Playing Hooky

 **Today was fun, which means an over-use of exclamation points!  Wheee!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!**

We played hooky today, the girls and I. Okay, I played hooky and the girls joined me after they did their schoolwork. They wouldn’t just walk away from it. It didn’t matter how bad of an influence I tried to be. Once the responsible children were done (they get that work ethic from their dad), we told the boys good-bye and skipped off to the American Girl store!

It’s not my favorite kind of outing, because it’s not my favorite stor Who am I kidding? I love the American Girl store! I especially love it with all of my daughters. The 8 year old had a gift card for a free doll hair-do which expires Saturday. We took advantage of one of my fave homeschool perks (we get to go places when other people are in school!) and went on a Thursday afternoon. It was deserted! The hair style lady was reading a book!  She wasn’t at all busy.  That never happens on the weekend!

As we wandered through the store, my eldest daughter’s face lit up. It didn’t matter that she was a cool 16 year old. These dolls were the beloved playmates of her childhood. She reminisced about her favorite stories and complained that the “best ones were retired.” She and the 8 year old, who don’t have a lot in common these days, oohed over the newest dolls and all the accessories available for them. They admired clothes and complained that curly doll hair is too hard to keep neat and tidy. They stopped with #7 to look at the littlest baby dolls and debate which one they preferred. It took all my self-control to not hug them right there in public!

As we headed towards the car, #1 told her sister that somewhere was her collection of doll clothes and #4 was welcome to them. It was only 2 years ago when she boxed up her dolls and declared them off limits because her little sister would “ruin them.” When I pulled into the driveway of our house, the girls were already trying to remember where that doll box had gone and what exactly was inside of it.

I sat down at my computer a few minutes ago and looked at my to-do list for the day. I haven’t accomplished a single thing on it. In fact, it’s going to take most of tomorrow to finish the things I didn’t get done today. I don’t care. It was well-worth the work of tomorrow. There are times when the to-do list is just oppressive and all I want is to get to stop for a while.  That’s exactly what we did this afternoon. We did nothing except enjoy each other. I think I’ll write it down just for the satisfaction of checking it off my list!!

**No boys were harmed in the writing of this post. They were off doing something else today.**