Chuck-E-Cheese

Last week my good friend Mary and I (plus my little munchkin and one of hers) took a little day trip up to the Bentonville/Rogers area.

There is a great place in Bentonville called Lawrence Plaza that is a splash pad in the summer months and an ice skating rink in the winter months. We spent about an hour watching Mary's daughter run through the water, laughing and having a great time.

Why weren't we watching Claire doing those same things you ask? Well, she got out onto the splash pad and decided to investigate one of the water fountain openings. No sooner had she gotten square over it that it sprayed water and got her right in the face. She ran to me and said, "up" and wouldn't let me put her down again for a long time.
 
When she was finally ready to explore again she had made it about halfway around the outside of the splash pad when another, older (maybe four or five) little girl stopped right in front of her. The older girl leaned down and looked Claire in the eyes and then proceeded to try and pick Claire up. A) This older girl was a stranger, B) The older girl touched Claire without Claire's express permission, C) This other girl was NOT her mommy. Suffice it to say that Claire did not appreciate the attempt much and struggled which resulted in Claire stumbling backwards and falling. (Claire HATES to fall down). I was on my way over to her when she fell and when I got to her she was whimpering and asking for "up" again. That was the end of any attempt to get Claire to explore the splash pad.

  

After Emmalee was tired of the water we decided to head out in search of a snack. I had intended to stop by TCBY for some delicious frozen yogurt on our way home; but when we got there we found out that they do not open until 11:00am. Bummer! There was no way to hungry little girls were going to wait patiently for twenty minutes, so we came up with plan B.

There was a Chuck-E-Cheese right across the road and they open at 9:00. So we headed on over.

This was Claire's first trip to C-E-C, but Emmalee was an old pro, so she showed Claire the ropes. We ordered a snack and some drinks and got a seat in the semi-isolated toddler area. Claire figured out the slide pretty quickly with Emmalee's help of course. Claire climbed the steps, played with the toys at the slide landing, and slid down the slide saying, "whee," more times than I could keep track of. Our food came and we had our snack and then the girls went back to playing and sliding. I had just gotten my phone out to record Claire going down the slide when I heard Emmalee screaming in the background, "It's Chuck-E, it's Chuck-E. Here he comes."

Chuck-E hit up our area first. I was a little nervous about what Claire would think of him, but as it turned out she loved him. Here is a little video of the encounter and the sliding:

I think from the results of this visit that we will have to go back to Chuck-E-Cheese's in the near future. : )