Singing in the Rain

It finally rained!  And got cooler!  Double bonus.

One of the best parts of being a parent is that it truly allows you to be a kid again.  There are so many opportunities to be serious that I think it would be really easy to miss out on the times when you can show your kids just how fun it can be to have fun unless you're looking out for them.  Tonight presented one of those moments.  I promised Natalie that we would go outside after dinner, then it started to rain.  At first we looked glumly outside as it poured.  Then, Eric said (mostly in passing, I think) that Nat just wanted to go splash in puddles.  And I thought, "why not?"

So, we picked out sweatshirts (yes, sweatshirts!!!), donned our Crocs, and headed out.  Natalie was totally into it from the start.  I wondered if she'd mind the heavy rain, but she sure didn't.  We found the biggest puddles we could and ran at them, jumped in them, and splashed.  Natalie even fell into one.  I did stop short of sliding down the mud hill though.  

But, we took a long walk down the road and even found a better puddle in one of our neighbor's driveways.  It was wonderful.  

The grown up me would have loved to curl up on the couch with a hot chocolate and a movie.  The grown up me also felt much younger and happier watching my baby run around in the cool rain, soaked, and thoroughly pleased with a fun new adventure.