Jennifer Coyne

When making plans to come here with my three kids on a Sunday morning in December, I was unaware the playground had been updated. It was a very pleasant surprise when we arrived. At ten am on a mild December day, there was only one other family there and for a good period of time we had the place to ourselves. When we left around noon, it was a popular spot for other families.

In regards to the new equipment, I was thrilled to see what had replaced the older playground. My kids are ages 4, 7, and 11. The swingset has two traditional swings, one toddler swing, and one of the newer toddler/parent type swings. There are some game type pieces, and musical equipment, plus a little house/store area. The bigger equipment contains a very large curly tunnel slide and one of those rope climbing structures. There is no smaller tot lot type slides or climbing structures. My older two loved the slide and my 4 year old tried it with them eventually, even though she had reservations. It is totally dark at the top since it is enclosed and fairly long. I'm a big fan of the rope climbing structures for a wider age range, not to mention parent visibility if there are any issues. My 11 year old didn't immediately comment about being bored and spent a lot of time climbing around before our friends joined us. I appreciate playgrounds that engage the older kids like that.

One thing I hadn't seen before was the use of light on a playground. There are a few tall pieces with translucent colored panels that filter the light through to the ground when the sun shines through them. One of them will spin if a child turns it. I appreciate this extra dimension to engage the kids on a new level.

Since it is winter the closer bathroom and water fountains are closed. The bathroom above the playground is still open, but the water fountains up there are also off.

Before we went home, we stopped on the beach to admire all the birds. Geese are common there, but there were also sea gulls and two other types of birds that seemed possibly swan like and perhaps cormorants. The area to the left of the dock is full of trash, as per usual.

This is a small community playground and fairly open grassy within the Hayfield Farm community. There is no parking lot or bathrooms here. Street parking is easily available, however. There is a small play area with no swings, but an average playground structure surrounded by mulch. A few benches and a couple of picnic tables are throughout the park. The playground is surrounded by decent sized grassy area sprinkled with trees here and there. In the spring, buttercups sprout up and dot the area with cheerful yellow blooms. There is also a planned garden maintained around a concrete circle area. The neighborhood holds events for Hayfield Farm members there such as a reading of the Declaration of Independence on the Fourth of July. We've had nerf gun battles behind the playground, played soccer, had picnics, and met up with friends there. It is a lovely area maintained by Fairfax County.

We stopped into the newly opened Lorton Library today. It was a bit smaller than I expected, but it was nicely laid out. Everything was fresh and bright with lots of windows on the library side.

There was an assortment of seating options throughout the library, particularly in the kids area. The young kids area is open to the rest of the library, but somewhat separated by a large open doorway. They thoughtfully put a family bathroom right next to the kids books, in addition to the traditional bathrooms right near the entrance to the library. The traditional women's bathroom had three stalls with a toddler safety seat in the larger handicap stall. The door to enter the bathroom has a handicap accessible button to automatically swing the door open.

They've decorated the children's area with a fun tree that has seats around the base. There are also windows with wide frames that kids can sit on to view the cars going by. As a parent of young kids, I appreciated the lack of computers with games as some other libraries have done. There were computers near to the kids area, but they were off to the side and not as enticing as the books. Additionally, they created a teen room complete with a door to quiet any noise they might make, books, large screen tvs, and couches.

They were still working on some construction aspects in the foyer area when we visited, and at this time we have not checked out the community center side of the building.

Outdoors they have both a playground and an adjacent workout area that adults could use (or kids could possibly climb around on). They also thoughtfully included several picnic tables with attached awnings between the two. One of the tables included a shorter bench to be accessible by a wheelchair user.

Simple green space with a nice walking trail loop. Small playground, volleyball net with sand, and a pavilion. The trail area is paved and fairly wide, so good for small kids to scooter or bike around without bothering other people. It's basically a neighborhood park so no dedicated parking or bathrooms.