White Knuckle Parenting: Wheaton Regional Playground—Terrific or Terrifying?
My family finally got a chance to check out Wheaton Regional's renovated playground. My kids had a blast. I had a panic attack.
Let's talk about Wheaton Regional Park, shall we? Now, I know that the renovated playground over there opened at the end of September, but I didn't get a chance to visit with my kids until a couple of weeks ago. The first thing I want to say is that my kids had a blast. There are giant slides, a climbing mound, swings, a climbing web, plentiful sand, and more than enough playground equipment to keep my three children happy for hours. I, on the other hand, nearly had a panic attack. The playground seemed intentionally designed to help kids escape from their parents. For instance, there is a giant, fenced, raised boardwalk bisecting the playground. Its sole purpose seems to be to obstruct parents' view of their kids and to provide child-…
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1:27 pm on Tuesday, January 8, 2013
I am so disappointed in the new Wheaton park. I think the whole thing was designed to get the kids to break a sweat while they're at the park, which is why they have to walk a quarter of a mile every time they want to go down the slides. The climbing structures leave no room for imagination-- no places to just sit and pretend you're in a ship or a treehouse, unlike the old park. It is like a gym … more ›