The Y with a playgound

After Kaitlyn was born, I took my kids over to the Winter Park YMCA that is less than a mile away from our house. The purpose of this trip was not for me to work out, but for me to see what goes on in their childcare center while parents are gone. I'll just put it this way... we never returned. Ah, well, I take that back. Nathan took James there a few times, and since it was before James was in school, James bawled his eyes out every time Nathan dropped him off. Very, very sad, and we could never leave guilt-free from that place.
So we stopped going, I didn't want to go because of the 50 kids that were in there with only 5 women watching them, and Nathan didn't go because he just got out of the workout routine.
A few months ago, I started bringing them to the YMCA that is still near our house but further than the other one that I talked about. The Crosby Y is fabulous, but it has an older crowd that attends. Since it is smaller, the care center is small and in less demand. Perfect! We started going, so I could get some exercise. After going two times in one week, Kaitlyn got Roseola and James got strep AND a virus at the same time. Awesome. We didn't go back... until I couldn't handle it anymore. It was just too HOT to walk outside.
I decided to try again, with the commitment that I would thoroughly wash my hands and the kids' hands for like a minute and a half for each finger (ha). So far, we've been good, no sicknesses except for maybe one or two that James brought home from school.
This was another motivator for me to go to the YMCA, the fact that James would be bringing viruses, etc. home from school anyway, so what harm would it do Kaitlyn to get out a little bit.
We have come a LONG way with the childcare at the Y. Kaitlyn started out by crying when I left, although she always seemed to get over it within a minute of my leaving. We met Miss Lindsey at the Crosby Y and she makes a big scene (in a good way) when Kaitlyn comes to play. This helped a lot, and I'm very thankful to Miss Lindsey for making this better for us.
After getting comfortable at the smaller Crosby Y, I ventured over to the Winter Park Y and decided to give it another go-round. Their group class schedule is way more focused on the harder strength training and exercise for younger to older people rather than just an older crowd. They have an outdoor area for the kids that is covered and has a playground and cars and trucks to pedal around. Perfect, absolutely perfect! The kids LOVE it, and now every time I tell the kids that we're going to the Y, James asks, "Are we going to the Y with a playground?" He gets so excited, and he actually has cried when I come to get them and has asked me to go back to work out because he's having so much fun.
Even Kaitlyn runs in there with excitement now, which leads me to believe that she'll have an awesome transition into school next year. That makes me happy because we had a rough first four school weeks with James (once a week though).
Yesterday I took the kids to the park playground since it was gorgeous weather. James couldn't understand that we were going to a playground, but not the Y with a playground. He finally figured it out when we got there, that it was an actual park instead of the Y playground.
This afternoon, around the same time that we went yesterday, James asks me, "Mom? Can we go to the playground without the Y?"
I love how these kids think. ;)