One of Those Days

Warning... major complaining ahead...

It was an "off" day in the Soto household today. Now I know that's common, but usually it's one person at a time that has the "off" day. For us? Nope. You name it, it went wrong here for Jonathan and myself. From sweet tea & hot sauce getting spilled on our light tan carpet, to the newly mopped floors getting spilled with stuff, to Ellison putting up a fuss at lunch time, to burning the dinner in the oven, it was just an uphill battle ALL day. The Carly Simon song, "It's the Stuff that Dreams are Made of" kept coming to mind. These aforementioned woes are just a few things. I mention all of this, because it sets the scene for what was supposed to be a lovely fall outing for the Sotos...

We've been looking so forward to fall and taking Ellison to the pumpkin patch for the first time to get those cute little fall snapshots and such, while sipping cider and eating fresh doughnuts. I'm not sure why we thought we'd find such a place when we're still wearing summer attire here. I don't know, I guess we were thinking we'd just stage the photos by slipping on a sweater and cute stocking cap for the photo op. No one would notice the beads of sweat falling from our foreheads, would they? We had been looking on the internet for such staple fall places, but thought it strange that we couldn't come up with any in the area. So we asked a couple of neighbors, and were told a place to go that was good. So the Sotos got strapped into the car, and away we went. The intersection we were told didn't seem to be an exact location, so we had to search, which meant going down the street a little ways in EACH direction of the intersection (and turning around a few times), because of course we wouldn't pick the correct direction on the first try. Meanwhile, our sweet little Ellison has managed to spill a pond-size amount of water on her pants. At last, we found the spot. A church parking lot... that just had a bunch of pumpkins for sale. So we decide to try to look for another place that someone else had told me about, which was, ironically, also a church. So we drive all around looking for this place without success. It appears that the "pumpkin patches" here are all fundraisers for churches. So then we decided that it was such a beautiful day, and there were SO MANY things we were putting off doing at home due to our quest for a "quick" fall outing, that we at least could take Ellison to a playground or something. So off we drive all the way back home toward a school near our house. We get in the parking lot, and Jonathan decides we need to try a different school because this playground sucks for Ellison. So off the Griswolds drive in search of the "perfect" playground. We get to another school, and we collectively decide the other one was better. Well, Ellison didn't really care - she was busy soaking her shirt now, too. So BACK we go to the #1 crappy school playground. Thinking Ellison was just going to love every minute, we joyfully and enthusiastically put her on the swing, the slide, the mini-rock climbing wall, and what does she do? Stare at us with a completely blank look. No smiling, no chuckling, no giggling. (Sigh). After an hour-and-a-half of being gone (for what?!), we cut our losses and headed back home. Oh, and I need to mention that after all this, I pull into the garage, only to crash into the bike with the front bumper (no damage done). And need I mention that I have Jonathan in the back seat?! So if there's one thing we learned, it's that there are NO fun fall "cozy" places here in NC like we have been used to in our other home states. At any rate, we managed to get a few cute shots of Mookie. Tomorrow's another day, right?