The dining hall

On Friday's preschool gets out at 11:30. Last year we often ended up at the dining hall for lunch on Fridays where our table of parents and preschool children joined the college students for lunch. Kids eat free there and what kid doesn't want to eat at a place where there is always infinite pizza and ice cream.

We don't go as often this year. Partially this is for the obvious reason that it is sad to be there without Drew. Mostly it is that many of the other children have headed off to kindergarten, so we don't have a crowd to go anymore.

Today we went anyway. On Fridays, we share the afternoon babysitter with a colleague of mine so that Meg can play with her friend A and my colleague and I can both work. So my husband, Meg and A arrived first and I arrived once I was done with class and my daily walk. Meg and A are quite an experience at the dining hall.

First of all there is the large number of college students that know them that I don't know. When your child goes to the preschool on campus that is used as a learning lab for the college students, every student who has taken Child Development knows your kid. Meg and A seem to be quite popular with the students.

The food routine is pretty consistent. Pizza and pasta with chocolate milk, followed often by fruit or yogurt from the salad bar, and then always ice cream. Ice cream that takes awhile to eat. Ice cream that is always messy.

Trying to keep them reasonably close to their seat while we finish eating is an adventure. It can involve them lining up their chairs and pretending they are on a train. Or seeing how far they can get away from standing at the table before we tell them to come back. They also make a game of hiding under the table and tickling our legs.

Meg and A look more alike than Meg and Drew did. I often wonder if the students think they are both ours. They also play together so well, we call it the "Meg and A show". Meg says "A let's do this" and the do it. Then A says "Meg let's do that " so they do that. Quite a team. I hope no one ever asks if they are twins.

Today was a good lunch at the dining hall. They ate pizza, drank chocolate milk, and ate chocolate ice cream for dessert. They did so badly at wiping their faces after the cones that my husband joked that they looked like they had a beard like him. We managed to time things so we had nearly finished eating when they were done.

I will miss Friday lunch at the dining hall when Meg is in kindergarten. Fortunately we have another year of preschool left until then.