Splish splash...

We had an unseasonably warm day on Tuesday. It was nearly 60 here. I think, with the strong wind we had it felt more like 50, but that's at least 30 degrees warmer than it's been lately. The kids and I walked up to the post office in the morning. We needed to take the Cherry Blossom Market package up to mail.

Have I already ranted about the Cherry Blossom Market? Ours came without one of the roof connectors. That renders the product useless. Of course we only discovered this AFTER we assembled the thing and the kids were really really excited about playing with it. I promptly called Mattel the next day. I was informed that the product is "too new" for them to offer single parts for it. They were all too happy to remedy the situation, but first they'd have to mail me a label and then I'd have to send the market back to them and then they'd send me a new one. Wow. That all seems really archaic to me - and also a little fiscally stupid. Don't you think it would be easier (and far cheaper) to email me the label and then open a box of Cherry Blossom Market and snag out the piece I need so that they can have the remaining parts for future customer calls? Surely that makes more sense, doesn't it? Anyway....

I was quite a sight at one point. I was pushing the double stroller with the wonder twins in it. The Market package was sticking out the side of the basket under the stroller. It was too big to fit in the bottom of the wagon ( my original idea was to have the boys sit on the package in the wagon), and too big to fit in the bottom of the stroller and too heavy to carry all the way up there. We approached a really really deep puddle and Kailin had her tennis shoes on. So I hoisted her onto my back and then held her with one arm whilst pushing the twinsmobile with the other and trying to balance on the soggy curb grass rather than walk through the 3" deep puddle myself. I did do it, but it was a little hairy there for a minute and I was actually laughing at the thought of seeing myself there.

After Steve got home, we decided to take the kids for a walk at the State Park near us. I told Kailin she could wear her boots and splash in puddles. We don't have rain boots for the kids yet, so they wore their winter ones and off we went. Kailin was so cute! The first part of the trail was covered in ice and snow yet, and Kailin immediately grabbed Colby's hand and said she was going to make sure he was safe and didn't fall down or get squished like a pancake (that part applied mostly to the parking lot). It was too cute!

We found a little puddle and the kids had fun splashing around in it. We walked a little further and I looked ahead and said "Oh Steve, there's the motherload!" It was at least 3-4" deep and ENORMOUS!! Steve told Kailin to look and her eyes lit up. She was looking at him he told her to go ahead and she was in disbelief... and then in she went, with her brother at her heels. They splished! They splashed! They danced and twirled and giggled and whooped. They would run to one end of the puddle and then splash their way back to the other end. They got SOAKED, but they had the time of their lives and I was so glad that we did it! On the very last run (we'd announced it in order to soften the blow of having to leave), Kailin slipped and fell and ripped her pants. I was a little worried that her puddle splashing days were over, but when I asked her if she'd splash again she said, "Yes, but not in any of those mean puddles!" Ha ha ha.

We walked back to the car and Colby was actually SQUISHING in his boots! Midway back I was thinking that he must be pretty cold so I offered to carry him. He was having none of that! When we got to the parking lot, he actually went entirely limp in protest of our departure. Only by telling him that Kailin and Daddy were waiting could I cajole him into going to the car. When we arrived, Steve pointed out that Kailin's pants were now torn and also bloody. Ick. We got the kids home and patched Kailin's scraped knee up. Steve took them upstairs to get some warm, dry jammies on and I got some warm dinner on the table.