Week Without Kids

Hooray! We're in February now!

Shad needed a mental break from kids to just calm down and let us try to figure out life. We've been very rocky and feeling unstable since the Air Force Reserves plan failed and then China was a roller coaster that also ended in a fail (just a recap: don't need a bachelor's degree to teach English, but you do need it to get a work visa). So I made plans with my mom, his mom, and his sister Ruth. Those three coordinated schedules and worked out the plan. We dropped them off Sunday afternoon at my mom's and then swung by to trade cars with Ruth so she and Coltyn would have a van to transport all the tiny humans. We played Unearth and then drove home to a quiet house.

Monday morning:

Do you know what it's like as a mother to wake up naturally? I don't, either. Monday morning was glorious!

Tuesday, Day 2 without kids, was fantastic. Shad took a mental health day and we had a long, lazy morning, a quiet breakfast, and a shower. Then we had a crepe lunch at Paris Crepes (oh, yeah, that meant we quit our Master Cleanse because do you know how amazing it is to eat without kids??!) before climbing the Incline...which took 3 hours. Guess that's what happens when you decide to climb after 1.5 months of not doing it; several weeks of low physical activity due to weird sickness; 5 days of a cleans fast; and eating crepes past the point of fullness. It was NOT my idea to order that dessert crepe. But it sure tasted good! But I survived! It was also colder than I expected because it was afternoon by the time we got there, so the whole trail was in shadow. Then we went to a witch shop to get herbs, followed by a little Mexican restaurant for a quick dinner where the lady laughed at me because I was so cold and couldn't stop shaking. And we had already booked the evening for Painting With a Twist so I couldn't go straight home into a warm bath. Painting With a Twist was fun and we really enjoyed it, even though I had Resting Bitch Face from being so cold and exhausted.

I did yoga with Scarlet and no child interrupted me to say they're hungry for breakfast.

We went to the zoo! I could totally go for a pet meerkat.

The sky ride was running! Shhh! Don't tell Samson!

I don't know why this picture is here, but back in November, I lost my ring when I took it off for lotion at volleyball. Not a huge deal since it was actually my third ring (first two were white gold and sterling silver, both of which have nickel that caused rashes for me; stainless steel for the win!) and was only $10 on Amazon. So I replaced it with this ring. THE ring. The one ring. One ring to rule them all, one ring to find them. One ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them. *and it glows in the dark! Sixteen dollas on Amazon is a win!

While the kids were gone out of the way, we worked like crazy on purging our house Marie Kondo-style. I read her book last year and have been wanting to purge for YEARS but really liked her methodology of keeping what you love and not focusing on numbers. In purging, we decided to rearrange the basement (made helpful at this point by reducing that Mormon food storage) and create a play space for the kids. We bought more foam mats from a listing on Facebook and they help with cushion and insulation from the cold cement floor. The kids love their new space!

(Shad quit going to church around the end of January. It's great to be on the same page!)