Birthday Bowling

For Dave's birthday last weekend, we thought it would be fun to go bowling. Caleb had never been before, and we weren't sure how he'd do, but we opted to give it a shot. I remembered from when my sister was little that some of the lanes were equipped with bumpers for little kids so their balls wouldn't go in the gutters. When we arrived, we learned that all the lanes now have bumpers and are on an automatic system that raises them for the player who needs them and then lowers them again for those who don't. It was a good setup and worked well for us so that Caleb could bowl and we could play a real game ourselves - gutterballs and all!

Caleb, who learned how to bowl recently with a toy set at Granny's, was raring to go as soon as we arrived. He did pretty well letting us help him and listening about keeping his fingers away from where the balls come out the machine. At one point though, he didn't really want Mommy's help and tried to push the ball down the lane by himself which ended up stuck half way. Dave tried to fix the problem by sending another ball to push it along but his aim wasn't quite on target. In the end, we had to get someone to retrieve Caleb's ball. After that lesson though, everything else went smoothly.

(Please forgive the cellphone quality pics; I didn't think the other bowlers would like me flashing pictures all over the place with my real camera.)

 

 

 

Poor Hadley didn't get to bowl but she still liked exploring and snuggling Daddy.

 

Caleb's interest waned towards the end of the first game, and he settled down to a corndog and some chips while we played another game.

Part way through the second game, my body started to let me know that bowling isn't a good activity for a pregnant lady, so we called it a day and went home to put our wore out kids down for naps. I think everyone had a good day and hopefully it will be a family activity we can do more of in the future.