Grateful Friday

Our two Cinderellas

- Bill's summer work hours. He gets home early (for him) on Fridays and we get the chance to start our weekend off early. I love weekends with him home. We try not to schedule anything with anyone else if we can help it, just so we can have that time all to ourselves.

- The warm fuzzies I get when I hear that my friend has mentioned me to her other friends and told them that I'm "a very sweet person." P-shaw.

- Activities! This new mom's group has been great because there are activities for kids almost every day of the week. We haven't gone to every one, but it's nice to be able to pick and choose so freely, and to be able to know people whenever you do go. This week the girls went to a "Pick a Princess Ballet Class" at a local dance studio. Basically, it's a little ballet class, but they center it around one of the Disney princesses. The class Maddie and Josie attended was for Cinderella. It was the first time I'd seen them in a class together, without me, interacting with each other and the other kids. The moms were able to watch from outside the door. It was so cute, and I took lots of pictures.

- A very special moment during the above mentioned ballet class: At one point, the instructor asked everyone to find a partner. Even though one of Maddie's good friends was in the class with her, she and Josie immediately walked over to one another and held hands. I literally got teary-eyed. All the moms around me went, "Awwwww!" in unison. I love seeing them express the love they have for each other.

- And speaking of ballet... Josie will be in Maddie's ballet class starting again in September. She had started her own class for the summer, but it was canceled due to low enrollment. Josie was upset, and I felt awful because she talked about her teacher and the class all the time. Now she and Maddie will be in Miss Mary's class together. I'm not sure I'll know what to do with myself. During the princess class, I realized it was the first time I'd actually sat by myself while the girls were both involved in something without me. Until now, I've had Josie stay with me or we've done Mommy and Me stuff.

- Watching The Wizard of Oz with Bill and the girls at the park last weekend. Our city hosts "movies under the stars" once a month. This was the first one we'd been to all summer. We arrived early, staked out a spot, and let the girls play at the playgroup while we waited for it to get dark. Once the movie started it rained just a little, but not enough for anyone to get too uncomfortable (we were under the umbrella and some plastic anyway.) The girls loved the movie. The rain cooled everything off and it was nice just sitting there with my little family on a summer evening.

- Discovering an indoor playground. Not one of the jumpy, inflatable places. Just a local church with an area devoted entirely to any equipment manufactured by Little Tikes or Fisher Price. It's carpeted AND fenced off so the kids can't run off. Did I mention it's indoors? No worries about sunburn or overheating or dehydration (96 degrees today!) There are a couple of playhouses, some climbing gyms for preschoolers, some toddler climbers, etc. Basically, Maddie and Josie just ran around like banshees and wore themselves out while I sat back with some moms and watched them. Didn't have to worry about them falling and hurting themselves much, thanks to the carpeting and padding under the gyms. The absolute best part? It's absolutely friggin' free! The church runs a preschool in the mornings, but in the afternoons you can just go and let the kids play. Isn't that awesome? I'd have loved a place like that as a kid.

- Seeing Amy Grant and Vince Gill in concert at Chastain. It rained. A lot. But we didn't mind so much and no one else did either. Instead of candelabras, it was a sea of umbrellas. The girls loved it -- Maddie danced in the rain and Josie loved cuddling up under the umbrella. We packed a nice dinner and some wine, and just enjoyed ourselves before walking back to the car completely drenched. We stripped the girls down, dried them off, put them in their jammies, into their carseats, and they were out of it before we even got close to home. I'm not a huge fan of Amy Grant or Vince Gill, but Bill got free tickets and we had nothing to do that night. It's not that I don't enjoy their music, but I just probably wouldn't have paid to see them. We couldn't get a babysitter at such a late notice, and we had 4 tickets so we took the girls. It was actually pretty nice seeing a concert together, all 4 of us.

- I'm grateful for the fact that a birthday party we attended this week, during the day, on the hottest day of the summer so far, was a POOL party. The girls had fun in the water and I was more than obliged to go in with them.

- Social networking sites. I've gotten in touch with friends I haven't spoken to in years. I'd searched for them, but couldn't find them until now. I've even found one of my old high school teachers. It's great being able to reconnect with old friends and acquaintances.

- The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Here's my routine: I go to bed, turn on the episode of The Daily Show that I've recorded on the DVR, watch and repeatedly laugh out loud to the point that Bill comes in to see what's so funny, catch up on current events, fall asleep. I almost always fall asleep right after the guest interview. Sometimes I'll be awake for the "moment of zen," but most likely I've fallen asleep with a smile on my face. I have to have the TV on to fall asleep. When I was a baby, my mom put a radio in my room near my crib as soon as I was home from the hospital. She wanted me to get used to sleeping with noise. We've done the same with the girls, at first with NPR playing, but now with a CD of recorded wave sounds. No tiptoeing around babies in our house! Unfortunately, Bill likes to sleep with it completely dark and silent. We've worked out a system over the last 9 years or so wherein I always go to bed first, fall asleep to the TV, and then he turns it off when he comes to bed. He's such a night owl anyway that the timing of it is perfect.

- Going without drinking any Coke for about a week and barely missing it at all now. Sometimes I think about it and miss the sugar rush, but then I'll have a drink and it just doesn't taste good at all. Yay! Now if I can only keep from drinking them regularly again.

- The Community Center. I started working out at their gym (free!) one or two evenings after the girls have gone to bed. Now I'm taking a yoga class. I haven't actually taken a class in a long, long time. I do yoga at home, not very consistently, but I'd forgotten how supportive it can be to practice with a class and have a real live human guide you through the asanas. I'm trying to get a friend of mine to go with me next week.

- Chocolate pudding. 'Nuff said.