The chaos of parenting and the bliss of a soft playground

I’ve come to accept that my children are on a mission to test the limits of their bodies. They get hurt everywhere. I really do mean everywhere. At the breakfast table the other day (TRUE STORY), my daughter somehow injured herself with a cereal spoon. I still can’t figure out how. My middle child? He had his adult front teeth nearly knocked out by a soccer ball to the face in the schoolyard a few months ago. He wasn’t even playing soccer (and has no memory of anyone else playing soccer nearby). The number of bandaids we go through in a week is staggering. We’ve had to start buying only plain, boring bandaids to keep our bandaid budget under control.

So, when we walked into the Adventure Soft Playground at Flying Squirrel, it felt like stepping into a magical realm where my kids could unleash their energy and, for once, I didn’t have to be on high alert. Everything was padded, bouncy, and engineered for maximum fun with minimum injury risk. For a parent like me, that’s basically paradise.

The One Place I’m Not a Human First-Aid Kit

I usually spend my outings half-watching my kids while mentally tracking the closest ice pack. But at Flying Squirrel? I was actually able to read a chapter of my book. The playground soft ground absorbed every fall, stumble, and overly ambitious leap. The foam pits swallowed them whole (in the best way possible), and the soft playground structures let them climb, swing, and slide without the usual threat of bruised knees or split lips.

My youngest immediately ran straight to the climbing nets, her tiny legs furiously scrambling up the soft webbing. Normally, I’d be hovering beneath, arms outstretched, ready to catch her inevitable slip. But here? She was climbing with no fear, and I wasn’t panicking. If she fell, it would be into a pit of impossibly soft foam blocks. When she did eventually lose her footing (which she did, spectacularly), she laughed. No cries for help, no request for a bandaid, no demands that we all go home. Just pure joy.

 

The Trampoline Park: A Truly Soft Playground

Let’s talk about the trampolines—because Flying Squirrel Chatham isn’t just a soft playground, it’s a full-blown trampoline wonderland. It’s as if someone decided that playgrounds weren’t exciting enough and cranked everything up a few notches.

My middle child took to the trampolines like he was training for the Olympics. He bounced, and launched himself into a foam pit with all the grace of a kid who doesn’t yet understand the laws of physics. Meanwhile, my oldest discovered the joy of trampoline dodgeball, which is just regular dodgeball but with twice the chaos and vertical space.

And then there’s the BattleBeam—an elevated jousting platform over yet another foam pit. I watched as my daughter and a much bigger kid squared off, foam sticks swinging wildly as they tried to knock each other off balance. It was intense, it was hilarious, and it was exactly the kind of free-for-all competition that keeps kids coming back for more.

 

A Parent’s Dream: No Ice Packs Needed

After a few hours, my kids finally stumbled over to me, sweaty, red-faced, and completely unscathed. No scraped elbows. No mysterious bruises. No sudden emergencies that required us to leave early. I wasn’t even clutching a handful of bandaid wrappers.

We had fun—real, stress-free fun. The kids got to be wild and fearless without consequence. I got to sit back and actually enjoy watching them play without constantly anticipating disaster

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Why We’re Coming Back (And Why You Should Too)

If you’re a parent who, like me, has spent far too much time patching up injuries and fielding complaints about minor (and major) playground mishaps, Flying Squirrel Chatham’s indoor soft playground is for you. It’s a place where kids can be kids, where energy burns off in the best possible way, and where—for once—you can actually relax.

So, take my advice. Bring your kids, let them run wild, and enjoy the rare moment of peace that comes from knowing that, for today at least, the bandaids can stay in the box.