Awesome Day

I know that it's my crushingly superior sense of humour that keeps bringing y'all back to this little ol' blog, but sometimes an awesome day trumps the funny ones.

Like yesterday!

I had the greatest day yesterday.  I can't even think of one exception to the greatness!

I have less than a week left to my maternity leave before I head back to work, and so I've been trying to be a bit strategic about how I use my last few days.  I've been easing the kids into daycare while I'm home so that I can be around to help with the transition, and now they are both there full time, leaving me with some time to myself before I head back to the daily grind.

I was a complete nerd and did up a spreadsheet (those of you who know me personally likely know of my addiction to spreadsheets) detailing how I would spend every morning and afternoon of my 'me' days for last week and this week.  I had glorious plans of dejunking the house room by room.  I also made detailed plans as to how I would relax and pamper myself.

So far, as is the case with 99% of my spreadsheets, I have drifted quite a bit from my plan.  I am proud to say that I have caught us up on our laundry, cleaned our closet, half cleaned the kids' rooms, almost finished cleaning the basement, and purchased the placemats I have been meaning to buy for 3 years.  None of this was according to my precious spreadsheet, but I don't care.  I think for me it's the thrill of the plan... follow through is overrated.  :-)

BUT... one thing I did execute to perfection was Monday!  With bonus activities!

My friend Cathy emailed me last week to see if I wanted to use some of my pampering time to go to brunch and a matinee with her on Monday.  Unbeknownst to her, I had labelled Monday on my spreadsheet:

 "Morning: shower and clean kitchen, take kids to daycare.  Paint toenails.  Afternoon: go to movie."

It's like she could read my mind!  I was thrilled, of course, and immediately agreed.

And now that it is Tuesday and I am reflecting on my day yesterday, I almost wish that yesterday was Friday, because it was a perfect day.

I woke up, went downstairs and realized that MY HUSBAND had already cleaned the kitchen.  Yeeeessssssss!!!!!!!  I kind of puttered around haphazardly, packing the kids' bags, getting their breakfast ready, and then lazily went upstairs to get them.  They were both in the BEST mood!  I love when they are in a good mood in the morning, because mornings with cranky kids are soooooo demoralizing.

Then we piled the kids into the car and went to drop them off at their child care provider's house.  Now, there is a big back story to this, but to make it short, things were awesome when I first started taking them, then Kaycie got bit in the eye again and I kept her home for one day, which threw Knolan off and he screamed all morning at daycare and has never been the same since.  Mornings have generally been Knolan crying as I pass him off, and Kaycie declaring that she thinks she'll just stay home with me (despite the fact that every single day when I pick her up, she is bubbling over with excitement about how much fun she had!).

But not Monday!  We dropped the kids off and Kaycie was thrilled to be there, and Knolan took one look at Kanwal (our childcare provider) and smiled at her and happily sat in her arms and waved as we left. 

Yeeeeesssssss!!!!

Then I went home, showered, painted my toenails, (so far, my checklist was filling out nicely!) and jumped in the van and headed downtown for my brunch/movie date.

Although Cathy has a better poker face than I do, I think we were both giddy at the prospect of a few hours of kid-free girl time.  I was practically bubbling over, but as you know, free time tends to do that to me.  :-)  We had a relaxing brunch on the patio at High Park with PERFECT weather.  It was so relaxing and it was great to catch up with Cathy AND be able to finish complete sentences (*usually when we get together, we have my two kids and her twins, which is always lots of fun, but as is the case with small children around, often results in fragmented conversations.  LOL).

Once we were done, we realized we had a bit of time to kill before the movie, so we went to IKEA to browse.  I hadn't been to IKEA in a long time.  It used to be one of my favourite places to just gawk at both the merchandise and the people.  I bought some plates for the kids and some napkins, but I have now made a mental list of about a bazillion things that I want to go back for.  That's the problem with IKEA... everything there just screams at me to take it home.  Regardless, I was sooo blissful just perusing the displays and chatting away with Cathy (who scored some good buys, by the way!).

By the time we were through the store, it was time to go to the theatre.  We went to see Horrible Bosses (if you watch the trailer, just be forewarned - it's not suitable for work or children), which turned out to be pretty funny.  Jennifer Aniston seemed to break out of her romcom mold and was pretty good (but very orange, as Cathy pointed out!), and Colin Farrell was almost unrecognizable thanks to some kind of latex make up, or wig, or something... but hilarious.  Was also happy to see Jason Bateman in something again... why isn't he in more movies?

Anyway, we laughed our way through that and a bag of popcorn and then headed home.  As a small sidenote, when we got to Cathy's house, we were unloading her IKEA haul, when I heard someone playing the clarinet.  I realized it was coming from an open window of a house close to Cathy's.  I looked at her, and she explained that whoever it is practices at least twice a day and that it is starting to make her and husband, Rob, a little batty.  Apparently Rob is particularly bothered by the fact that, despite the continual practice, this person is not getting any better.  :-)

So, our date ended there, and I gave Cathy a hug and was on my way.  When I got home, I relaxed for a bit, and then went to pick up the kids.  Pick up was also dreamy!  Yeeesssss!!!  For the first time, Knolan wasn't desperate to escape Kanwal's home when he saw me.  He was just smiley and happy and content to wait until I got Kaycie's knapsack on her back.  Kaycie was also thrilled to recount the day's adventures for me.  I was all smiles driving them home and then it dawned on me.   The only way this day could get better was if it ended at Red Lobster!

Well, Ken hardly needed any persuasion at all, so we all piled into the van and headed out for dinner.  Of course, our fashionista daughter decided that if we were going out for dinner, that her outfit would just not be complete without the pink cardigan sweater that Gramma had knitted for her.  There was no point in arguing with her that this didn't make sense during a heat wave, so we just let her wear it.  She looked kind of cute anyway.

I am happy to report that dinner was a huge success.  It's a bit of a gamble taking kids to a restaurant close to their bedtime, but we had a great time!  Knolan was sitting close to another baby his age, and the two of them kept trying to hold hands and play peek-a-boo with each other through the whole meal.  Kaycie entertained our server with answers to questions she didn't ask (for example, the server asked her what she'd like to drink, and Kaycie replied with, "Well, you see... today we went to the park, and I met a dog named Molly!).  At the end of the meal, I asked Kaycie if she'd like to share a dessert with me.  Well, I might as well have asked her if she'd like me to buy her a thousand ball gowns... she nearly exploded with excitement.  I have never seen her so full of glee and gratitude... it was adorable.

And the dessert was....  tres mag-ni-fique!  *dramatic finger kiss*  It tasted wayyy better than if I would have eaten it by myself.

So, after we said goodbye to the lobsters and to Knolan's new friend (Kaycie called out, "Goodbye what's your face!"  Slightly embarassing!), we headed home to put the kids to bed.

When we got home, we remembered that a package had arrived for the kids from my friend, Marlaine, in Winnipeg.  The kids were sooo anxious to see what was inside.  We tore into it and found a Jumbles stacking set for Knolan and a book for Kaycie.  The kids were immediately engrossed.  Ken and I got a kick out of how quickly Knolan was able to spread his stacking toy across the entire room!

Our post Red Lobster package frenzy!

We could have played for hours, but it was bedtime.  While Ken took Knolan to his room, I happily laid in bed with Kaycie when we got upstairs and read her favourite books to her, and then we both fell asleep snuggling like bunnies.  Heavenly.

Now THAT'S a great day!

Annnndddd... when we woke up this morning, we discovered that we managed to grow one cute little strawberry.  I was starting to lose hope, but it feels like today just might be another great day!

There it is!  Our pride and joy!