But we did have fun last weekend ... eventually. Here's what I mean.
Friday night I'm looking through the paper and lo and behold, there's a 4th of July parade this weekend. Fantastic! Firetrucks, marching bands, free candy ... what's not to love. So Saturday morning after breakfast (which is around 10am) we quick throw on some clothes (because no one has bothered to shower by this point), put on our shoes, pack a quick toddler survival bag (snacks, water, sunscreen, more snacks) and headed downtown. The whole time we were talking up this awesome parade to Brooks and boy was this kid excited to see a firetruck! We were running a bit late, but we actually found a parking spot, pulled out the stroller, and started speedwalking the two blocks to the parade route. We rushed up to 6th street to be welcomed by ...... no one. There was no one on the street. No people. No firetrucks. No candy. No marching bands. Um, what? So Chris pulled out his phone and looked it up. Sure enough. The parade was on MONDAY. Not Saturday. Oh, and did I mention that I texted a friend of mine that morning too to meet us at the parade. Talk about feeling like a schmuck!
So I apologized profusely to my friend for my inability to read a calendar and started the walk back to the van. Brooks needless to say was quite disappointed. But as a loving mother who hates to see my kid sad (especially when I caused it) tried to cheer him up.
Brooks: (sad) Parade? Firetruck?
Me: Sorry buddy, no parade. But look, there's a water fountain!
Brooks: (excited) Water!! Touch water!
Me: No, sorry you can't touch the water.
Brooks: (crying) Touch water!
Me: No you can't touch the water. Look, there's a puppy
Brooks: (cheered up) Puppy! Puppy! Pet puppy.
Me: No, that's not our puppy. You can't pet it.
Brooks: (more cyring) Puppy!!!
And so the morning went. Yeah, I was pretty much the world's worst mom. I was considering giving him some candy, just so I could take it away.
Anyway, we came home, had lunch and put Brooks down for a nap. I still felt bad about the morning's events, so in an attempt to make it up to him we decided to go swimming after he woke up. So around 4pm we put on swimsuits, sunscreen, grabbed the towels and the toddler survival bag and headed to the pool. We swam for about half an hour when they blew the whistle and closed the pool .... for an hour! Boy I sure was batting 1000 today. Fortunatley Brooks can't tell time and that 30 minutes must have seemed longer to him because he was ok with leaving the pool.
We went home, changed and went out to Qdoba for supper, because this awesome day also happened to be our anniversary. Happy anniversary to us! The upside of the day was that after supper we took a random trip to Target. You know the "we don't really need anything, but since we have nothing else to do let's go to Target" kind of trip. And Chris found a new grill for 50% off! Which was great since ours died just a few days prior. I'll post pics of that later.
(here's where the fun really picks up) Saturday night our friend Tyler calls us.
Tyler: I'm sure you guys already have plans for the weekend, but we're heading to my uncle's cabin on a lake tomorrow after church if you want to come.
Me: Actually, we're pretty lame and have no plans. Sounds like fun. We're in!!
And so we did. We went camping overnight Sunday into Monday and had a BLAST!! It was so nice to get away and relax.
This whole barn was renovated into a cabin. Pretty cool, huh?
We rode 4-wheelers (and by "we" I mean everyone but me. Bumpy trail rides + lots of already occuring Braxton Hicks would not have been a good combination.)
played games
and had a ton of fun playing outside. 2 acres of open grass and a 2 year old boy?? Yeah, he had fun.
That night the boys blew stuff up for a couple of hours .... it was a lot of fun.
The next day we decided to go canoeing.
yeah, I know I look goofy.
We paddled out to an island in the middle of the lake to have a picnic. Going out was easy because we were going with the wind. Coming back ..... well, that was a different story. Let's just say that all marriage retreats should include a canoe trip with your spouse. Chris was a trooper because there were many times when my arms were so tired I just couldn't paddle anymore.
And what did Brooks think of it?
Well, despite the fact that he could barely see up over the canoe and he could hardly move in his oversized life jacket, he had a really good time. On the way home, all he talked about was the "blue canoe" and going for a ride on the water.
So despite the rough start to our weekend, it ended well and we have a lot of great memories from it.
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