The newspaper reported that Thursday was the first day over 65 degrees - in 196 days. Wow. We knew this past winter and spring had been wet and unseasonably cold, but 196 days? With rain in the forecast for the rest of the weekend, and the week ahead, I knew we needed to capitalize on the nice weather, which was slated to hit 70 degrees.
So, we met up with Michelle and her boys for a trip to the zoo. Along with every other elementary school class in Western Washington. To say it was madness would be no exaggeration. But the kids loved it, and listed the animals they had to see:
Before we left, Michelle managed to capture a fun picture of the kiddos on a bench, which was dedicated to a little boy they knew who had passed away suddenly. You can't see the bench very well but it was an absolutely beautiful, polished slab of wood, with an engraved plaque. I was amazed that not only did Benjamin sit still for a second, but when she pulled out the camera, he yelled, "Cheese!" really loud. What a hilarious kid.
Originally, Dave was going to camp with the scouts this past weekend, but another leader was skittish about the possibility of rain, cancelling the outing altogether. When Dave goes on these excursions, I usually try to put together a girls' night with my friends. Because Dave would be around, we invited their husbands to come too. Everyone brought treats and we hunkered down on our big couch to watch "Country Strong" with Tim McGraw & Gwyneth Paltrow. While I did want to see it, I'm glad I didn't catch this one in the theater; it was a very sad storyline which included depression, death of a child, alcoholism and suicide. Oh, yeah - there was a love story hidden in there too, but it was nearly incidental to the overall story, almost an afterthought.
Nonetheless, it was so fun to see our friends and spend a lovely Friday evening with them.
Saturday, Saturday
We had BIG activities slated for Saturday. Dave joined a group of cyclists for a 50-mile ride to Lake Stevens. After their ride, we were going to head for the mountains to go sledding in the amazingly-deep spring snowpack. Unfortunately, the weather didn't cooperate. Dave still rode with his mini peloton, but came home drenched, tired and very dirty; cycling in the rain will do that to you. Because the snow level had suddenly climbed to 7,000 feet, we decided against the idea of sledding in a constant downpour.
Instead, we spent the rest of the day cleaning and playing with Benjamin. Rachel & Bracan (thanks guys!) were kind enough to whisk Benjamin off to dinner with them so that we could attend a quarterly dinner party with friends from our old ward.
It was a kebab party, with marinated chicken, steak and shrimp as the prime-time players. To finish off the kebabs, we also had various bell peppers, onions, mushrooms and pineapple, as well as a variety of fruit and vegetable salads. After stacking our skewers, we threw them on the grill - and the result? Heavenly. Despite the cool weather, we had hot food to warm the belly and good company to warm the soul. And, because a certain someone's birthday fell on that particular night, we had Texas Sheet Cake with vanilla-bean ice cream. And with that, we capped off another wonderful evening with friends.
Stuffed, we headed home - where we met up with a very tired Benjamin. After thanking everybody for their help, we collapsed into bed... contented and ready for a good night's rest.
And Sunday comes after ... wards
After a busy and somewhat stressful Sunday morning, I welcomed our bishop's talk. He spoke of conquering our goals simply by starting with one step at a time. I loved his talk and felt lucky that I could hear it; normally, one or both of us has to take Benjamin out by the end of the sacrament! Fortunately, armed with a tuna sandwich, one sippy cup of milk, one sippy cup of juice, dried apples, mini marshmallows, PEZ candies (& Rex - "Rick" as Benjamin calls him - the Dinosaur PEZ dispenser), fruit snacks and an arsenal of books, we managed to keep him "still" for over 40 minutes.
I had a great visit with a new VTeachee, then zipped to Edmonds for dinner with the family. It was particularly laid back, and the food was wonderful. After some playtime with the cousins while the adults munched on brownie sundaes, we were off again - this time to get Dave to his youth fireside. B & I stayed home, getting a surprise visit from Rochelle, who was dropping off our bag of produce. Love that girl! We sat and chatted while Benjamin ran back and forth, gave high-fives and generally entertained our Party of Two.
Rochelle headed out when Dave got home, but after getting Benjamin to bed we partook of the HP Marathon, catching HP & the Order of the Phoenix on ABC Family. Being the ultimate multi-tasker, I grabbed my laptop, excited about the prospect of getting some nagging ideas/storylines down on paper. No shock to me, I dozed off 15 minutes into the movie - and only after typing down some possible story titles. At this rate, I might finish a book before I die... maybe. If I'm lucky.
All in all, it was a very good weekend - and you know, we are already looking forward to the next weekend... a long, HOLIDAY weekend!
1 comment:
What a fun, busy weekend! We loved going to the zoo, in our rare 70 degree weather!
I love the picture of the kids on the bench. Why is it so hard to get 3 kids to look at the camera, at the same time?? :)
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