Tag Archives: spring

a much needed day out

Posted on by

This past Saturday, we did something we haven’t done in a long time: went on a fun outing. I know, it’s pathetic, but I’ve been feeling so awful lately and I just haven’t been up for it.

The story is, there’s a church near our house that we drive past every day. They have an annual Spring Fling, and we saw them setting up the rides and whatnot last week. Catie saw it too, and was all, “Oooh, we go see that???” So I looked it up and found out that it was open to the public, and better yet, the entire event was free (apparently it’s the church’s way of giving back to the community), so I said that heck yeah, we’d go.

So, on Saturday, Dave, Catie, and I trooped off to the festival and met up with our former neighbor and her daughter (who is Catie’s age) while we were there.

The girls LOVED it.

This is when I said, "everybody say, CHICKEN HEAD!"

Tip for getting genuine smiles from preschool-aged kids? Yell, “Everybody say, CHICKEN HEAD!!!” It cracked them up.

Oh, and the best part of the whole day? They had pony rides.

This was probably the high point of her entire week.

There’s probably nothing that Catie loves right now more than horses and unicorns, so the presence of actual, live ponies? Made her freaking year.

After that, Catie and her friend Morgan jumped themselves silly in the bounce houses, and when they hit the point of exhaustion that both of them were crying and throwing tantrums? We headed over to the free food area. After some hamburgers, hot dogs, and cotton candy, all was right with the world again.

So, yes, I probably over-did it, because I completely exhausted my pregnant self by being on my feet for over two hours, but it was totally worth it. We’ve been needing a Fun Day around here. We need to work on making them happen more often.

getting in the game

Posted on by

I’ve noticed a shift in the past few weeks since Catie has started full-time daycare. I mean, of course there’s an obvious shift in her. She comes home every day spouting some new random thing. A couple of weeks ago she was telling me about Obama and George Madison (I guess they were studying U.S. Presidents for President’s Day; she apparently confused George Washington & James Madison, but I like the mash-up of their names), and then this past week she pointed at her stuffed cow (which is supposed to look like the one from Mr. Brown Can Moo) and said, “That’s from Dr. Seuss. It’s his birfday. He’s 1-oh-2 old.” So I looked it up, and sure enough, that day was Dr. Seuss’s birthday. He would’ve been 106, not 102, but she was still damn close.

Wait, what was I talking about?

Oh right, changes in behavior.

No, some of the biggest changes are in me. I think I was probably like a lot of stay-at-home moms for a while, and I was guilty of often phoning it in with regards to childcare. During the day, the TV was usually tuned into a cartoon channel (regardless of whether or not she was watching it), I spent too much time goofing off on my computer, and we just didn’t do very much together for fun. The functional stuff, sure. Mealtimes, bedtimes, grocery shopping, whatever. But playing games and that type of thing? Those things tended to fall by the wayside. Often.

But now that she’s gone so much during the week, my time with her feels more precious. So this past weekend, we (FINALLY!) had some really gorgeous, sunny, semi-warm weather, and we took advantage of it by spending a lot of time outside.

at the playground

I’m ashamed to admit it, but I am that mom who you see on her iPhone at the playground, usually playing Words with Friends or goofing around on Twitter while my kid runs around playing. But this weekend, I made the conscious effort to not do that. I checked my iPhone once, when she sat down to drink some juice, but the rest of the time, I played with her, instead of being a bystander.

And it’s probably no big surprise, but we’ve had a truly fantastic weekend. We went to three different playgrounds in two days, we played with some neighborhood kids, our lunches were backyard picnics, we drew pictures in the driveway with sidewalk chalk, we blew bubbles, and we had long talks about birds and airplanes and fire hydrants and a million other things that you see every day but never really notice. It’s been a blast.

static hair

Normally when Catie goes to sleep, I’m so exhausted that all I can feel is a wave of relief that she’s finally asleep, because it means that I can finally go to bed myself. This weekend, though? I felt sort of sad because I missed my sidekick.

It’s strange how something like a fun weekend goofing off with my kid can validate my gut instinct that going back to work full-time was absolutely the right thing for me to do. It was the kick to the head that I needed to make me realize exactly how fleeting these childhood years are, and just how much I don’t want to miss any of it.