Baby free weekend

It's about time we had a weekend without Ada around. We waited 51 weeks to do this. She's been nursing and I didn't have enough milk to send with her for more than a day. The opportunity came up for us to ship her to Sycamore for the weekend and we jumped on it. This isn't the first time I've been away from her for 48 hours though as I ventured to Minneapolis earlier this year for an extended weekend. Rick's gone a few days without seeing her at some point, too.

So we did it.

I drove Ada out to Huntley so we could make the exchange -- really so I could spend way too much money at the Banana Republic outlet since the whole store was 40% off--and Rick's parents met Ada and I there around noon. We had lunch and poof, the adventure began.

Rick and I had set a few goals for things we wanted to get accomplished over the weekend. I wanted to go on a date and get to ride in the front passenger seat of the car --I normally sit in back with Ada-- Rick had a holiday party for a co-worker, I was hopeful that I'd be able to run errands and get a manicure/pedicure with Aunt Anne, of course I needed to set aside time to wrap presents, and if I was lucky, I'd get to my list of things to mend as it continues to grow. We also decided this was our chance to build shelves for our basement storage unit so that all of Ada's baby stuff would fit. Yep. We were ambitious.

So what did we accomplish? No much. We went to a quick dinner and a movie-4 Christmases was cute and funny. We were home by 9:30. You know us-- wild and crazy! Then we slept in-- Until 8:30 or was it 9 am? Hmmm... I made pancakes and Rick measured and drafted what we'd need for the storage units. At noon he was ready to go to Home Depot... but we can't fit all that stuff in our civic. Hmmm... Aunt Anne? Can we borrow your CRV? (Ha ha ha...) So we drive up almost to Evanston to trade cars with Anne. We get to Home Depot at 2, get the wood, get out to the CRV and the Home Depot guy measures the car. Nope. You need to rent the truck. So I go in to rent the truck and thankfully I had my insurance guy's number - James Taylor with Farmers Insurance --He rocks!- in my cell phone because I didn't have an insurance card with me and Rick had the one from 2007 and our previous Insurance agent. Jim happened to be at work and faxed the card over. We got the truck, Rick and the guy loaded it while I did paperwork. Tick tock. Tick tock. It's 3:45 when we get to the house to unload. Rick called our neighbor Lee -- who also rocks -- to help us unload the truck, in the rain since it started raining as soon as we got the wood outside, of course. And it's icy out. We can't get the truck into the back lot due to the ice so it is hanging halfway into the alley and ticking off our neighbors. Sorry about that. Half hour of unloading wood in our golashes - Rick in wet tennis shoes - we get it all into the basement. We return the truck, return Anne's CRV, and return home at 4:45 to order a burrito (since we skipped lunch), park the car, and sit on the couch to watch Jurassic Park as we digest - oh yeah, perfect movie to aid digestion.

Now it's 6:30. Rick still needs to make a dessert or appetizer for the party so he walks to the store as I finish the movie -- and all of the scary parts ALONE mind you. We make a batch of puppy chow -- corn chex with chocolate, peanut butter and butter melted and covered with powdered sugar -- got showers, got dressed and cabbed to the party so we didn't have to have a designated driver.

The party was nice. Got to meet fun people and drink fancy martinis. At 11:30 we both started yawning and were home, in bed by midnight. Sad. I know. We just don't have it in us anymore.

Sunday morning we got up at 9, ate cereal, wrapped presents, cleaned the house and left to meet Ada and my family for lunch in Wheaton at 12. We started off going the wrong direction (90 instead of 88 --oops--old habits die hard), but made it and had a wonderful afternoon.

So what did we get done, not much. I still have errands to run. We have a pile of wood in the basement that needs a full day of two people hacking at it to make anything resembling shelves, and my mending pile is still collecting dust. But I did organize my knitting stuff. We'll get to that other stuff on the list... eventually. Until then, we have the memory of a nice weekend with just the two of us.

And now I just keep saying "What did they do to her? She looks like a toddler now. Where's my little baby?" I know it didn't happen overnight, but it sure seems like it did.

Moral of the story: It's good to be kid free every once in awhile. It helps you reset, take a break, and realize just how much you love the little munchkins that bring so much drama to your life.