day of the dead

Ah weekends...
I remember a time when big daddy & I would lounge in bed reading the paper, sipping our soy lattes leisurely trying to figure out what to do with our two days off.
Hmm brunch, drinks with friends, check out a gallery or two, go shopping, just hang and do nothing.....
Getting up when we felt like it and not when "someone" starts yelling at the top of her three year old lungs "get up DAAADDY!!! COME AND PLAY WITH ME!!!!! I WANNNA WATCH T.V.!!!!!!!! NOW!!!!!!! CARRY ME DOWN THE STAIRS!!!!!! I DON'T WANT TO WALK!!!!!! I'M HUNGRY!!!!!!!LETS GO WAKE UP MOMMY!!!!!!!!"
Oh and I might add that all this hooting & hollering usually takes place at around 6:45 a.m.
And good morning to you too my little sweet hell child....Sigh.
Hard to imagine that someday we'll be the ones who will be yelling for her to haul her sorry ass out of bed.
Oh the sweet pay back...
Anyhow somehow our weekends have turned into a quest of "how can we keep Lulu entertained enough to exhaust her into actually going to sleep at 7:30ish so that we can actually have a sliver of a weekend too?"
Well that and Lulu is no longer the mellow anything goes kind of child and needs to be constantly entertained "or else".
Anyone out there with a three and half year old might just know exactly what "or else" entails.
If not, lets just put it this way- It ain't pretty.
So now we are up & at'im first thing Saturday mornings.
We managed to go to the Day Of The Dead "Dia De Los Muertos" festivities down at Harbourfront on Saturday.
Bonus that it's free and wasn't super packed with people.
Big daddy was in heaven when we found these

And Lulu was somewhat sated when she got one of these

But all she really wanted was to do the crafts.

That child is never more happy than when she is surrounded by paints, markers, glitter glue and crayons.

We did a bunch of other stuff and by the end of the day I pretty much felt like this

Let's not even talk about Sunday.
Word to the wise- don't ever bring a three year old shopping on Bloor st- especially not to the Hermes Store.
Ever.
Funny that she was the perfect angel when we were at Pottery Barn Kids though....

as an aside- not every weekend starts off like this one did.
Thank g-d... but for some reason, and oh do I wish I knew why, Lulu was like a different kid this weekend.
The majority of the time she is sweet and relatively relaxed in the mornings and sometimes down right adorable, but our regular Lulu must have been on vacation this week.
Let's just hope she gets back sometime before next Saturday.