Bowling

There is a small bowling alley next to the skating rink the trio and I skate at. We walk by it almost every time we visit the rink, so months ago the children started asking me when I would take them bowling. (They've bowled there once before.) I put them off again and again, but finally I had to make good on my promise to take them "sometime".

On Saturday we went with opa. He didn't bowl with us, but he came along. We rented one lane for one hour. I thought this would be the best deal moneywise because the bowling attendant told me that a group of four could easily bowl two or even three games in a hour. He obviously hasn't observed young bowlers. They are slow to pick up their ball, slow to walk down the 16' runway, and slowest of all is their ball rolling down the 62' 10 3/4" lane. We only finished one game and four frames in an hour. 

It was hard to find a ball light enough for our young ones to bowl with, but eventually we located a 7 pound ball. Viva used an 8 pound ball instead because it was pink. Bentley could put his fingers in the holes and hold on to 7 pound ball long enough to send it down the alley, but Jake and Viva could not. Viva wasn't strong enough to grip the ball when her fingers were in the holes and I was afraid that Jake was going to dislocate his elbow, so I told him to not used the finger holes. They more or less threw the ball on to the lane. Viva's balls were so slow that even when the ball hit the pins perfectly (the strike zone), there was not enough momentum in the ball to knock down very many pins.

We played with gutter rails so instead of going into the gutter if the ball was thrown poorly, it would bounce off the rail and stay in play. This makes the game so much more interesting. Instead of watching gutter ball after gutter ball (boring!), we got to see some very unusual pin falls. 

I started with a strike and maybe got one other, but I didn't achieve a high score even with the gutter rails up. Bentley had two strikes and some spares. Jake got one strike and lots of 8s. Viva didn't usually hit down more than four pins at a time because the ball was just too slow and light weight. (Maybe I should have given her the 20 pound ball? Could she have thrown it?!)

The children greatly enjoyed bowling. As we left Bentley asked if we could come again on Monday. HUH!? It took me six months to make good on my last agreement to take them bowling. I don't want to make a new agreement just yet!