Today we went to the trampoline park with friends.  Long story short: it was amazing.

It’s actually part of a larger venue which is a full-on leisure centre, from swimming pool to gym to cafe to soft play for the tots.  The ticket we purchased gave us entry to soft play as well as the tots trampoline session.

I wasn’t fussed about going to soft play.  Something about it has never appealed to me.  It feels like the opposite of real life: it’s a sterile, baby proofed environment that children are encouraged to go into because the parents are guaranteed that there are no risks inside.  I have friends that spend their days going from one soft play to another, never setting foot outside.

I’d much rather be out in nature, letting Bella walk on uneven ground, stepping on stones that have somehow formed a path, dealing with the elements and having as much fun, if not more, on the journey.  Of course there are more risks, but the reward is that much greater too.

But I had no choice today, if I wanted to go trampolining.  And I did really want to do that, because Bella has taken a real shine to the trampolines at the gymnastics session we go to.  I thought it would be a nice way to do something new, while engaging in a familiar activity.

The best thing about the trampolines was that there was nothing else there, save for a couple balls that had snuck in.  There were 18 trampolines all attached to one another, and literally nothing else.  The girls ran from one end to another, bouncing up and down, falling over, laughing, giggling, tugging on ours arms to join them, and they spent three quarters of an hour doing this over and over again.  There was literally nothing else there to amuse them, and it did not matter in the slightest.

I loved it.  I loved watching these girls, all just under two years old, have fun learning how these strange new ‘floors’ worked.  I loved watching them explore how things changed when there was more than one of them on a trampoline.  Their curiosity and energy never abated.

People often think that you need so many bells and whistles to engage children.  It’s not true.  At this age, they’re still figuring out how their own bodies work.  It’s time for us to let them get down to that important business and get out of the way.