The Puddles

. . . stop and roll down the window to listen to the train as it rumbles past (and it is important to wave to the conductor!)?

. . . see a turtle crossing the street and then run out in your pajamas to check it out?

. . . go to Sonic during happy hour to order a really cool drink because you need to celebrate the normalcy of the end of the school day?

. . . sit at dinner and go around the table telling each other what was special about your day?

. . . celebrate the fact that you have been watching that squirrel make numerous attempts to eat out of your birdfeeder and it finally left defeated?

. . . take an extra five minutes in the morning to cuddle in bed when one of your children crawls in and says he/she just needs more hugs to wake up?

. . . turn off your favorite TV program in order to spend the next hour “judging” your kids while the perform their acts for their version of “America’s Got Talent”?

. . . drink the coffee (?) and eat the breakfast (?) that your children decided to surprise you with because they thought you needed some more love?

. . . throw out the alarm clock and tell everyone to crawl into bed with you so that the whole family can watch Saturday cartoons together?

. . . buy cans of Rutabaga and hide them around the house so that the kids find it and think they have saved themselves from ever eating it because it is now in the trash (eventhough there are 10 more cans hidden in other places)?

. . . pin blankets around their necks so that they can be super heroes for the day?

. . . put on a snotty English accent while your children do “beauty shop” on you?

. . . come up with an endless list of play scenarios that they can play pretend with until they finally get tired of your nonstop list making and run out of the room crying, “ENOUGH!” only to find out that they took half of your list and combined it (Princess leia is on a navy ship running from the cowboys who are trying to steal her babies while her husband, the knight,  fends off the sharks with his gun.)?

. . . see new buds on your rose bush and bring all of the kids over to “smell the roses”?

We do.  And it is worth it.