Monday confessional - playing hooky

Yesterday morning at around 8:30 am, Russ realized what a gorgeous day it was going to be and suggested we play hooky from church so he could cut and mow the trail down to the river on the back of our property and take the kids down to play. 

I said something along the lines of "yeah right, get out of bed and ready for church, Mister" and continued getting myself ready... but the idea of a fun family day sprouted in my mind and before long it had grown wildly. I came back into the bedroom and suggested we surprise the kids with a trip to the beach for the day - since we only go once a year, and never just on our own. 

Sadly Russell poo-pooed my idea soundly, even though I tried to sell him on it for a good 5 minutes; he had no intesrest in driving 3 hours round-trip on the last day of his weekend, but said he wouldn't be opposed to spending the money it would have taken in gas to get to the coast to take the kids to a movie, as long as he could still have his afternoon to work on his trail. 

Which is how we ended up skipping church and driving to the mall at 10:20 am instead. 

I choose not to dwell on the message we might have sent our kids yesterday (we really do love church!), but rather the memory of the initial confusion on their faces when we went the wrong direction (Blake noticed first!), and then their growing excitement when we wouldn't tell them where we were going. When they finally guessed a movie (after Disneyland, buying a new trampoline, and buying a puppy) we told them we were going to see "Rio" and they were ecstatic. And rightly so... it was a fantastic movie!

Blake, under the assumption that one must ALWAYS consume popcorn at the theaters, asked for some about 30 times.

We said no to the popcorn, but yes to Mommy's white chocolate mocha. Mmmm :)

My little movie buddy and I. We laughed so much together.

Afterwards we ate lunch at the mall food court and then stopped at Yogurt Shack for a dessert treat on the way home, throwing caution to the wind after such a foot-loose and fancy-free start to the day.

Then Russ had his afternoon to clear the river trail and we spent the last couple of hours of sunlight exploring the woods and hiking around along the river banks. 

It was a perfect day. We had such a great time with our kids and they were so full of love and gratitude for the time together all day that we really felt it was worth it. More and more we are seeing the value in investing A LOT of family time together and yesterday was just another reminder of that. 

Which helped make up for the sadness I felt when I realized we'd missed Palm Sunday at church. Darn!

Just in case you're wondering why we did all the spending when we're still on BUDGET LOCKDOWN... it's thanks to a little thing called my husband's side-business. Him and his buddy refurbish and resell these:

And in the last four days they sold 6! Hello fine weather - we love you and the motivation you give folks to buy play sets for their kids!

And that's how we played hooky. 

p.s. Wondering about the Friday night sales pitch we were going to and whether I held strong or not? Come back tomorrow for the story, it was QUITE the event.