Impromptu

That's my word of the day.

When I awoke this morning to a naked Charlie (don't ask...), a still sleeping Kate (at noon) and a poopy Ella, the last thing I thought I would be doing tonight is taking a ferry boat across a marina.

We had a lazy, impromptu kind of day.

The kind where the kids lounge around in their PJs until 2 pm reading books

and playing with their babies and Bionicles.

The kind where we load everyone up and drive to my brother's house

for a quick afternoon dip in the pool just because we can...

and Kate gathers up enough courage to go in the pool all by

herself with her arm floaties for the first time.

and Ella hides behind the bushes for a little game of peek-a-boo...

The kind where Kate thinks she's one of the guys

all ridin' her scooter around the backyard with them...

until I go out there to check on them and find her like this -

all glammed up, ballet flats, boa crown and all.

God, I love her.

The kind where we declare it a girls night out and leave Eric and the boys to do boy things.

We drive out to Newport Beach and walk along the marina with the little girls in tow

and on a whim, hop the ferry to Balboa Island where we ride carousels and 

have ice cream and frozen cheesecake pops dipped in

chocolate and all other kinds of sugary goodness.

Miss Ella was enjoying that carousel ride so much she

was very cross with us when we took her off the pony.

Yes, it was definitely a lazy, light-hearted, spontaneous and much needed kind of day.

The only thing missing was cake.