young and wild

Our Saturday was an eventful one. I mean it. The first event was a 3-year-old's birthday party. That certain 3 year old is my Niece, F, who is just as cute as can be. We arrived, toting the famed bouncy castle that our church owns, and walked into a wild and crazy preschooler party! Actually, there weren't all that many 3-year-olds there - only four (not including the birthday girl herself). However, with every preschooler came a younger sibling. In total, then, there were 10 chill'ens, along with most of their parents. It was a wild and fun time!!!

The toddlers got to go on a wee scavenger hunt, looking at pictures and following clues to the bouncy castle prize at the end. Plava, who had talked about the bouncy castle constantly for days leading up to the party and who begged and begged and begged me to set it up in our living room ("We can just move the couch and then we can play in the bouncy castle!!!") was too timid to venture into it, but had a lot of fun watching!! :)

After the party, I headed out with Pito to spend an afternoon with a good old friend - one of those friends who no matter how much time has passed or connection has been lost, is as easy to talk to as if there had been no absence. It was a really nice time, with the added bonus of Pito sleeping through most of it.

We then headed back to the family's house (where the party had previously taken place) for Easter dinner. A little late, but no less enjoyed!! It was marvelously delicious. Sesame chicken wings, "fat" noodles, and a deeeelicious vegetable and cashew stir fry.

My brothers in law and Ryan then decided it might be fun to be wild and crazy and go out to a pub for a drink. I nodded my approval (haha) and off they went as I went and put Plava to bed and my mom plunked Pito in the sling and walked her to sleep.

So then it was just us women. Me, my sisters Teresa and Anna, my good friend, and my mom with Pito in the sling all chattered away until 9:00 pm rolled around and Anna suddenly said, "WHAT TIME IS IT?? ACK, WE MISSED IT!!"

You see, there was an international lights out hour that night starting at 8:00pm. We completely missed it, but decided to do it an hour late instead. So off went the lights and we lit candles. It was lovely. SO lovely that Plava, who had never truly fallen asleep, just had to be a part of it all. She came out in her red sleeper and the evening rolled on.

The boys came back shortly after and one of them suggested we all head out to Little Mountain Studios to check out some bands that were playing and have some more wild times. Normally, at this point in the evening, it being quite late, Ryan and I would kindly bow out and head home with our two younglings. This particular evening, however, we were feeling a little CRAZY.

So, at 10:15pm, we packed up our 2-year-old and our 4-month-old daughters into the car, and headed down to Little Mountain Studios. It was snowing an awful lot, and rain mingled with the snow. A wet night, we might call it.

We got the kids out of the car and ran over to the door. We opened it and woah, did we ever feel like we were in the wrong place with kids. A mostly naked man had the mic and as he shouted out some spoken word he wandered through the crowd, soaking wet, rubbing up against people. Ryan and I looked at each other. Maybe we should take the kids home.

HAH. Wild and crazy, that's us. We went home and got the kids into bed.

Life has changed. We can still be wild and crazy if and when we feel like it, but it's not like it used to be. Mostly naked, soaking wet, rubbing around, shouting-out-of-spoken-word men just don't mix well with tired 4 month old babies and timid 2-year-olds, at least as far as I'm concerned.