Lost and Found

What are we doing in the morning? OVER.
Go to bed. OVER
Yeah, okay, we will, but what are we doing tomorrow? OVER
We're all going to be together and play and have fun, it's going to be a really good day.  Now go to bed.  OVER.

The kids got Walkie Talkies for Christmas and four weeks later we, the parents, finally put batteries in them.  And now it's like Christmas all over again.  The kids are enjoying the hell out of their new means of communication.  And so is my husband Tim.  OVER.

This past weekend was very full.  Full of playing, communicating, escaping and reconnecting.  Full of getting lost and finding our way again.

Friday night I got all kinds of turned around in IKEA.  There we were on a quest to get organized without spending a lot of money and somehow we got separated from each other.  Tim had the three older kids with him somewhere in textiles.  Wade and I were together trying to find our way back to the rest of the family after losing our way in the warehouse.  

We were lost, of course I stopped and took a picture and put it on Instagram. Duh.

"I heard them," I excitedly told Wade as I pushed the cart around the corner confidently only to find a cute little family picking out dishes.  Not my cute little family.  

How could I be so convinced it was my child's voice?  I mean I was certain.  

It was like a giant Nordic, crisp, clean and supposedly easy-to-assemble maze.  Each turn led me to more affordable furniture and other strange families. My head was spinning. 

When I did finally see Tim and the kids, I dramatically ran to him, flung my arms around him and said "I'm so glad we found you!"

We have fun EVERYWHERE we go. 

Reunited and it felt so good.  We left with new curtains and closet organizers that sadly didn't fit into our closets.  But who cares we found each other. OVER.

Saturday night the kids spent the night at Tim's parents' house and we played the roles of real grown ups for almost 24 hours. 

Sometimes while being married and living life you can get a little lost.  You can get buried in all the scheduling and the whole divide and conquer strategies of parenting four children.  The exhaustion of it all makes even the most in love people simply get a little further apart, distant.

First on our grown up agenda was seeing a matinee of Les Miserables.  Even though I felt it was a little too long, it was good.  I left the theater crying and singing and talking and talking and talking.  "My God, the injustice! the poverty!" "Why did she have to die?" "Isn't it too much?"  "I want to start a revolution.  A revolution of faith and love."  

And of course, singing and singing and singing. "Where should we eeeeaaaaaatttt?" I sang.  "I loooooove yoooooouuuuu!" I kept singing.  Not obnoxious at all.  Not. at. all.

Tim, not only put up with me, he seemed amused and interested.  He seemed relaxed and in love.  And I felt heard and seen, relaxed and in love.

We went out to dinner and talked about grown up stuff and I drank and we watched hockey.  Then we headed to the next movie, Silver Linings Playbook.  Even though I was a little drunk, I think it was good.  I left the theater laughing and talking. And holding my husband's hand.

I don't have to look hard for my silver lining.  I'm married to a good man, a wonderful man.  A man who will/would/does defend my honor, supports my need to sing about making dinner reservations, gets a kick out of and respects my real, honest desire to get in on a revolution of faith and love. 

Vive le France.
Vive le silver linings.
Vive le IKEA reunions.
Vive le grandparents that watch four children overnight.
Vive le getting lost and getting found.
OVER.

Here's a kick ass video of a wedding Les Miserables flash mob.