Dates and a Birthday

We did some dates with the kids as a Christmas present this year. They got to pick the restaurant and the activity. Annie loves The Hunger Games, and she had listened to A Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes which is the villain backstory/prequel to The Hunger Games series. And of course they came out with a movie, because money, so Annie wanted to go see it. 

In case you were wondering...it was horrifying. Annie said the book was super interesting, and it probably was, but reading about children killing each other and seeing children killing each other on a big screen really are two different things.

Also, there was a preview of a movie with a demented teddy bear that has been giving me nightmares for weeks. (I'm a wimp, but still.) 

Let's just say that taking Annie to this movie was not our finest parenting moment. Come on a date with Mom and Dad! There will be food, fun, and trauma!

We have had lots of conversations about the story since then, so there was that. (None of those conversations were with a licensed therapist, though, so there's probably still some work to do.)

Anyway...we ate crepes afterward, and they were super yummy. But we decided to allow our face to express our inner turmoil at what we had just seen.

We did succeed in creating a memory. And we love our girl, Annie. She is smart and fun and cool and sweet and mature and interesting.

Scotty picked pizza for his dinner. And he wanted to go bowling. But on a Saturday night, bowling alleys are apparently the place to be! We were going to have to wait an hour for a lane. So we decided to play ping pong at the church instead. So the night went like this: we got pizza and other Italian dishes at Gino's, where I forgot to take a picture, and then we played ping pong, and then we ate Andy's. It was a good time. Scotty is a good kiddo. We had to change the date of our date because I was sick, and he was chill about that and our other changes of plans during our actual date. And he was really energetic about retrieving the ball while we played ping pong. Made it easier for us old folks. 

I also had a birthday! My dream was to read all day and eat cookies instead of cake. I did read all day, and it was dreamy. Then we went to BJ's to get pizookies. And the strawberry shortcake flavor was yummy, but the other ones we got were a little bit gross--the brownie one tasted like cocoa powder. Last time we had these, they were amazing, so I'm not sure what went wrong. But it was still a great day to turn 37.

Thanks, Mom and Dad, for the amazing presents!

Isn't our dog cute?