Can you teach kids "Come!" or "Heel!"?

I'm beginning to think that when you don't hear from me for a few days, it's because things are starting to veer of course a little bit around here. I've been trying to go to bed early to catch up on sleep since last Friday night, but I'm addicted to
this right now. Plus, the usual other stuff that I like to do after the kiddos are sleeping.

Well, I officially became the mom who chases her toddler around the park yelling at him today. Heh. We had playgroup at a park this morning, which is admittedly not my favorite place to have a playgroup for just this reason.

The park that we went to is brand new and has a great area for the little guys and one for bigger kids. We went early because the baby had fallen asleep and I was hoping that maybe he'd stay asleep through most of the time we were there. That didn't happen, but whatever. He's finally got the cold that we've all had for the past bazillion weeks.

We get to this beautiful play area specifically for toddlers and what does my favorite toddler want to do? Anything BUT play there. Running out of the play area, running out of the park altogether, splashing in the puddles, and playing in the big kids play area with its 10 foot high,leg-breaking slides (I'm a little paranoid about this at the moment because a two-year-old in our other playgroup just broke his leg while sliding -- a two-year-old, in a leg cast -- is that sad, or what?)and the menacing giganto-kids.

So, yep, that was me, the exasperated mom, trying to hold onto her crying baby and catch her escaping toddler at the same time. The toddler who has now learned to sit down as an effective tactic to keep from going where he doesn't want to go. And there was much raising of the voice.