Why our family is Rocking the Block – and we hope you will, too!

I don’t know about y’all but we’re two days in to the school year and I’m exhausted. My oldest started second grade and my middle began his foray into the world of public school as he started Kindergarten on Wednesday (my eyes may or may not be swollen from a few tears shed).

I am a type-A, driven-by-routine mama, but even I love the more lax schedule of summer. The return to waking kids early, scrambling to make breakfast, packing the lunches, losing the battle of what they are wearing and the every-day-without-fail searching for a missing shoe (how do they always lose one shoe?!) is draining on all of us.

I know we’ll all settle back into this new routine with time. I’ve found that higher stress times, when none of us want to add even one more thing to our already packed schedule, are the exact time we need to plan fun family outings to destress and reconnect.

Dolese Bros. Co. Rock the Block event this Saturday, from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., comes at the perfect time for us. The family-friendly touch-a-truck event is open to the community, located at the company’s headquarters at 14th and Broadway, and FREE to attend, which makes this mama’s heart sing after I’ve exceeded typical monthly spending on back-to-school supplies, clothes and shoes.

Dolese has hosted the event for the last three years to delight community members young and old by getting an up-close-and-personal look at the machines that build our community’s streets, bridges and buildings. When I first saw this event on MetroFamily’s online calendar, there were several things that stood out to me, encouraging me to pencil it in to our family fun list. Here’s why:

• The eye-popping plethora of machines and trucks that will be on site, thanks to Dolese and an impressive list of community partners. All three of my kids, from 8 to 3 years old, boys and a girl, love to build, create and problem-solve, so I know they will enjoy climbing on, pushing buttons and pulling levels on the loaders, graders, cranes, bucket trucks, trenchers, concrete trucks and material exploration drill trucks. I don’t want to give away all the fun, so I haven’t told my truck-loving boys that we’ll also get to explore a fire engine from the Oklahoma City Fire Department and a trash truck from Oklahoma Environmental Management. I can say with certainty their minds will be blown!
• Dolese and partner companies will have volunteers on hand to explain what each truck does, provide guests a personal “tour” of its parts and answer questions (I hope they are prepared for upward of 100 from the Page children alone).
• The event’s first hour, from 9 to 10 a.m., will be a “quiet hour,” where all trucks and horns will be silenced for children with noise sensitivities.
• Perhaps most compelling are the strides Dolese Bros. Co. takes to not only provide a day of exploration for families but to give back to community organizations important to the company. Rock the Block attendees are encouraged to bring non-perishable food donations for the Regional Food Back of Oklahoma, where employees frequently volunteer. A hot dog lunch will be served, and though it’s free of charge, donations offered by attendees will benefit the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. Kona Ice will be serving up sno cones with 25 percent of proceeds split between RFBO and LLS.

I’m looking forward to reconnecting with my family this weekend with this fun, free local adventure. Lunch onsite takes one more thing off my to do list. Plus, an end time of 1 p.m. means we can still get in those afternoon naps. For all of us. We’ve earned them!