4 days of Family and Friends!

My job observes federal holidays and I am off on Fridays so I got a 4 day weekend! I have to pay for the kids daycare whether they go or not on Fridays so we always just get up and go like we do all week on Fridays. So, that gave me the opportunity to go to Arkadelphia with Nathan to drop off his motor to have some work done - and I got to go to Shorty Smalls for lunch (a favorite of mine) and spend some quality time driving with Nathan.

Saturday I got to surprise one of my best friends for her birthday! Her husband called and asked me to surprise her at a restaurant and then go out for a Girls Day. Her face when she saw me sitting at the table was priceless - I have never had my name screamed at a restaurant but I have now :) We shopped and shopped and shopped! Since it was a holiday weekend we found some great deals! Lots of girl talk - we saved a lot of time not having to text all our conversations out! We ended the day with dinner at one of our favorites Pasta Grill back in Clarksville. My husband was awesome to watch the kids (or "have them on lock down" as he put it) so I could go out with my friend. I rarely ever go out without him so it was nice for him to take care of things for me to be able to go.

Sunday after church we spent lots of time in the yard playing. We were having some unusually warm weather for January. Noah informed me that it was "great weather for being a man" and that he was going to be "doing man work so you may want to stand back". He kills me! I took all the Christmas lights down off the house - I was waiting for a warm day, I knew we would have one soon, it is Arkansas after all. Then we all went to the movies to see Paddington - it was very cute! Listening to Noah belly laugh and slap his forehead is awesome. He really gets into movies and Ryan wants to do whatever Noah does so she was laughing at all the same stuff just as loud.

Monday was our bonus day at home thanks to Martin Luther King Day! We stayed home all day playing outside - Noah helped Daddy fix up the yard with the dozer and burn leaves and Ryan helped me detail my car. We went through all of last years summer clothes - they both tried on a big stack of clothes for me - that takes bribing :) But, we got it all done so now I just have to sort it to sell so we can buy them new clothes next summer. It is more difficult to do this with Noah being older - every shirt was his "most favorite shirt ever" and he was not happy when I would throw them in the sell pile. I promised him some new dinosaur shirts so that made him happy. Plus he decided to give Ryan some of his old clothes - she was so excited with her new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle shirt and Spiderman house shoes :)

These two were on hug overload! I kept catching them hugging while they were playing :)

4 days off with my most favorite people was exactly what I needed and didn't even know it. I needed to sit in the truck with my husband and talk about important things and non-important things, I needed to play outside with my kids, I needed to stay up late watching movies with my husband (I recommend "This is Where I Leave You" {LOVE Jason Bateman} but I do not recommend "Gone Girl" - I hated the ending, crazy just has to live with crazy?!), I needed to see my kids holding hands while "discovering" the yard, I needed a day of shopping and girl talk with my BFF :) , I needed to give my house and car some extra attention without missing out on time with my family.