Almost every night after dinner Keith, Autumn and I go for a walk. Sometimes they're short walks -- once or twice around the block. During those ones, we let Autumn walk freely. She stops to explore neighbor's mailboxes, the rocks in driveways, the acorns that fell from an Oak tree and she stops at the drainage grates, bends over and tells us there's water down there. She also likes to stop at the fire hydrant and tell us it's yellow. Or red. Depends on what mood she's in, I guess. (For the record, it's a yellow hydrant.)
We've made the most of our summer weather, and it shows in our little girl. She hates to go back inside and will drop everything to go outside. That's what made last night particularly tough. It was raining.
If it was just sprinkling, I would have put her cute little rain boots and her coat on and we could have gone out for a short walk. But it wasn't just sprinkling, it was a nice, steady rain. The kind you'd hope for to water your flowers.
She kept asking to go outside. She cried to go outside. Keith took her out on the porch and showed her the rain, but she didn't care. She wanted to go for a walk. So she came in the house and cried harder. I sat on the floor by the door and asked her if she wanted to watch the rain with me. So she came over and sat in my lap on the floor and we watched it rain for a few minutes. I don't necessarily think she still understood why she couldn't go for a walk, but she was pacified enough that she was ready to color instead.
I suppose grasping concepts is something that just comes with growing up. Eventually you understand rain without having to be in it. Then you begin to learn cause and effect -- if I go out in the rain, I'll get wet. If I'm wet in cooler weather, I could lower my defenses and get sick. If I get sick, I won't be playing at all, so that won't be fun.
But that won't happen for a while. Instead, for now, all we can do is sit and look at the rain, wishing we were outside.