Imagine with me for a few minutes…
You’re seven years old and lying in bed after a full day of spelling words, four square and practicing your cursive. Life is good. After getting your goodnight kiss from your mom you imagine what the next day will bring. Then out of nowhere, as if a bolt of lightening, your door flies open with the sound of pots and pans being beat like the Notre Dame Fighting Irish. You pop up, knocking over the water by your bedside. “Pajama Run!” your parents claim, as they stand in your room telling you and your sister to get up and get moving! Woo hoo, a Pajama Run!
You put on your slippers and coat, but are not allowed to change into regular clothes… that’s the whole point. No wonder mom asked you to wear your new pajamas tonight, you laugh to yourself! Dad will not divulge the final destination, even though you beg him to tell you.
You hop into the station wagon and zoom off to a local ice cream joint, where you are invited to order a sweet treat… in your pajamas! Sitting in the Twisty Station, you and your family laugh as you recall the looks on your faces, how your sister had no idea what was going on, and how funny it was that you spilled your water. You also recall that you did notice mom setting the pans on the counter before bed, but thought maybe she was just getting ready for the morning. Lots of giggles all around! As you eat your sweet treat you announce to your family that when you get big and have a family, you are for sure going to take your kids on Pajama Runs!
This is what I imagined as a woman at a recent speaking gig explained her family’s tradition of the Pajama Run! She shared that this is a fun way they Escape Adulthood. She also mentioned they sometimes they do it as a school (smaller school) and all meet at the same place in a similar time frame. The kids are thrilled to see their friends there, also in their pajamas.
It keeps things interesting, playful and spontaneous.
There’s nothing better than to sit in your pj’s out in public, enjoying a banana split way past your bedtime!
[tags]family fun, pajama run, spontaneity, ice cream[/tags]
Wonderful!! Thanks for visiting my blog. You have an amazing work of art in progress here… I’m jealous!
Sometimes stuff like this makes me tearful, and I think, “Dang! I want a do-over! I didn’t get a childhood like that!”
…and then a little light goes on.
OH.
See you at the ice cream parlor. I’ll be the one with the curlers and the cloud-printed flannels…
Such a wonderful post!
If it wasn’t this cold here, I would definitely consider going for a strawberry icecream at 10 o’clock at night!
Well I’ll just have to settle for the ice on the sidewalks…
What a great concept! I’ll have to remember this sometime. I have no kids but I can call some girlfriends and do the same thing! TadMack, I’ll join you in the cloud-print flannels!
Oh, what a marvelous adventure!
Funny, last night Cubby and I were talking about doing something similar to this on Christmas eve or Christmas night. What a terrific memory it will make for the kids!
Thanks for always throwing out these great ideas and getting us all to think outside the box!
Crazy fun! I worked for the U.S.Government all night in the Post Office back in 2000. I suggested a ‘ Night Before Christmas Pajama Night’. All of us ( at least 50) came to process the Christmas mail in our PJ’s.