My Amazing Valentines Day and (totally different subject) Making My Father-In-Law Proud

Well, I don't know how your Valentine's Day was, but mine was great. Jeff was so sweet and nice and had a great evening planned for us. It all started the night before when he let me in on what was going to be happening and I was so excited. Now, you probably won't think it was all that amazing, but for me it was. He wanted to bad to make me happy and do everything right that he told me that he wanted to make me breakfast in the morning and then asked for the most detailed explanation of how to do it so I would be perfect. So in great detail I told him how to make me one of my most favorite breakfasts of late - waffles with butter, strawberries, blackberries, raspberries and syrup... mmmmm, makes me want some just thinking about it. The sad thing was when the next morning came, all I wanted was a bowl of cereal. But he gladly made it for me (only slightly easier than my previous request so he wasn't exactly sad that I had changed my mind). Then he left a little early for work and came back a few minutes later with a beautiful bouquet of flowers (he was so smart not to buy me roses knowing that I know how stinking much they cost at Valentine's time) and a heart shaped box of Turtle's chocolates. Man those things are addicting. Anyways, later that night, our wonderful friends Chris and Penny (they celebrated Valentine's Day the day before because they had the day off on Monday) came over to watch Sydney and Jeff and I left for dinner. Now, we didn't go anywhere fancy at all, actually one of the least fancy places that's not fast food, RJ Gators. We were going to go to a Sports Bar and Grill called Duffy's that's right across the street from our little community thing, expecting that no one would want to go there for Valentine's Day with all the sports stuff blaring in the background, but it was packed and we would have had to wait for 40 minutes to get a table. That wasn't going to happen so we went a block farther down the road and found out that there was no one at RJ Gators. Initially it worried us some because no one was there, only like 5 tables were filled and it's a decent sized restaurant, but the thought of not having to wait was great. So we got a table in the back by ourselves and had the most wonderful food and time talking. It was really weird at first because I didn't know what to do without having to entertain Sydney like usual when we go out for dinner. I actually got to talk, wow, that was such a strange concept. I had the most amazing Shrimp Pasta and am totally ready to go back and have more already so that kinda stifled the talking on my end, but Jeff had no problem talking and sharing and it was so great getting to hear everything that's happening with him and his job and just his thoughts. Something that doesn't happen to much with a noisy, active one-year-old at the table. Following dinner we went to the Garden's Mall and walked around talking and then had coffee and sat and talked some more. Like I said, nothing really fancy, but just the fact that we got to spend some one on one time together was great. It was so needed. So a huge thanks to Chris and Penny for staying with Sydney for us. We really are going to have to get over the awkwardness of asking people to watch Sydney (those who don't require being paid) and go on more "dates". I guess this is one of the hardest things about not having family around. People are always telling me that whenever we want we can just ask and they'll watch Sydney so we can go out, but I still have a hard time actually asking for a specific occasion. With family it's so much easier, Grandmas and Grandpas are always dying to watch little terrors aren't they? Although, it seems that every time I have had someone watch Sydney the are amazed at how great she does and how well she just plays by herself. I'm totally confused and think that they mistakenly switched my kid with some other kid because with me around Sydney never plays by herself, she always needs me right there with her, but well, not for other people - lucky them. Anyways, I guess I'm just going to have to learn to get over the fact that I'm not really burdening anyone with Sydney when I ask them to watch her and just take their offers up because I forgot how nice it was to just spend time with Jeff and only Jeff and not have to worry about what Sydney is destroying or putting in her mouth now.

On to a totally different subject... I must have made my Father-In-Law proud yesterday. At least I feel like it's something that would have made him proud, so here it is. Actually, first I should explain that he's a Traffic Engineer (I'm not sure if that's the official title or anything, but he works for the city designing roads and stuff like that) and seems to love his job and marveled at the inadequacies of our traffic system while he was down here a few weeks ago. So now on to my story.... Yesterday on my way in to Target, I was stopped by this nice lady who was a reporter for some small local newspaper that I don't think I've ever heard of. Anyways, I'm too nice to lie and say that "no I don't really have time to talk to you" or something similar (if you work for a newspaper or something and are looking for an interview, please don't ask me, I hate doing them but I'm too nice to say no and then I'll just hate you for a long time instead, oops, that sounds a little mean, so, I'll just really dislike you for a while) so I talked to her. She does an article every month or something like that on people's opinions on some subject and this times subject was something to the effect of "if you could change one thing about the city that you live in, what would it be". At first I didn't really know what to say, but then I remembered walking to Dunkin' Donuts with my Father-In-Law and how we had such a hard time getting there (it's only about 5 blocks away, across one main street) because of the new traffic and pedestrian crosswalks or lack there of. So I complained about that. They are doing a bunch of construction right at the intersection of Northlake and Keating (about a block from where we live and the main road in and out of our little development) and there used to be a crosswalk with crossing Signal there that I would use to walk to the grocery store and pick up a couple items with Sydney. It would take me about, well, 10 minutes to walk there, and half that time was walking through the parking lot. But then they started working on the street and now there's now crossing signal. There's still plenty of time to cross, but I'm not going to do it just in case the one time that I do try and cross something changes or something, I guess it's a level of security or something. Anyways, now if I want to cross the main road, I have to walk and extra five blocks or so up the street to an even busier intersection where there is a crossing signal. That extra walk adds an extra 20 minutes or more to my walk and makes walking seem really stupid. So I complained about that. I also complained that once you do cross the road, there's no access into the shopping center except by the same entrance that the cars take, ie the road. Shouldn't there be even a small sidewalk or something that makes it so you don't have to dodge traffic just to get into the shopping area? Sure, you could walk across the grass, drudge through the gardens and little shrubs and stuff, but have you ever tried to squeeze a stroller through a foot wide gap between to pokie shrubs? Let's just say dodging traffic sounds a little nicer and even more plausible. So that's what I complained about. After all my complaining, the lady wanted to take my picture. Now if you happen to be one of the few people who actually find this unheard of paper and read the article and see my picture, please note that I was just quickly stopping by Target to pick up a few things and then was on my way back home to continue with the cleaning and stuff so I looked horrible. Ya, it probably is what I look like on a daily basis while I'm sitting at home with Sydney, but I don't often like going out looking like that, so please, just blind yourself to the picture.

So that was my exciting Valentine's Day. I better head off now, Sydney will be waking up from her nap any minute now and I really had wanted to get a few more things done while she was sleeping, so have a great day!