Last week was a long and tiring one for me! It wasn’t a bad week, just busy.
But Friday really made up for Sunday through Thursday π
Friday was busy as well, but my kind of busy! I had an 8am ultrasound appointment that Michael and Gabriel attended with me. Getting to hear Baby Franco’s heartbeat and see his or her little pictures for the first time–as a family–was so special.
I took Gabriel in to MDO for the day (we’re on a MWF schedule now since Jenay is here) but they asked me to take him home since he was still rattling a good bit. Bless them for their caution and health policies, but Gabriel has been to MDO exactly two full days in February due to cold weather cancellations and to his having a cold and being sent home. It’s been tough trying to work with him at home so much. And I’m trying hard not to abuse my sister-in-law’s gracious babysitting offer while she’s here! In any case, though, Gabriel ended up sleeping a lot and I ended up finishing my work projects early, so everything worked out beautifully in the end.
But back to why the rest of the day was wonderful.
After I finished some projects for work, I had some time to pick up the house a bit and then take a nice shower before I went to get my hair cut at 3:30. I haven’t gotten my hair cut in many months, so it was a treat to go again. The hidden treasure behind not getting my hair cut for all those months, however, is that we’ve been saving a few dollars each month in our budget for so long that I had quite a little wad of cash to spend on myself!
Which means that I had enough money on Friday for a 5pm spa pedicure, 6pm dinner at La Madeleine with some girlfriends, and 7:30pm movie (“The King’s Speech). The best words to describe my Friday evening are “refreshing,” “fun,” and (dare I say it?!) “well-deserved.” π
The spa pedicure was fantastic! My friend Max suggested Suzie’s Nail, a salon right by my house, and I ended up loving it. The pedicure chairs were top-of-the-line massage chairs that actually did an incredible job on some aching parts of my lower back, and the hot neck wrap was lovely. I loved the extensive drink menu and hot towel leg wraps, as well as the foot and leg massage and choices of salt scrub and lotion scents (I got Orange Dreamsicle because it actually reminded me of my honeymoon).
And I just love the color I chose for my toes. It’s a very dark red called “I Don’t Do Dishes.” It just spoke to me…
The only downside of the pedicure whatsoever was that I happened to shave my legs only a few hours before. They were shamefully, er, wooly. Shaving right before a spa pedicure of course didn’t bode well for my poor legs when they did the scented bath salt exfoliant. I had her skip the salt scrub on my right leg after my left leg erupted into a painful, bright red, fiery rash! It brought some wetness to my eyes for a few minutes, I’ll admit! The sweet woman doing my pedicure, Paula, told me that I should come with hairy legs next time.
To which I said that I would and simultaneously thought to myself, “which will be when exactly?”
Dinner was almost as much of a treat as my pedicure. I love La Madeleine. I got half of a hot chicken Caesar sandwich, some tomato-basil pesto pasta salad, and a cup of soup. Some of my favorites! The only thing was that I really could have eaten TWICE the amount of food I had on my plate! I wanted to go back and order something else, but the line was long and my Stash of Cash was actually running out a bit.
So I just bought a ridiculously expensive small bag of popcorn at the movie theater later, of which I ate about $.75 worth. Looking back, I should have just sprung for more food at La Madeleine. $5.75 for a small paper bag of popcorn is a tragedy.
At the least the movie was fantastic! I loved “The King’s Speech” and definitely recommend it. It is rated R, however, I’m guessing for one scene in particular when the king is doing speech therapy and begins cursing up a storm in order to deal with his inner demons. I actually blushed all over in that scene, but really the scene was very fitting and funny in that particular moment of the movie. Otherwise, the movie was clean, funny, and beautifully done. Colin Firth should win an Oscar for this one. He was wonderful.
At the end of the movie, I was pretty tired. It was 10:15pm, which is WAY past my normal/ideal bedtime. BUT it was a good tired. A very good tired. The kind of tired where you are dreaming of your warm bed as much as you are cheerfully remembering all of the high points of the evening. π
I’m so thankful for a fun evening with Jenay and my girlfriends, and for such a great day to refresh me after a long week. Not to mention a long time since I’ve done anything remotely like this for myself, not to mention spent this kind of Girl Time with my friends. Michael does “guy stuff” with his friends much, much more regularly than I do things with mine, and he’s an inspiration to me in that.
It’s Saturday night and I’m off to bed. I had another great day today, but as usual, I’m exhausted and ready for my lovely bed, even though it’s only 8:50pm. Goodnight!
Laura Buller says
Sounds wonderful! I will get my night out one day… Grant is still nursing and has been sick. I have not been gone for more than a few hours in a year! Ah!!!
The Clarks says
What an awesome day! It's very important to have some girl time every once and awhile (which I haven't done in awhile!). It's so easy to forget that you need that for yourself! Oh and I enjoyed seeing the pics of baby Franco, Exciting!!! (:
fairycakegirl says
That sounds a wonderful day. I saw the King's Speech a few weeks ago. I loved it too. I am ashamed to say that despite being our current queen's father I knew very little of the history. I thought Helena Bontham Carter was amazing too. Apparantely the Queen Mother was some stuff. And Scottish too! Yay!!