Special Days

I took July 5 and 6 as vacation days, partly because I wanted a break and partly because I've guilted myself into thinking that part of the reason why the girls' behavior is so bad lately is that they get almost no "alone" time with us.

I kept Julie home on Thursday, and when I asked her what she wanted to do, she said she wanted to go see fish.

Go see fish.

I had no idea what she meant.

So, we went to Petco.  We looked at the fish, the ferrets, the birds, the frogs.  But do you know what her favorites were?  The mice.  Gives me the chills just thinking about it.  But she stood there watching them and narrating forever.

After that, I figured she needed a few suggestions for things to do.  So we walked through REI where she got a huge kick out of the bikes hung from racks - they were "upside down."  We walked around the craft store for a bit.  Then, she wanted to go to the burrito house for lunch.

I took her to Chipotle and got her a taco, and she went on and on about how good it was.  "This is delicious!  It has all my favorites!"  And when she tells the story, she likes to say, "And I had two drinks!" because we were carrying around a sippy cup with water that day, and I wanted to refill it before we left.  Apparently, a sippy cup + apple juice box = most awesome lunch ever.  She also was excited about the bag of chips.  She insisted on saving it to share with her sisters and her dad.

After lunch, we went to the bookstore to play with trains.  She said she wanted a train book, so I coaxed her in to The Little Engine that Could.  We went and got some ice cream, did a little more shopping for something for the wall for their room.  And then we headed home for a nap.

For Rebecca's day, I took her to Krispy Kreme first.  The first thing she wanted was a hat, and two for her sisters.  Then she declared that I must wear a hat.

For her, anything.

I talked her in to going to the other craft store with me, where she picked out little wooden birdhouses for herself and her sisters.  She started trying to get me to buy everything.  I talked her out of the package of stickers that she wanted that said "pregnant," but did let her pick out some flowers for her outdoor play house.

Next, she wanted to go bounce.  Luckily for me, she got bored with it after about an hour.

For lunch, she wanted to go to the chicken nugget house.  I tried really hard to make this be Chick-fil-a, but when we got there, she said, "No, the chicken nugget house with the tree in it."  I'm still not sure what this meant - if one of them has a tree in the play area or what - but she was satisfied with McDonalds.  After we ate, she played in that play area for a while, and then, even though it was 100 degrees out, she insisted she wanted to go to the playground.  I told her we could go for a little while, but then we'd have to go home and take a nap.  She agreed.  Of course, by the time we got to the park, she was sound asleep.

She woke up as soon as we got home, but we put on some Mickey Mouse Club House and crashed on the couch.

Greg stayed home on Monday and kept Emma home.  She spent all weekend planning her special day. She wanted to bounce, too, but apparently they got there before it opened.  So they stalled by going to Walmart.  She got bored of bouncing after not too long, and wanted to go to the park.  All weekend, she had been planning to go to the macaroni and cheese house (Panera) for lunch.

They went to the book store, too, and came home with what Emma calls her "favorite book," a Max and Ruby book with flaps, about costumes.

Definitely want to do more of this in the future.  It's so hard to find alone time with them, and I think it's really important, for them and for us.