Cheese + Penguins = Bad Mom?

On Saturday, Cory got tickets to the final K-State football game of the regular season in Manhattan. For some reason, he really enjoys going to these games, so he left us Lafferty Ladies to fend for ourselves. Yep, it was a Lively Lafferty Lady solo evening adventure.

The last couple days in KC have been absolutely beautiful, weather-wise. And, because as you all know, I very rarely cook, I decided to take the girls out of the house and to their favorite place to eat: Noodles. We are just sitting, minding our own business and enjoying dinner when a cute little old lady comes up to tell me how cute the girls are. I thank her, smile and continue eating.

Then, another woman comes up. "Your girls are so cute."
"Thanks," I said.
"Are you girls eating mac and cheese?" she asked, looking at Molly and Charlotte.
"Yes," I answered (the girls usually don't talk to people we don't know), "we love mac and cheese in our house."
"I'm a daycare provider, and my kids just don't like mac and cheese."
"Really?" I ask politely.
"Well, I think the problem is that I cook everything really healthy for them. I always make everything with really healthy whole grains and no additives, plus lots of vegetables and proteins. So, I just think they don't like the taste of something unhealthy like mac and cheese."

Um. Ok. As my children are gobbling down the cheese and butter ooey gooey goodness of Noodles mac and cheese. Talk about making this non-cooking mom feel like crap.

At that point, I kind of mumbled something like, "wow, huh, interesting," or something to that extent. And, then she finally walked away. I'm not sure if she was trying to say something about what my girls were eating, or if she was just making conversation, but either way, I was done. Thanks, lady.

Once we finished our delicious, but apparently completely unhealthy mac and cheese, I decided we needed to do something fun to make up for feeling like a bad mom. Plus, I wanted to take advantage of the 60 degree weather on December 1st. I had several ideas about what to do.

I have been really wanting to take the girls ice skating and thought it would be a great night to try it. But, I'd of course want to take pictures of the experience (I have a really cute scrapbook kit for skating!). And, I couldn't figure out a good way to help both Molly and Charlotte on their first times on skates and be able to take adorable pictures, too. I could just picture all three of us falling on our butts, and me dropping my really expensive, really nice new camera. I didn't see it ending well.

I also thought about driving around to look at Christmas lights, but that wasn't exactly taking advantage of the weather. We can ride in the car just as easily when it's 60 degrees as when it is 20 degrees.

Then, I came up with a plan: the Penguin House! For those of you not in the know, the Penguin House is actually "Paulie's Penguin House." It is a house completely decorated in inflatable penguins, polar bears, Santas and other polar animals. I mean, completely decorated. On the house, on the fence, in the yard, on the roof. Everywhere. You park your car and can actually walk through the yard to look at all the different inflatables. Plus, it's just a family that decorates their house. It's completely free, but they take donations for the Leukemia Society. It's just a really cute thing to do. Especially on a 60-degree night in December.

So, we headed over, and the girls were so excited. Cory had taken them last year on a day when I was sick, so I didn't go, but I know it wasn't as nice of weather as we were getting. I didn't even have coats on the girls, plus I was sweating in my sweater and vest. Crazy. Anyway, we got over and started exploring.

Charlotte is in LOVE with polar bears.

Posing with another polar bear.

Then, they found the snow. Ok, so it wasn't real snow. They have this bubble-soap-snow-machine that makes this snow-like bubble substance and sends it flying down through the air every couple minutes. It took everything I had to get Molly out of that after she discovered it.

Luckily, we were on our own for the evening, and it was beautiful out - I let them play pretty much as long as they wanted. I mean, I had already been called out for being a bad mom that night, I might as well just let my kids play to their hearts' content in weird bubble stuff at a strange house covered in inflatables, right?

I just can't stop laughing at Charlotte's face in this picture.

Posing with the snow in front of an igloo - with no coat!

Her shirt kind of says it all: "Snow much fun"

In front of just one of the many displays of penguins.

The kid was having a  ball.

"Mom, can I bring it home?"

In the snow storm!

It ended up being a great evening for us Lafferty Ladies, despite being abandoned for a football game and being called out for my kids' food choices. We ran into an old friend while we were playing in the snow at the penguin house, and then after it all, we came home and watched "Madagascar Christmas." Yep, nothing like rotting their brains with TV right after rotting their stomachs with mac and cheese.

Go ahead. You can nominate me now for Mother of the Year.

Lafferty Ladies