just a lovely autumn day

This week has been a little bit rough.

Keith has been away for five or six days in a row each week for the last few weeks. He and his dad are camping out as they work on some forestry contracts that are two or three hours away. I'm glad they have the work, and I'm glad he's not alone, but I miss him so much. I find it hard to be home alone all week when he is not here. The first two weeks weren't too bad, and I could tell that God was helping me, but I had a big meltdown yesterday and had to admit that this is pretty rough on me. But it was good to have a good cry, particularly because I have an incredibly compassionate and loving mother-in-law who is the third-best comforter I know (besides God and Keith, that is).

But that is just to preface that today was lovely. I took my two under two to the city for a La Leche League meeting and to meet up with a friend. It was such a lovely day that I decided to forego the grocery shopping and instead went downtown to use up a handy buy-one-get-one-free Pita Pit coupon and take my wee ones to the park.

I love going out to eat with Rilla. Once every month or so I will take her to a restaurant and we will have lunch together. She loves it too. We just sit together and eat and chat and smile at all the people who stop by to ask if my children are twins and whether I made their adorable hats. (I wish I had made the hats, by the way, because somehow just being accomplished enough to find them on Etsy just doesn't seem nearly as impressive as making them up out of my own brain. I did attempt to start crocheting a hat a few weeks ago, but as I've never used patterns and they are as foreign to me as reading music, it was an utter wreck and I've given up, at least for now.)

And so anyway, Pita Pit was near a lovely chocolate shop, and I just had to go in. I should mention here that Rilla hasn't been exposed much to sugary sweet things until now. A few forbidden donuts slipped to her at church by those indifferent to the requests of idealistic parents has been about the limit. But somehow today just seemed like a good day to open her little world to chocolate. So in we went, and our day was much enriched by the consumption of seafoam, pumpkin truffles, and huckleberry white chocolate. We thoroughly enjoyed our little date together.

I didn't find the camera in time to take pictures of those sweet moments, but I did find it once we reached the park, and so here are some memories fresh from the memory card.

See how happy Abraham was on the swing? It was his second time on one and he just grinned and grinned and grinned.