A Girls' Weekend

Weekends are my favorite! Sure, there are a lot of things that I like about the other days of the week: after-dinner walks around the neighborhood, Monday nights watching the Bachelor/Bachelorette, a spontaneous dinner with family, and reading during my lunch hour, but still, the best days are Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. Boomer picks on me that my favorite day is actually Thursday, since it's the anticipation of the weekend that I really love. Back before baby, weekends meant sleeping in, working out, enjoying a dinner out with friends or a date night with Boomer. As I was pushing the stroller around the neighborhood on Saturday morning around 7:30AM, it hit me that the weekends are quite different than they used to be. Definitely no more sleeping in! That's probably the biggest difference. But I've found that getting up early isn't so bad. It's amazing how much you can do before 9AM! Now that we are at the six-month mark, I feel more and more settled into our 'new normal.' This past weekend showed that we are still enjoying some of those things that we would do pre-baby, while also incorporating our little girl in to our life. There's no doubt, she is the star of the show! We are getting better at planning around naps and bed time, as well as when one of us is on solo-duty. 

On Friday night, we were invited to a birthday party for Boomer's former athletic director at Glenn HS. From Boomer's four years of teaching there, he made many strong friendships with the staff; it was great to see some of those people again. Most of them are still working at Glenn, and Boomer and I enjoyed catching up with them. When you get a group of educators together, there is always a lot to talk about! The party started at 6:30PM, which we knew would be pushing Emmy's bed time, but we made the decision to bring her along, even though it would mean leaving early. We stretched bedtime until 8PM, which was a good compromise. 

On Saturday, Mom, Megan, and I enjoyed a day of relaxation and pampering at the Grandover Resort & Spa. It was a belated Mother's Day gift to ourselves and to each other. Last year, we went on a similar day-trip to the Rock Barn Spa in Hickory, and after that, we decided it may need to be an annual tradition. The Grandover is a little closer to home, only about 20 minutes away in Greensboro. We were there right at 9AM when they opened -- we intended to get full use of the facilities! We first worked out at the fitness center and then showered off before our 50-minute Swedish massages at 11AM. By noon, we were hungry and enjoyed some sandwiches poolside. We were by the pool for the rest of the afternoon, with some light reading material as you can see (ha!) We joked that you never turn off being a mom! We ended the day with dinner back in Kernersville at J Pepper's. Boomer and my dad were going to the NCAA baseball regional game between Wake Forest and West Virginia at 7PM, so we planned for a Em-handoff at the restaurant around 5:30PM. It was only appropriate that our little girl would join in on our girls' day. And we just so happened to match! The first of many mother-daughter twinnings! :)

 Perhaps it is not a coincidence that both Meg and I brought along 'how-to manuals' for the stages of life that we are in. It seems that we are both trying to understand more about our role as a mom. As we were by the pool on Saturday, we would read off at random a tidbit from our books. "The most important predictor for how well your child will thrive in someone else's care is you." or "For every one female that is incarcerated, there are eight males." or "The fact is, you've never been a working mom before. It's a totally new scenario. You may be a pro at your job, but you're an absolute beginner at being a working mom." and "We live in a culture that has forgotten many crucial aspects of the divine design at work in the body and soul of boyhood." There is so much to learn about being a parent! I've come to the conclusion that it is helpful to have the advice from the experts; it is also helpful to have a day at the spa! 

Here are just a few more pictures of Em from this week. Just like I love the weekends, Em loves shiny, reflective objects and her exersaucer! :)