Love

Will was out of school on Friday, so I told him we would have a Day of Fun.  Although I’m extremely grateful for the time I have with Ben now that Will is in all day school, I have to admit that on more than one occasion, I have wished that he didn’t have to go to school so that a) (let’s be real) I didn’t have to set an alarm, and b) we could have a day to do all the things we used to do before he got big enough to go to school and roll his eyes and say things like “Mo-om!  Stop it.”

So, here we had a whole day to spend together, just Mom and Will and Ben.  I packed a bag of healthy food (with a bit of Halloween candy for good measure), loaded the sit-and-stand into the back of the car, and headed downtown.  Our first stop was the Children’s Museum of the Lowcountry, one of our favorite places in Charleston.  I’m pretty sure that when we move, I’m going to build a golf ball room because my boys can roll golf balls down ramps for hours.  Cheapest entertainment ever.

After scarfing down some lunch, we moved on to the aquarium.  We enjoyed getting to know Dante, an Eastern screech owl who has lived at the aquarium for two years after getting hit by and blinded by a car.  Ben accidentally opened the box holding the owl pellet (which rolled across the floor for the entire audience to see), and then he was mad when I put it back in the box and he couldn’t throw it around.  

Will and Dante

He insisted on wearing his hoodie inside.  Hmm.  I guess my boys do look alike.

At the Great Tank exhibit, Ben stood at the base of the two-story, 385,000 gallon tank pointing at fish and yelling, “Another one!  Another one!  Another one!”  (You can imagine how long we stood there before I finally convinced him to move on to the otters.)

These pictures NEVER get old.

A couple of years ago, we had a great fish tank disaster in our house, during which our 20-gallon tank started leaking in the middle of the night and flooded Ben’s room (along with the dining room below), so we have been anti-fish for awhile.  However, I got a wild hair the other day and asked Will if he would like to get some more fish.  I decided our Day of Fun was the perfect time to get some new pets, so we left the aquarium and headed to Walmart to pick up two male bettas (and all the accompanying betta accoutrements).  While there, being the cool mom I am, I thought we could pick up Toy Story 3 since it came out on DVD this week.  

On the way to pick up TS3, we hit the motherload--a 75% off costume sale.  Long story short, we now own pretty much every costume for boys ever invented.  I even let Will get the magician’s costume (which clearly goes against my Not Raising Dorks Policy) because it was $3.  We also somehow acquired two bags of Doritos and some Haribo gummies on the way because cool moms don’t say no on an official Day of Fun.  The plan was to drive home (while Ben took a nap on the way), drop off our loot, and head to the theater to get tickets for a 5:20 show of Megamind.  

I’ve said it a million times, and I’ll say it again.  I HATE Walmart.  I mean, I obviously love it for the ability to pick up live fish and Halloween costumes in one stop, but GOOD GOD IN HEAVEN, it took us 50--that’s 5-0--minutes to check out.  So much for a decent nap for Ben.  We would now have to skip the stop at home (hoping the fish would survive a short stay in the car) and drive directly to the theater if we wanted to make it to the movie on time.

Luckily, Charleston traffic was only slightly horrible, so we did make it on time.  Ben got about a 30-minute nap, which is better than nothing, and of course, life was infinitely better the moment everyone saw Daddy in the parking lot.  Day of Fun elevated to Day of Super Fun.

Exiting the theater, Will said, “Mom, Megamind was megarrific!”  I can’t think of a better way to describe it myself.  Really funny, and not just for kids at all.

To finish the day, we stopped at Logan’s Roadhouse for dinner because as Will’s Sunday school craft from last year explains, his favorite food is “steak and salmon.”  And although Scott and I are kind of snobby about restaurant chains, I will never turn down a chance to eat those yeast rolls.  Ben will eat anywhere that has French fries.  

While Scott changed Ben’s diaper, Will and I were seated, and Will whipped out the crayons and started playing Tic Tac Toe by himself (I offered, but he wanted to beat himself, he said).  While I studied the menu, Will exclaimed, “Mom, these are alliteration crayons!”  (This just proves that kids will remember EVERYTHING you tell them because I explained alliteration ONE TIME while we were reading some particularly alliterative library book about six months ago.)  I asked what he meant, and he said, “Look!  Rockin’ Red, Yee-haw Yellow, Blazin’ Blue, and Goin’ Green!”  Yes, Will, those are, in fact, alliteration crayons.

Before we got in the car to leave, Will was looking somber, and I asked him what was wrong.  He told me, “It’s dark, and I really wanted to go play on the computer at the library.”  I’m sorry, Will.  Days of Fun have to end.

When we got home, we brought in our loot and got the fish set up in their new home (one bowl with a divider so they don’t eat/fight each other).  Will wanted to name the fish “Wyatt” and “Billy,” so that they would have names that began with the same letters as Will and Ben (see, alliteration strikes again!), but I told him Ben got to pick his own name.  So, Will changed his fish’s name to Jacob (after one of his best friends) and said we could call him Jake for short.  When I asked Ben what he wanted to name his fish, he said (very seriously), “Fight.”  There you have it, my two kids.

That's Jacob on the left and Fight on the right (and Mommy's wine in the back).

So after trying on a few of the costumes and watching a little bit of Toy Story 3, everyone headed to bed (okay, okay, I totally fell asleep in Will’s bed while watching the movie).  We got up the next morning and enjoyed some (leftover) steak and eggs and got started on our Weekend of Fun.  So thankful for my life!