Persistence

We've had a very active week with a lot of traveling about, trying to make the most of another glorious week of holidays before it is back to work and school on Monday. (Poor Chad was back at work this week, so the kids and I were trying not to gloat about our fun too much, lest he feel left out.)

One of the things we crossed off the to-do list was a trip to Listowel to see my grandmother, who has recently moved into a retirement home. Because it's a three-hour drive each way, we don't get up to see her all that often, but with some time on our hands we made the trip.

Luckily, Stratford is en route, so we made an overnight stop there to break up the drive. Liam and grandpa enjoyed polishing off a crossword puzzle together.

As a fun reward for their good behaviour for long hours spent in the car, we decided to go to a place that is not far outside of Stratford - the River Side snow tubing complex. Last year Mallory was too small, but they accept kids 4 and up so this was our year. They had half of the resort open (4 of 8 slides) and were frantically making snow on the other half of the hill, though given that it was 8 degrees C yesterday, I think that was in vain. Anyway, conditions were good on half of the hill and the lines were not too awful given that the school break was still on.

As I expected, Liam loved every minute of it - pulling his tube around, riding the lift to the top of the hill, attempting to race Mallory and I (on the lift) while he climbed the entire hill on foot, and most of all, the high-speed ride down the hill. I had forgotten just how fast you get moving on these tubes, not having been here in ten years. It was pretty darn fast.

Also as I expected... Mallory. She was excited to arrive at the resort, excited to see the hill, excited to ride the lift up the hill, excited to get ready to launch... and then hated the trip down. At the bottom of the hill she said she hated tubing, wanted to go home, and was not going to go down the hill again.

Because I had just bought a two-hour lift ticket for all three of us, and was not about to let my six-year-old have run of the place on his own while I spent the morning sitting in the chalet with Mallory, I told her that like it or not, she was going to keep tubing. People behind us in line commented on her mopey face and asked her if she was having fun, to which she emphatically replied NO. I'm sure they wondered why I was forcing the issue.

And I will tell you why I did: it's because I know my daughter pretty well. By her fourth trip down the hill, she was shrieking with glee, and by the time the two hours were up she was sad that we had to leave.

And that's the way it is with Mallory in general. She hates everything until she gives it a try, and I think we do her the most disservice when we listen to her original pleas to quit something without pushing her a little bit to continue. In the back of my mind while all of this was going on, I was thinking about the trip we have planned for later this year. It's the kind of trip that Chad and I enjoy most, and the first time we are planning to bring the kids along on the ride. It will involve some activities we have done before without kids (river rafting) and some that are new to all of us (rock climbing/canyoneering), and I fully expect that Mallory will insist at some point along the way that she is not having any fun. I also fully expect that she will come around if we just stick with our original plan and encourage her. Having recently booked the trip, knowing full well how she can be, it was nice to see that I was right in thinking she would eventually grow to love snow tubing. Let's just hope the other activities grow on her, too.