Just a walk in the park....

Today was gorgeous. Although it was cloudy when Colby and I got up at 5:30 (leave it to him to awaken early on the one day his sister sleeps in a bit....), it was soon sunny and warm. My plan was to get up with Kailin and head out to the grocery store while Colby and Steve slept. Obviously that was shot to heck. ha ha. Kailin was up by 6 and by 6:45 I had them both ready to head out. Steve came down about that time and I did the cowardly thing and stuck him with Colby. Kailin and I set out and were back by 8:30! Hooray!! Looking forward to a long day of freedom ahead (astutely having busted my butt last week during naps to get the lawn mowed, the laundry done, and the house cleaned to allow us the guilty pleasure of having "nothing" to do this weekend), we arrived at home and I unloaded the groceries. While cutting up a watermelon it dawned on me that if we were headed to Harrington Beach State Park for our walk, perhaps a little impromptu picnic. I commenced to making up sandwiches, cheese cubes, crackers, and watermelon and portioning them out into ziploc bags and containers in the perfect sizes for our idyllic family picnic.

Steve made a pitcher of lemonade. This is of little consequence except that this is what I heard while I had my back turned cutting up the melon.... "What is this?" "It's the pitcher." "Why does it stink?" "It doesn't stink." "Yaaaaaessss. It IS stinking!!" She was talking about seeing the powdery stuff rising up out of the pitcher apparently, but her extended yes and her use of stinking somehow tickled my funny bone and I was laughing uncontrollably. She said it with such conviction in her voice. I wish you all could have heard it!

After Colby finally got up from his morning nap (read - when we gave up on him waking up at a reasonable time on his own and woke his sleepy butt up at 11am), we joyfully loaded the picnic, dog, and two kids into the Jeep and headed off for our adventure. A blissful ride to the park was followed by a joyful walk around Quarry Lake. We then returned to the car, spread our tablecloth on the grassy knoll, and enjoyed a peaceful and tasty meal together before heading home for some much needed naps (needed by all, actually taken by only the children).

Here's what really happened...Kailin was entirely uncooperative as we tried to get ready to leave (including throwing her brother's sandal and having a tantrum because her stuffed dog couldn't come with us). I forgot sippy cups for the kids and we had to turn around and head home for them. When we did finally get going, Kailin and the dog whined loudly the entire way to the park. I didn't hold out much hope for a calming walk. My hope fell further when the distance from the car to the trailhead was filled with...."Where's my picnic? Do you know where my picnic is?" Thankfully, I was wrong and the walk was actually entirely peaceful with Kailin playing a rousing game of "let Daddy get ahead and then run to catch him." We looked for fish in the lake and a group of little girls let Kailin look at the frog they'd caught. We did make it back to the car for our picnic only to discover that someone else had staked out the picnic table we'd been hoping to use (our options were somewhat limited with a dog). We plunked our tablecloth down right on the grass in front of the Jeep and I set about making our picnic as nice as possible. Steve and Sugar discovered that the pump hadn't been turned on yet and so we had one seriously hot dog and no water for her. Kailin was obsessed with not allowing the wind to blow any of the edges of the picnic cloth up and Colby set about cramming as much sandwich into his face as was physically possible. Idyllic, huh?

Seriously though, once things calmed down a bit, we did have a great little picnic and it was a lot of fun. The whole thing was fun - just in a much more realistic (much less idyllic) way.

The kids are both still sleeping as I write this, but after they wake up we're all going to McDonald's for ice cream. Kailin's been asking all weekend, "Can we go McDonalds? Get some ice cream?" so I'm glad to be able to tell her yes. She's getting to an age where she truly enjoys asking for something and then getting to do it. And I get the pleasure of seeing her delight. Win win if you ask me.

This day of fun has reminded me how blessed I am to have such a wonderful little family and how blessed we all are to be able to go where we want when we want and say what we want while we're there. Without wanting to wax philosophical or sound cliche, I am thankful on this Memorial Day that there are men and women who are willing to risk their lives to keep this country free. What a gift we have in this country, and in it's people.

And now, I think I'll take a little nap while the kids finish theirs. Save that, I hear Colby...