Valentine's Day

I wanted to call this post "I don't feel pathetic!" but, I went with Valentine's Day because it seemed a little more upbeat. Lemme 'splain....

Mike and I got my folks to watch our darling offspring for the night on the 13th so we could go out and have a Valentine's Day date. We had reservations for the Blue Bayou inside the Pirate ride at Disneyland. Excellent. By the time we actually got to Disneyland it was really cold and I wasn't looking forward to the tram ride. This nice employee snuck us onto the returning and empty special needs bus so we rode to the park like we were in our own special needs limo. When we arrived at the resturant we decided that we didn't actually want to pay that much for dinner, so (laughing at ourselves) went from place to place in Disneyland looking for something "good." (I hate looking for something good. You don't know what you want, you just know you want it to be....good.) Picture us. Valentine's date. No kids. Walking all over. Tummies growling. We ended up in Pizza Port and after waiting in the wretched huge line were about to get the pasta when I said "You know, we could just go to Red Robin." So, we left. We got to Red Robin, had a noisy dinner, and thought we'd try a movie. So did the rest of the town! Even the Fandango line was huge! We looked at each other, laughed, and agreed that we'd go home and use our new movie projector.

So, to sum up, while we could have eaten at Disneyland and hung out all night, we left and went to a "nicer" place. Then, when we could have gone to the movies until all hours, there was no rush to go home, we chose to leave. We were laughing that it was 9:30pm, I was already in bed, and Mike was setting up the movie projector in our room so we could watch "Mystery Men" (one of my favorites) on the wall. Mike said "you, know, if we could have seen ourselves 15 years ago tonight, we would have called ourselves pathetic!" I answered "But - I don't feel pathetic!" because oddly enough, we were both blissfully happy to just be. Be together, having fun. We laughed all over Disneyland, enjoyed the noisy dinner, and didn't feel like waiting in a long line just so we could say that we'd gone to the movies. He is a good man to be married to. He even gave me a Willow Tree Statue that I'd been wanting and a Hoops and Yoyo Valentine heart you can hang on a door knob that when you walk by talks to you and calls you cute! (I have a thing for Hoops and Yoyo.) All in all there was very little that could have been improved upon. A strange, but really nice night.

Sweetheart Day Suprise!

Friday the 13th was "bring a your sweetheart lunch" day at Squish's school. Not one to miss a chance to hang out with our kiddos, Mike took some time off from work and we met over at Squish's school for lunch. Well, that was the plan.

Actually what happened is I forgot how many people all wait until the last moment to buy a lunch, and that the fast food joint closest to the school would likely be kinda busy on a "bring lunch" day. DUH! So, I called Mike, and he said he was enroute to the school, but that he'd collect the boy and wait for me to get there. Sweet. What he didn't mention was that Uncle Dave showed up at his work - usually out of state Uncle Dave, so he was totally unexpected. We were so happy to see him! Mike and Dave drove over to the school together and surprised Squish and I! We don't get to see Unc very often, so it was great to hang out during the lunch. When we'd finished eating (well, before that really, Squish was fairly impatient) Squish was urgently requesting that Mike and the Unc go play kick ball with the playground kids. Not regular kick ball, more like the grownups kick the ball and the kids watch in amazement while it soars high in the air and then they - the kids -catch it. I stayed by the "stuff" to make sure nothing blew away in the cold wind, so I had this great view of two brothers, playing on a school playground for the first time in who knows how many years. It was kind of a Hallmark moment. They were unaware of my misty eyes, they were just having fun. (If you click on the photo you can enlarge it and possible make out the details of them playing. I like this photo because it has the ball up in the air.) Both men had kick balls and it was amazing how high the balls soared into the air. Plus, it was great listening to the playground kids scream with delight while they watched.

Photo #2 is of Squish with his best friend. His folks weren't able to come on Friday (most parents didn't) so he ate his lunch with us.

Celebrate your birthday with Mickey!

Some of you may have heard that this year Disneyland will let you get in for free on your birthday. Woo Hoo! But, what I haven't heard mentioned until today is that you have to go online and register yourself and your family in order to get promised free entrance. You can click here and it will take you to the site that you have to register at. Or you can go to the Disneyland website http://disneyparks.disney.go.com/disneyparks/en_US/WhatWillYouCelebrate/disneyland/index?name=CelebrationsDLRFreeOnYourBirthdayPage and it will get you there too.

Mike and I went to Disneyland Friday night for Valentine's day and the park looks really cute! It's all dressed up like birthday parties and the entrance gate Mickey that is below the trains looks like a Mickey wearing a party hat and holding big floral Mickey balloons. It's all very festive and colorful - well done Disneyland!

Have a magical day everyone!

Pinewood Derby - Cub Scouting at it's best!

Do you have a boy in Cub Scouts? If you do, or if you had brothers in Cubs then you know about the pinewood derby. That great tradition of Dads and boys, working together, to create the coolest car they can make from the block of wood that comes in the box.

This year, because of an email glitch, we didn't find out about the derby until it was 2 weeks away. We were going to build or create a lego shaped car, and had it all drawn up, when because of time constraints we decided it would be funnier to "leave it in the box." So Squish and Mike (mostly Mike) cute the car out, got the wheels in, and glued the box back to the outside of the car rather than painting it. The race was run freestyle with everyone just shooting their cars down the track when they wanted, so there were no winners, but then there were no crying, broken hearted cubs either. (BIG PLUS!!) The kids made stands to display their cars, played games, and raced to their content. What a great event! They even got their own pretend driver's licenses! Many thanks for a fun time!

Free Valentines & Tokens from Chuck E Cheese

Okay, if you know me, you know I am all about the "free." I love free stuff and this came in an email from Chuck E Cheese today:


Celebrate this Valentine's Day by sharing the love of Chuck E. Cheese's with your kids and their friends! Our printable Valentine's Day cards are redeemable for 5 free tokens! Click this link to print.

Each Valentine actually has a little gift certificate for 5 free tokens on it (they have to buy a drink or food item to use it, but it's free!). All it costs you is for the ink! (And maybe if you wanted to print them on cardstock.) There's one that is a little more girly than my boys would like, but we can use the other 3 just fine. (There are 4 images per page.) Anyway, if you haven't bought cards yet, or were looking for something to give with the cards, this might be it! The price sure is right!