The weekend, I have to say, was downright lovely. After a rather serious talk about life, etc. with Mr. Darcy Friday night I eventually had folded the laundry, put it away and got some shut eye. Saturday morning I woke to run the longest I have ever run in my life... 8 entire miles without stopping. It took me 1:49.56 to complete, but in defense of my slowness I purposely ran slowly to ensure that my back could handle it so I could, in fact, complete all 8 miles and not be completely stiff for the rest of the day. I hope to get faster as my back gets better. From Friday's chiro appointment, I learned that the reason I sometimes have felt like my upper body is angled like this slash / is because my sacrum/hip has for some reason rotated that way and all these adjustments are not only to help with my lower back situation at large but to un-rotate me. Perhaps this is why I was having such pains in my legs when running... the aha moment arrives.
I was completely thrilled with my run even if averaging over 13 minutes a mile. I really didn't care (although now I am wanting to be faster... always the little perfectionist despite not being a natural runner... or even liking to run until about 2 months ago when I decided it was acceptable and sometimes even relaxing although I haven't hit the "fun" part yet). The 2nd 4 miles actually seemed easier than the 1st 4 miles and I got to a point where I wanted to run faster but when I would I'd hit zone 3 on the HR monitor and try to reign myself back in to protect my back, etc. I did have a little bit of leg pain while running, but it wasn't terrible and easily enough ignorable. So I was pleased as punch.
And, I had gotten up at 5:30 am (starting while the sun was down and watched it rise on the run is pretty enjoyable actually) so we had plenty of time to shower, get the girls ready, talk to my parents on the phone and then go to the Winter Park Farmer's Market. It was smaller than I thought it would be, but perfectly enjoyable. I got some good pictures, including one of Ladybug with a yellow pepper that makes me smile (and that I forgot to email to myself to share). But let me tell you... it was hot. Hotter than hot. Hotter than Hades. It was in the 90s that MORNING and only got hotter. When Angelfish, Ladybug, Mr. Darcy and I get very hot, we get ornery. We eventually bought the girls some Italian ice to cool them off and headed to get some lunch. Indoors. Poor Amanda's cheeks were almost as red as her hair. I sometimes forget that she is so fair with her redhair and thus gets hotter a bit faster. It was amusing to hear the guy selling us the Italian Ice tell us that Angelfish was feisty. We blame it on her red hair, but I think it's just her personality.
After lunch we decided to head home. But the girls fell asleep in the car, so we ended up going to Publix. Mr. Darcy napped in the car with the girls (and the air condition blasting) while I went in to order the birthday cakes and the nugget platter for the girls' birthday party coming up this Saturday. I about fell over when I looked at the cake prices... If I had gone with my original plan of 2 separate 1/4 sheet cakes with the princess toys on it that the girls have been asking for for an entire month it would have been $60 for cake. Let's just say that I am not willing to spend $60 on cake for a birthday for two 3 year olds. Sheryl, the woman working at the bakery, was awesome. I still spent $40 on cake, but it was at least a lot more acceptable to me than $60. I want Angelfish and Ladybug to have some individuality with their birthday so I wanted a separate cake that was for each of them (but to be shared with partygoers of course). They have these cute little 5" cakes that feed 4 adults and probably about 8 toddlers.
The little ladies have been clamoring for a Sleeping Beauty cake for Angelfish and a Cinderella cake for Ladybug ever since attending their cousin's birthday party who had a doll baked into the cake so the cake was essentially the doll's skirt. I have a feeling that they think this is what they asked for, but unfortunately it is decidedly not what they are getting. Instead they're getting the cute little 5" cakes - one with pink roses and draping (like princess Aurora's dress) and one with light blue roses and draping (like Cinderella's dress) that will have a $4 plastic doll of each princess that I will either place on top or next to the cake. Then a 1/4 sheet cake that says "Happy Birthday Angelfish and Ladybug" with pink roses and light blue draping. Enough cake for all the attendees, $20 less and the best that Mommy can do in the situation. Call me cheap, call me whatever, but I am not a Mommy who believes that birthdays for children should be more than a celebration of your life and realizes that the purpose of cake was originally to remind us of the sweetness of life NOT to impress our friends. Plus my savings pretty much paid for the nugget platter which I ordered, despite Mr. Darcy's suggestion that we merely purchase bags of nuggets and cook them all ourselves the morning of the party. I think getting everyone organized, dressed, picking up the cakes, setting up the party at the park, and getting the party going (with the Birthday Girls in attendance) on time is going to be hard enough! The Mommy Veto Power was exercised on that one!
It's hard to believe that my little ones are going to be 3. For Father's Day we got Mr. Darcy a gallery picture frames set because he had mentioned he'd like to have more pictures of the girls and family up in the house instead of just artwork. It's a beautiful set really, and he loved it (yay). So last night, we looked through all of the myriad of digital photos that we've taken over the past year and it is amazing how much our girls have grown up in such a short time. They went from baby faces to almost little girl faces. They've grown so much taller and bigger.
I can remember when they were first born and were only 5 pounds 10 ounces and 6 pounds 8 ounces and were these tiny pink things that were so sweet and helpless. Now they can climb furniture and cabinetry to get bandaids, cups, and anything else that you've told them they cannot have but want; they help me make pancakes and eggs for their Daddy for Father's Day and draw pictures, identify letters and know the first letter of their names. (Angelfish calls the first letter of her name "MY letter.") They want to know what words say and sit with books making up stories to the pictures. They have moods and thoughts and tell you that people aren't very nice when their behaviour isn't correct. (In fact last weekend we were in the grocery and the girls were sitting in the cart chatting and these high school age girls walked by. One of them said to the other "Shut up!" And Angelfish said, "We don't say that!" To which Ladybug answered, "We say please be quiet." Mr. Darcy and I were rolling in the aisle - almost literally - with laughter, and of course told them they were absolutely right.) They have wonderful sense of humor and are curious about all things, and walk around smelling flowers with abandon or stop to look at an earthworm or bug (unless it's ants where they say "ants. Don't bite us!" and back up - Ladybug stepped in an ant hill several months ago and had 20 bites around her ankle. We discovered she is NOT allergic to ants, thank goodness.)
They are not little babies anymore. They are my sweet, intelligent girls though, even with their rants and tantrums that come with being 3 and frustrated about not being in charge. I hope I am a good enough Mommy to them, for I want them to be happy and healthy all their days.
They are super excited about their birthday party. I don't know what they expect, but they've been to a few birthday parties for their school friends and their cousin so they know that birthday parties are fun and involve presents. I think they'll have a good time. We're having it at a park with a playground and a water fountain that is meant for playing in, which they love. So hopefully all will go well and it will not be too hot. They're also very excited about Nanna and Poppop and Grammie and Papa coming to the party and staying with us too. Mommy's pretty excited about it as well. Nanna's job messed up and gave her Thursday through Monday off so this will be a nice long visit instead of a 1 1/2 day jaunt. YAY!
Anyway, back to Saturday. We also got the girls' passport applications filed and the girls requested yellow passports instead of the standard issue blue, which made us all laugh. I loved it when the passport person asked Ladybug if she had blue eyes. Ladybug said "yes" and kept playing with the pen and paper she had. The woman asked her to look at her and Ladybug looked up and gave her the most beautiful smile, and the woman told us she had the most beautiful blue eyes and smile she had seen in a long time. Then it was Angelfish's turn and she asked Angelfish if she had blue eyes too. Angelfish looked at her, gave her a big smile and said "yes, like Mommy and sister but not Daddy!" (As you might have guessed, Mr. Darcy does not have blue eyes.) We all had a good chuckle and the woman said how beautiful Angelfish was too.
Then Chuckie Cheese with Auntie L, Mr. S. and their little one. It was fun but chaos. We'll do something like play at the pool next time. We had a great time but we were chasing small people all over the place and didn't get to socialize as much as we would have liked. But a good time was had by all.
After that Mommy and Mr. Darcy had a date night. The babysitter arrived just as we were serving the girls one of their favorite dinners - fish sticks, green beans and applesauce. As usual, the green beans were left on their plates, but the rest was eaten. One of these days they'll eat their veggies! We went to Outback Steakhouse, where we haven't been in forever and a day. It was nice and relaxing and happy hour. But, we've realized that we're old because when the waiter brought the 2nd drink we said "we didn't order that" and he said "it's 2 for 1 happy hour" like we were mad, crazy people. Our first thought was well, if it's free then OK. Our 2nd thought was we had no clue it was happy hour. Old. Oh well, I guess it was going to happen sometime.
Then we went to see "The Proposal." Primarily because there was nothing else to do and no other movies really grabbed either of us. So I just said, let's see that. We both really enjoyed it. Very funny movie - in fact in one part, I can't remember the last time I laughed that hard at a movie. I had tears in my eyes I was laughing so hard. Quite the nice surprise.
Father's Day was fun too. I woke up with the girls (who miraculously slept until about 8 am) and we made Daddy pancakes and eggs while he slept in. Angelfish and Ladybug got Daddy "Kung Fu Panda" so we watched that and then the girls took a nap and so did we! Then we lazed around and Daddy watched a little bit of golf on TV and then let the girls watch "The Backyardigans" and "Little Einstein." Then we went for pizza and to the pool for a bit. A nice time was had by all!
This morning, it was hard to get up though. Monday reared it's head again with Mr. Darcy on a day trip for a project and Ladybug grumpy as ever (probably has something to do with her staying up until 11 pm claiming she couldn't sleep). But all were calmed, loved on, fed and dressed. Eventually. I got a late start for my 2000 m swim, but it all worked out. It was a ladder today, which was kind of fun. A 100 warm up and then a 50 sprint, a 100 moderate, then 200 and 300 both moderate, an easy 400 (which I think I swam more moderate than easy out of habit - I started easy but ended up fast), another 300 then a 200 moderate, a 100 sprint and a 50 sprint. Then a 200 cool down. I had a lot of fun with it! Even if I was worried about the guy in the next lane whose swimming was more like a concerted effort at not drowning (and kept his head above the water the entire time) and then an elderly lady decided that she would get in my lane and walk the pool while holding on to the edge but got in right in front of me as I was swimming somewhat quickly. Luckily, I found my googles and could see properly today and I was able to avoid a collision.
Nack to the grindstone today... but I'm having dinner with a wonderful friend who is in town for work. So I can't wait!
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