A Lovely Day

Me and my hunny

This last Saturday we had such a great day. It was our family rest day which we try very hard to guard. Depending on Doug's schedule we pick one day a week that we reserve for 'rest day'. I'm pretty convinced that when God set aside a day for us to rest it wasn't for religious reasons, it was for sanity!
Anyway, this last Saturday was so enjoyable I just wanted to write about it:

I woke up late, of course. What's a rest day without sleeping in?
The kids got up early to watch cartoons and eat their once a week ration of 'sugar cereal'. This day it was Corn Pops, my pick:)
When Doug woke up we had a long talk in bed about the state of things in our marriage. We worked out a few things that had been piling up, emotionally, in our communication. It was a great talk. We needed to clear the air. I was so grateful that it was effective without any blow ups. I love the fact that we are progressing in our communication with one another. It's such a miracle and a blessing to me since I am watching, one by one, as marriages around us crumble.

After our great talk we got up, ate some breakfast and watched a movie with the kids. It was a 3 hour movie so after it was over I was ready for a nap!
Actually I had a headache so I escaped the after-movie release of energy that the kids were expending on their dad. Or was it the other way around?

In between sleeping I heard Doug tell Naomi about 3 times not to come and bother me. I heard wrestling and tickling and also Doug coming and locking my door so that Naomi would let me sleep. I can't tell you how nice that was. She is at a very needy, clingy stage and I needed the reprieve.

When I finally woke up for good I realized I had been hearing strains of classical music coming from, where? I got up and came into the living room and found that it was coming from the stereo. The boys and their dad were listening to it while sprawled out in different areas of the room. Now this was interesting.
Doug told me he thought it would be soothing for me as I slept. What a sweetie!
I cuddled with him for a little bit and then it became very apparent that Naomi needed her nap. I went upstairs to put her to bed and when I came back everyone was asleep in their respective positions around the living room. How funny! I guess we tag-teamed.

I got to have a little time to myself while everyone slept, which was very nice. Then after everyone woke up, staggered through out the afternoon, we went out to eat. We just went to Shari's a little 24 hour restaurant nearby that's very casual. We all enjoyed our time together and having someone else do the cooking, serving and cleaning up. Or maybe that was just me that enjoyed that part! Nonetheless we came out feeling joyfully content.
It was a lovely evening. Somehow it was already around 8:30pm but the night was clear and balmy. A perfect 76degrees according to the bank digital display across the street. Doug decided we were going to walk over to Baskin Robbins and have dessert. Sounded good to me!

On our way over Doug noticed Payless Shoesource across the way and said he wanted some shoes for work. The kids were excited about the shoestore, imagine that? So we walked on over. Upon exiting, we had 4 new pairs of shoes and 3 grateful children. One of them proudly sporting her new sparkly flip flops that, according to her, 'shined in the dark too'!

At Baskin Robbins we all deliberated over what flavor to indulge in. It was fun to see what all of the kids would choose. Tyler decided pretty quickly on a wild medley of neon colored sherbet, while Zak, consistent to his preference, chose a rich chocolate mousse. Naomi had no idea what to do and couldn't see over the counter anyway, before I could pick her up to have a look she piped out, "cherry!" So she had dark sweet cherry ice cream and 'made' me pick out all the cherries for her because she didn't want them. Lucky me!

I had to smile at Doug's generosity. I certainly didn't expect him to buy all of the kids shoes on the spur of the moment and then the ice cream was more up my alley than his. He had just gotten a little extra check from Hynix for some differential pay they forgot to add into his regular pay. It was sweet the way he was choosing to spend it.

So, with ice creams in hand, we all walked over to the bank to deposit Doug's check. We arrived back to the truck as the last bite of ice cream was being eaten and loaded up for the short trip home. Ah, what a sweet evening. Right to the last drop. I felt full of contentment as we exited the square and waited for the light to turn green. Then to my surprise Doug made a left turn instead of a right, toward home. Even Naomi said, "Where are we going?"
I figured he wanted to take a round about way home, but he didn't say anything that made sense.
We drove down Beltline and past the exit home. Then we turned off on Highway 99. I guess he was taking a 'really' round about way home. We turned onto Airport Road right as Zakary noticed a particularly bright star on the Southern horizon. We said, "No, Zaky, that's not a star, it's an airplane." It was then that I realized where Doug was taking us, to the airport to watch the planes land!
We used to do this when the boys were little. It was a special way of getting out of the city and impressing them (and ourselves) with something beyond our understanding. There is just something amazing about those huge tubes of metal and people and fuel lifting so effortlessly off the ground and shooting up into the clouds. Not to mention the exhilaration that is felt when they land at such a speed that you can't imagine they will stop at the terminal but end up in the next city and then they reverse the engines in such a display of power that all of our insides vibrate with the roar.
It had been a long time since we had watched the planes and I said so to Doug. He very simply told me that he had been reading my blog and he wanted to bring some spontenaity back into my life. Wow, that really meant a lot. Thank you God for such a thoughtful husband and such a blessed day with my family!