSIDE the box! or better yet, stop thinking altogether." i mean, seriously. does everything have to have rules?
as a sidenote, these are not free-standing slides, but are attachments to massive and very safe play structures, and climbing up is no more dangerous than sliding down. i'm teaching my kid to be courteous, and to get out of the way if someone's going down (since it takes him FOR-EV-ER to climb up... squealing "i can doo iyit!" all the way :rolleyes: ) and to not do anything dangerous... and i think that's where the parental interference needs to end. i mean, so long as he's using manners and being safe, what's the big friggin deal?
of course, one or two moms were giving me the evil eye because i'm one of those horrible parents who lets my kid climb up the slide. oh, yeah, and i also let him get dirty (eek... yeah, let's get our little girls dressed up in a skirt and dress shoes and take her to a park and then yell at her to not do anything fun cuz she might get dirty... (#%(#^%()#& parents... it's like dangling a twinkie over a kid's head and bopping him for having the audacity to reach for it... but i digress...)
jase71
05-09-2002, 05:38 PM
Climbing up the slide was the only thing FUN about the slide. Anyone can climb the ladder. Climbing the slide was a challenge.
Gotta let kids be kids. Let 'em experiment.. test their limits.. it's called PLAYING! No kid ever says "Hey mom, can we go out side and have organized group activities?"
put vaseline on the slide and collect the teeth at the bottom :hehehmm:
sho.gun
05-09-2002, 05:52 PM
wow, more moms should be like welfare... I'm one of those people that just hates how everything nowadays has to be formal and done according to generally accepted rules.
welfareloser
05-09-2002, 05:59 PM
hey! who the heck said no?!?!? come forth and splain yerself?!?
(it was mojo, wa'n't it? :hmm: )
Originally posted by welfareloser
hey! who the heck said no?!?!? come forth and splain yerself?!?
(it was mojo, wa'n't it? :hmm: ) i didn't vote. i didn't exactly understand the question. which is why i covered my embarrassment with a smartass remark.
cruelpupet
05-09-2002, 06:19 PM
i vote.. its always ok, no matter what
kids will be kids... let them be stoopid while their young so they learn to not idiots when they grow up... hopefully...
I let my kids climb if they are not in others way. Wouldn't want them to get kicked in the face.
CarolinaGal
05-09-2002, 08:28 PM
Not cause I care much for the "rules", but because once one starts it - they ALL want to try it, even those who really can't, and then you have to carry them off by their ankles bitchin' and screaming blue bloody murder cause mean ole mom won't let him climb half-way up and let go and bust their sweet little faces.
If you are there by your lonesomes - go for it - knock yerselves out.
Oh, and don't smugly rag on the moms who "get our little girls dressed up in a skirt and dress shoes and take her to a park and then yell at her to not do anything fun cuz she might get dirty". That may be true in some cases, but it could also be that little Gertie won't leave the house in anything but that dress, no matter how many days in a row she's worn it, and would rather cut her leg off then put on the "ouchy" sneakers, and thinks she looks just fine, dammit! Poor dumb mom may be yelling at her not to get dirty cause she knows she still has 7 more hours the kid will be in that dress and wants to at least make some attempt to have her look less like an orphan when she goes grocery-shopping. Not that I've had any experience.
Oh, and any of you youngsters without kids who feel the urge to add anything about how you would discipline the kid so they wouldn't act that way? STFU. Parental veterans only, please.
NuTs62
05-09-2002, 08:39 PM
*whoa* to the post above. :P Well, I'm not a parent.. won't be for a long while. I've never been to the park with my mom, or dad for that matter. I did used to go with my daycare. They used to allow us to do all sorts of stuff.. Climbing the slides was one of 'em, if I remember correctly.
For younger kids, I'd try to keep an eye on them anyways, because there is a risk of getting hurt. Some big kid may come sliding down, and may not see the kid. The park I used to go to had those twirly slides, so it was very possible that the slider wouldn't see the kid climbing up. But I guess the question would be when do you stop watching..? Theres inherently some risk involved, but I wouldn't go all crazy like some of the parents described up above.
welfareloser
05-09-2002, 09:35 PM
Originally posted by CarolinaGal
Oh, and don't smugly rag on the moms who "get our little girls dressed up in a skirt and dress shoes and take her to a park and then yell at her to not do anything fun cuz she might get dirty". That may be true in some cases, but it could also be that little Gertie won't leave the house in anything but that dress, no matter how many days in a row she's worn it, and would rather cut her leg off then put on the "ouchy" sneakers...
i'm not smug... i'm bewildered and appalled. the girls who insist on wearing a dress... you can tell. they're twirling and prancing. they're comfortable with who they are. (and their moms are generally letting em play away.) the ones who get forced to dress up have moms in $200 "casual sweats" by dkny and a ton of makeup, and the girls look wholly uncomfortable, tugging at their clothes. they're miserable.
and so what if a dress gets dirty? bleach solves everything, and nothing fits a kid under the age of seven for more than a few months anyhoo. my kid has one dress up outfit at any given time, and everything else he owns cost between 25 cents and $4. he can do whatever he wants to em. including the dress outfit, actually. if he wants to slop barbecue all over his ring-bearer outfit next july, more power to him. if clothes and what ppl at the grocery store think of your parenting skills supercede fun, then it's time to re-evaluate your priorites. that's what i'm sayin. why be miserable over clothes and buggy-pushin nimrods?
it just seems to me that some parents are more interested in following THE RULES than making any damned sense.
styleee
05-09-2002, 09:39 PM
what i don't understand is how all of us survived the playgrounds of our youth... those in 70s or early 80s.
we used to have these crazy wooden playsets(?) at the park. they had netting to climb on (and get caught in, and get cut on, etc.) there were huge tire swings that we used to hit into eachother and knock the other person off. oh, and the best part was that there was a balance beam thing across the swing part, that u could walk across. oh, it was only about a 8 or 9 feet high, 15 feet long log that you could traverse. how did we manage to keep our heads on?
and if eg waits his turn, and decides that he wants to climb up the slide as opposed to take the ladder and slide down, then he should be able to.
my parents always let us do what ever we wanted, and we turned out just fine. :)
welfareloser
05-09-2002, 09:43 PM
yeah, i think some parents worry too much about injuries. like me. (my ecuse is that my kid has low muscle tone... his muscles don't tense when their supposed to, his relaxed state is TOO relaxed... handling him as a baby was like handling a ragdoll, and lord you should see the poor kid run, funniest thing ever... big ol head bobbin all over, limbs in 12 different directions... anyway...)
this playground is sooooo safe. i mean, kids could climb up the slides one after another and all fall and hit each other and the worst that would happen is a few bruises. the slides are so UNslick that it's easy to get stuck halfway down, they twist, they have high sides, everywhere you turn is a soft landing...
NuTs62
05-09-2002, 09:51 PM
Originally posted by styleee
what i don't understand is how all of us survived the playgrounds of our youth... those in 70s or early 80s.
we used to have these crazy wooden playsets(?) at the park. they had netting to climb on (and get caught in, and get cut on, etc.) there were huge tire swings that we used to hit into eachother and knock the other person off. oh, and the best part was that there was a balance beam thing across the swing part, that u could walk across. oh, it was only about a 8 or 9 feet high, 15 feet long log that you could traverse. how did we manage to keep our heads on?
and if eg waits his turn, and decides that he wants to climb up the slide as opposed to take the ladder and slide down, then he should be able to.
my parents always let us do what ever we wanted, and we turned out just fine. :)
heh.. I concur.. the playgrounds I used to play on were those old wooden structures.. but there was one baad baad incident.
I remember a kid actually cracking his head on the wooden play structure. I forget if he died or not, but Ambulance came and took him. There was a lot of blood. The massive wooden structure was sealed off and off-limits to all the kids. They tore that thing down.
As for the safety of these new structures, perhaps I just believe a bit too much what I see on TV.. but I've seen news segments on how unsafe the play structures of today still are. But heck, given any place, people are bound to get hurt.. no pain no gain.. we learn from our mistakes right? let the kids learn theirs.
Hoser
05-09-2002, 10:05 PM
I remember our playgrounds were on concrete or ashphalt. The monkey bars were made of metal. I don't ever remember anyone ever getting hurt. I fell a couple times, but got back up and climbed again. Nothing was child-safe back then. I guess it was survival of the fittest. If you can't survive your playground maybe you shouldn't reproduce.
Uhh I still climb up the slide and why shouldnt I? I mean I have to show the nieces and nephews who's boss!! RRAAWWRRRR
topane
05-10-2002, 06:13 AM
I can see stopping your kids if he's doing something life-threatening, but climbing a slide? Kids are always getting bumped and bruised. Let them find out for themselves what their bodily limits are -- no need for mom or dad making that judgement.
MJordanash
05-10-2002, 06:16 AM
Originally posted by topane
I can see stopping your kids if he's doing something life-threatening, but climbing a slide? Kids are always getting bumped and bruised. Let them find out for themselves what their bodily limits are -- no need for mom or dad making that judgement.
Yeah, I agree on that one. I've had my fair share of cuts and bruises. Hard to believe, but I survived.
DoPeY5007
05-10-2002, 07:58 AM
I try to tell my son not to do it when @ the park, just makes things easier and less colisions....
@ Grandma's it's ok
Burzhui
05-10-2002, 08:13 AM
i say let them run free and wild, and if they get hurt they learned a lesson
whitak24
05-10-2002, 08:42 AM
hmmm....i never WANTED to climb up slides when i was little. i liked the rush of sliding down. the faster i could slide down, run around to the ladder and climb back up so i could slide down again, the happier i was.
but i say as long as kids aren't going to hurt each other or screw up the equipment, play away. the whole jungle gym idea is to just mess around and stuff.
besides, most of the new slides are about 5 ft long, have a 12 degree drop, and are made out of plastic. sliding down them isn't fun if you're over 18 months old....so you might as well climb them :rolleyes:
attgig
05-10-2002, 08:59 AM
My pastor has 4 boys, 3 of them from 3-6. I play with them/take care of them on swings/slides, etc....
Welfare, ESPECIALLY if you gots a little boy - he should break some bones by the time he's 10 to toughen him up a bit :)
I let the boys do whatever - cause pretty much their boys.... the littlest one is the coolest, cause he can get hurt and look like he's about to cry....and I start talking, 'cmon dude - you're a boy - it's all cool. The pain will go away...' after a couple quick sniffles, he's back playing. :)
that's what bein a boy growing up is all about :)
sigh....i remember when I was a kid and......
wrkngirl
05-10-2002, 09:16 AM
When I was a kid, we'd run off to the park and spend the entire day there, unsupervised, playing on big metal slides that would burn your a** at mid-day when the sun turned them into giant skillets. We had swings with the chain links that would catch your finger every now and then and pinch and cause you to bleed. We had monkey bars that invited you to hang upside down and occasionally plummet a few feet to the ground. The best was the ring-a-ding: a pole with a metal ring attached to it with chain links, you'd sit on the ring and get it to rock back and forth and the intent was to not bang your knees on the center pole as you went around in circles. To paraphrase Burzhui, we ran wild and free and when we got hurt, we learned not to do it again.
Let the kids climb up the slides. If someone wants to find a local statute that dictates the way to play on them, then they have way too much free time on their hands. It's bad enough that kids can't play alone in parks anymore without worry of them ending up on the back of a milk carton, or finding nails in the sandbox, or razors on the swings. The last thing they need is someone dictating how they can properly play.
(climb off soapbox, exit right)
Speedfreak
05-10-2002, 09:46 AM
Oh, ya.. slide climbing is a must. Only, if you are a male, don't let the other kids slide through your legs, because kids have hard heads. :(
Hopper1
05-10-2002, 10:52 AM
I'm not that old yet but we never had wood play structures when i was a kid. The jungle gym was all steel and the slides were just huge. And everything was on asphalt or hard packed dirt.
NuTs62
05-10-2002, 11:08 AM
Originally posted by wrkngirl
When I was a kid, we'd run off to the park and spend the entire day there, unsupervised, playing on big metal slides that would burn your a** at mid-day when the sun turned them into giant skillets. We had swings with the chain links that would catch your finger every now and then and pinch and cause you to bleed. We had monkey bars that invited you to hang upside down and occasionally plummet a few feet to the ground. The best was the ring-a-ding: a pole with a metal ring attached to it with chain links, you'd sit on the ring and get it to rock back and forth and the intent was to not bang your knees on the center pole as you went around in circles. To paraphrase Burzhui, we ran wild and free and when we got hurt, we learned not to do it again.
Let the kids climb up the slides. If someone wants to find a local statute that dictates the way to play on them, then they have way too much free time on their hands. It's bad enough that kids can't play alone in parks anymore without worry of them ending up on the back of a milk carton, or finding nails in the sandbox, or razors on the swings. The last thing they need is someone dictating how they can properly play.
(climb off soapbox, exit right)
Well said.. heh.. your description helped bring back many memories.. whether that be good or bad is another thing.. :P
NuTs62
05-10-2002, 11:10 AM
Originally posted by Speedfreak
Oh, ya.. slide climbing is a must. Only, if you are a male, don't let the other kids slide through your legs, because kids have hard heads. :(
heh.. sounds like you experienced it once or twice.. :P
molecularfire
05-10-2002, 02:18 PM
Sorry Welfare, I had to vote no. Don't have a problem with it in theory, but I was a particularly dumb kid and broke an arm going up the slide (slide side) once.
welfareloser
05-10-2002, 02:31 PM
Originally posted by molecularfire
Sorry Welfare, I had to vote no. Don't have a problem with it in theory, but I was a particularly dumb kid and broke an arm going up the slide (slide side) once.
how'd you manage that? fall off? details, man, details!
molecularfire
05-10-2002, 02:41 PM
Yeah, I fell off. I decided that climbing up the slide was getting a little too easy, so I was trying to climb up the slide without touching the actual flat part of the slide. So... I was climbing up the side of the slide (it was a pretty tall slide) got almost the whole way and fell off the side. Luckily, Lt. arm broke my fall. ;)
NuTs62
05-10-2002, 08:37 PM
heh.. i remember those metal slides.. just walking on the sides up the slide instead of walking up the sliding portion.. and not holding on to anything.. almost fell several times.. but i figured since all the big kids did it, i could do it too!
welfareloser
05-11-2002, 05:38 AM
Originally posted by molecularfire
Yeah, I fell off. I decided that climbing up the slide was getting a little too easy, so I was trying to climb up the slide without touching the actual flat part of the slide. So... I was climbing up the side of the slide (it was a pretty tall slide) got almost the whole way and fell off the side. Luckily, Lt. arm broke my fall. ;)
well, that invalidates your "no" vote :P cause that isn't "climbing" ... climbing involves using your hands.
that falls into the "obviously dangerous" category that i wouldn't let eg do... not that a two-and-a-half year old is going to be attempting that anytime soon... and by the time he does, i won't be watching him every minute, anyway...
i guess a broken arm is inevitable *sigh*
Nanotech9
05-11-2002, 08:58 AM
i've got an idea - i'm gonna make and market a slide just so kids can climb up it... nope, no stairs at all... just a set of like 4 slides that converge at the top on a small platform, adn the kids get to play king of the "hill". now THAT woudl be a ton of fun.
BTW, unless the slide is REALLY steep or fast, the kid climbing up wont recieve permanent damage when he gets taken out by a kid sliding down it... usually kids clumb up in a half-standing position, and all that happens is their feet get kncoed out from other them and they slide down together.
and remember kids are tough.
Personally i would encourage him to find new ways to play on the old toys in teh playground... I mean c'mon, a bunch of stuffed up old farts invent playground sets - what do they know what will be fun or not? Obviously in this case the kids know best :)
molecularfire
05-11-2002, 12:38 PM
i've got an idea - i'm gonna make and market a slide just so kids can climb up it... nope, no stairs at all... just a set of like 4 slides that converge at the top on a small platform, adn the kids get to play king of the "hill". now THAT woudl be a ton of fun.
Sorry nano... it's already been invented. I've seen those around a few parks.
climbing involves using your hands.
Actually, I was using my hands. Think of it this way... the slide is a metal sheet with two walls. I was trying to climb up the slide using just the wall... not enough surface area for me to get a base, so sooner or later, I'd lose my balance and topple over. Unfortunately, that time, I didn't topple over to the slide side but to the great big fall side. :)
i guess a broken arm is inevitable *sigh*
Or, in my case (and this is my tally for my life so far) two broken arms, both shoulders dislocated (Lt. shoulder once, Rt. shoulder 4 times), Rt. thumb broken, head broken, and various scrapes, sprains, pulls, etc... Man... I feel bad for my mom. :eek:
Powered by vBulletin® Version 4.1.12 Copyright © 2013 vBulletin Solutions, Inc. All rights reserved.