A Productive Day

I'm feeling so excited right now. It is almost 4:00, and I've crossed off 11 out of 15 things on my to-do list for today. We've been busy getting ready to go out of town, had lots of errands to run, packing, housecleaning, and we even squeezed in time at the park with our weekly Friday playgroup. It's been a full day. But it thrills me to no end to have one really productive day out of the last seven. Whoo-hoo!!! You can tell I'm getting things done around here when I have four blog posts in only five days. Don't get used to it.

Yesterday was fun, as I enjoyed a nice lunch with a couple of girlfriends at a "girly" place. We planned this for my friend Ame's birthday (and Kate's, but unfortunately, it didn't work out for her to join us after all, so we'll be doing something like this again when I get back in town!), and it was a refreshing outing. It's not very often that we're able to get together without kids during the week. Our girl time usually consists of desperate coffee dates late at night after kids are in bed. Those are nice too though. After our yummy lunches, Shelly, Ame, and I then spent some time walking around these cute boutiques that are in the shopping center where the restaurant is. These are not the kind of places you take kids, so again, this was more of a special treat...at least for me and Ame. Shelly is expecting her first baby (a girl!) in May as well. She still gets to do fun, cool things for now. Actually, she'll probably still do fun, cool things even after she's a mommy. I want to be her. =) But anyway, it was a good time, though we missed having Kate with us, but really....how much fun can it be to go in stores and look at beautiful things that we either can't afford or can't fit into??!! We need to think through that one a little more next time!

Per Amanda's request, here is a belly shot. I had my mom take this before yesterday's lunch date, and the style of the shirt probably isn't the best to show you what my pregnant stomach looks like...I think it looks a little deceiving. A fitted shirt would show that in reality, it's much bigger than that. But there you have it. In all its glory. I'll be 30 weeks tomorrow.

One more semi-interesting thing I'll leave you with....When I told Ame this earlier this week, I prefaced it by saying that if you know me or my family, you already know we're pretty weird. So this shouldn't be a shocker. But still...this jewel I'm about to share may cause you to understand our weirdness to be at a whole different level than you thought. Do you want to know Jonah's absolute FAVORITE place to eat? The food court at Target. Yes, that's right. When my mother-in-law was visiting a few weeks ago, he BEGGED to eat there. We tried to distract him with Chick-fil-A and the reminder that he could play at Chick-fil-A, but he was adamant that Target was where he wanted to go. While I have grown quite accustomed to easily answering "no" to that common request, it was a special time, because Nanny was there and all, so I relented and we all ate at Target. OH MY WORD, their food is soooooo good!!! Did you know that?! I had no idea. They have this amazing California Chicken Salad that I have a crush on now. You can get a kids meal for 1.99, which makes Jonah happy. Candy ate the hot dogs and said they were really good. Anyway, I was pleasantly surprised by my eating-out-at-Target experience. So much so that I talked a lot about it for the few days after that. However, I was still not ok with just going in and eating there if I wasn't actually shopping at the store already. But last Sunday when Joel, Jonah, and I were out and over on that side of town and needing somewhere to grab dinner, I joked to Joel that we should go to Target, and he immediately asked Jonah if that's where he wanted to go. JOEL!!! I was kidding!!! But Jonah enthusiastically shouted, "Yeah, let's do that!" and was so excited that I couldn't tell him no. Actually, Joel had already decided we were going, whether I liked it or not. He wanted to see if it was really as good as we had said. So, in we went. I was slightly embarrassed at the thought of explaining ourselves to people we know that we might see at Target. That we had actually gone to Target specifically to eat at the food court. But then, one bite of the California Chicken Salad....and I remembered. Amazing. I didn't care at all who saw us. And I don't care anymore who knows. I'll share it with the world. I have no shame. It was one of the best family dining experiences we have ever had. That's just the truth. I can't wait to go back and try the yogurt parfait. It looks downright beautiful. If you ever want to meet for lunch at Target, I'm your girl! Seriously. You should try it, if you haven't. Don't let anyone tell you it's only for exasperated mommies who get so caught up in their shopping endeavors that they realize they forgot to feed their kids and it's two hours past lunchtime. (I know none of you have ever had that happen in a Target! Ahem...Yeah, me neither.) You don't even need to go shopping at Target. (Although, I don't know if there's a ever a time that I don't need to shop at Target. ) You can go anytime. Just go. I'm paving the way for this to be normal. At least, that's my goal.

Oh my goodness....I can't wait to hold that sweet Brady tomorrow night, assuming he'll still be up when we get there. I hear he's a cuddly one. That's new for babies in our family. His Aunt Hannah can't wait to have his little body curled up against her with his head resting on her shoulder. Especially since this is surely my last niece or nephew, I really think that this time around, I am probably going to be one of those family members who spoils the baby and doesn't ever put him down and holds him every possible second of the day, every second, of course, that he can be wrestled from his grandmother's arms. The mommy in me is mad at me for that. But oh, the aunt in me wants nothing to do with putting him down! How can I put him down when I can hold him?!! I'm just going to apologize in advance, Amy! No...I will try to be good. But it will be hard! I need this baby boy and the rest of his family to live in Texas. I figure, since they are not living here and I don't get to see them very often, I will be somewhat justified in my annoying spoiling techniques. Right?! I mean, Blake and Amy, if you don't like it, you can always move here!!!!! That would get me to stop.
=)