Surprises!

My little Emma likes to be included, involved, out in the world, doing something.  She is a mover.  She's my earliest riser and the first one to finish her Saturday jobs so that she's ready to GO whenever the opportunity comes along.  And for her, it always does.  This morning, she woke up at 8:00 so that we wouldn't forget to take her with us to the Scouting for Food activity.  She eagerly and happily paired up with her little Cub Scout brother and knocked on doors to "scout" for food for the Allen Outreach Food Pantry.  She was enthusiastic and competitive, and I'm sure she motivated all those other boys to RUN, not walk to the houses and collect as much food as possible.  After two hours, when I told her we needed to leave, she was reluctant.  They had already collected so much and she wanted to see her responsibility through to the end (and she also wanted to see if she and McKay had collected more cans than any of the other pairs.)  We left before all the groups returned, but they collected 535 cans that they took to the Food Pantry.  Huge success of a day for all those scouts!

Emma lamented all the way home about how waiting another 45 minutes wouldn't have ruined our plans for the rest of the day.  We were just running errands after all??  I put her off as long as I could, but she would not stop hounding me about the urgency of leaving that fun service project.  So I finally said, "OK, well, I can't tell you where we're going, but you should wear something cute."  And then she guessed.  Oh, that girl is so quick.  

Last weekend, I got tickets for the two of us to see The Little Mermaid in Dallas.  What awesome timing that they decided to go on tour just after the middle school's production of The Little Mermaid.  I knew Emma would be so excited to go and I wanted it to be a surprise, but I'm terrible at keeping secrets.  If I know it, then everyone else usually knows it, too.  

Emma and I had such a great day today.  We were both in awe of the amazing music and singers that we heard.  Isn't it shocking that you can be so intimately familiar with the soundtrack to a musical, but still be completely overwhelmed when you hear it live??  I was completely overwhelmed not just by the music, but by the set, and the orchestra, and the great seats that we had, and all the little girls dressed up with mermaid tails.  The whole experience was just great.  And on the way home, Emma said, "Mommy, you know what?  This was a great day when I only thought I was going to a Scout thing and then babysitting tonight!  But this surprise in the middle makes it the BEST DAY EVER!"  I love it when my kids say that.  I'm so grateful that we were able to spend the day together and that we have opportunities like this that are accessible.