All in a days work

It's days like this that I love being a stay at home mom. The kids and I slept in as long as we wanted (which is never as long as I'd like), we stayed in our jammies until it was time to get our outside clothes on, and then we spent the rest of the morning playing in the snow with friends. I try not to take for granted the privilege of spending all my days with my kids. This will be the first summer since Sam was born almost 3 1/2 years ago that I will be a full time stay at home mom during the summer months. I don't count the photography work I have planned for a number of weekends or the photo shoots I'll do. Those types of things I can schedule around MY schedule rather than the other way around. Speaking of photography....I got a call from a man today who was looking for a photographer who could take the portraits for a birthday gift for his wife. Since my blog is G rated I can't tell you what he was looking for and because my life is G rated, I couldn't accommodate his wishes. Once my brain stopped reeling from that awkward phone call that went downhill quickly after I asked how many kids he had and he explained that he didn't have kids, I got Sam and Julia out of the house so Brian could sleep after an early morning of plowing. We spent some quality time at an indoor playground. The sweetest boys took Sammy under their wing and played with him for almost an hour. They lifted him up the steps that were too high for him over and over and over again. I made a point to seek out the brothers' dad to tell him how kind his children were. As we were driving home a couple hours after our indoor adventure began, I remembered that it was the night of the Perkins Restaurant drawing for a huge Easter basket filled with goodies. I contemplated dropping Julia off at home so I didn't have to negotiate a restaurant meal with two kids all by myself, but then I remembered that you had to be present to claim a prize in the drawing. (Both kids entered the contest by turning in a coloring sheet a few weeks ago.) Sure enough it was Julia's name they called. Good thing she was sitting in the high chair gobbling up a banana nut muffin oblivious to the hubbub around her. Sam kept asking when they were going to call his name, but I just assured him that there was enough candy for all of us in the blue basket Julia had picked as her runner-up prize. He was satisfied with that answer and pretty much forgot about the whole thing as soon as he had his chocolate chip cookie in his hand. He was too busy talking about how he was going to share it with Daddy as soon as we got home. I was too busy thinking about crawling into bed and sleeping after all that work fun today.