Friday

I think it’s important to always look professional for work…

You never know who might drop in…

My 13-year-old had some friends over for a Halloween party later that evening…

Saturday

On Saturday morning my husband was acting really fishy. My daughter came down the stairs in her pjs and plopped herself next to me.

“Dad sent me down to keep you company.”

“Why?” I asked her with narrowed eyes, “Does he not want me to come upstairs?”

She grinned and shrugged her shoulders. Very suspicious.

He came down himself and started putting away the laundry that I had just folded and placed on the back of the couch.

Now I knew something was up. It takes at least a full day of nagging to get my family to take their laundry and put it away.

Next he started to take away the empty laundry basket.

“Hey! I need that!”

“I was going to put it away for you…”

<What?!>

“But I need it for the next load of laundry that’s in the dryer now.”

“OK,” he said reluctantly and put the laundry basket back down on the floor.

Fishy. Very fishy.

And then the doorbell rang.

And then these lovely friends came in bearing flowers, gifts, and scrumptious foods and drink:

Love these ladies!

It was a surprise housewarming brunch! My husband had managed to keep the secret for weeks, even when I announced that I’d be taking the kids to Arlington this weekend.

“You can’t leave that weekend!” he had blurted in a panic. “I have to check the calendar…I think I have something going on.”

I remember feeling a little miffed at the time. “You don’t have to come,” I said. “The kids are out of school on Monday and Tuesday and I’m taking those days off work. We have trick-or-treating on Saturday, and then we’ll leave Sunday morning.”

As soon as he heard that I was leaving after Saturday, he dropped it. Poor, poor, long-suffering man.

How awesome is that? If I had known about the housewarming, I’d have spent hours, maybe even days cleaning and stressing out. Fortunately, I had done some tidying up after the boys’ party the night before.

Later that day, we went back to our old neighborhood with our last trick-or-treater. For the second year in a row she dressed up with a friend. They were Calvin and Hobbes…

Sunday

We drove up to Arlington on Sunday morning.

The kids had fun checking out the new foot massager my sister got for my parents:

My sister (Sissy to me, Auntie Sissy to my kids) had come up with a surprise for the kids. As we rounded them up to take them to the undisclosed location, they kept venturing guesses as to where we were heading.

“Oh, I know where we’re going,” the fifteen year old said. “You’re taking us to a mountaintop to sacrifice us, right?”

“WHO SPILLED THE BEANS?!” I asked.

Well, since the surprise was ruined, we took them to a trampoline park instead. While they waited for their time slot, they practiced their driving skills.

This boy…

is about to get his learner’s permit. Be afraid. Be very afraid.

Actually, he was a genius driver compared to these two:

But that’s not saying much.

Trying to get over their disappointment at not being sacrificed on a mountaintop.