The other day, I took the kids to the mall so they could play in its play area. They love climbing on the different things there and I enjoy just sitting and watching them play. It is a typical mall play area with a small building with a tiny slide on it and five different shaped fiberglass things the kids climb in, on, and over. It used to have a lot of kids books there and Hope would occasionally bring one over for me to read to her, but they’ve gotten rid of them. I like to think that it is because the books became too damaged, but they were probably removed because few people used them.

So I’m watching Piers play. There is this round pig about ¾ as tall as he is. I think it used to be a baseball but when they repaired it, they turned it into a pig. Regardless, kids love to climb on it and then jump off. So Piers starts to climb this half-sphere when another little boy pushes his way to the top. Piers and the boy stare off and I can tell that Piers is angry that he was pushed out of the way. I’m proud of my boy though, he handled it very well. He raised his hand at the boy and made a grunting noise to show his displeasure, but that was all he did. The boy climbed down and Piers quickly scrambled up and defiantly glared at the boy. I figure for a three year-old, that was excellent conflict resolution.

After watching that incident, I looked around at the parents in the area. The place is crawling with kids and there are about a dozen parents there. Of this twelve, there are perhaps three that are actually watching their children. The majority is using cell phones and the rest are just not paying any attention at all. Some even have brought in their Starbucks or cookies.

The food thing annoys me because it is clearly stated to not bring food into the play area. The reason being with all these kids running around, things will get spilled. And they do, almost every time. It doesn’t help that backing up to the play area is a Starbucks, but still there is a good reason for the no food rule and it bugs me that people ignore it. Now there is also a no running rule, but I see know way in the world you could tell any preschooler not to run in a play area, so see, I’m flexible. Don’t break a rule that is there for a logical reason.

Anyway, back to the parents. It doesn’t bug me so much that they aren’t paying attention to their kids because of what their kids may do. I’m fully capable of telling some stranger’s child they need to stop hitting someone and I’ll do it with no fear. What these parents are truly missing though is watching their kids interact with the world. They are missing precious moments to observe their children with no distractions. See the look of triumph in their little faces when they climb to the top of the fire engine all by themselves or watch how they handle the conflict when two kids want to do the same thing at the same time. If you turn off your cell phone, there is nothing else to distract you. You are just sitting there watching your kids play.

I know that Hope will probably stop playing at the play area in a year or two; she’ll just have grown up too much for it to be fun. I want to take advantage of the time I have to watch her and these other parents should too. So watch your kids at play. Turn off the cell phone. Share in the fun your children are having.