Hiding Places

Somehow I magically became NOT IT! when it comes to taking Alexis to dance class on Wednesdays. It's all sorts of fantastic given that half my life is spent giving that child rides to places, but it's extra fantabulous because Mila goes along for the ride.

I end up with the house to myself for an hour.

HUZZAH!

That is a thing that is so very rare and SO VERY needed. In theory I would spend the time cleaning or such, but lately I've been super excited about being able to work late without risk of interruption. Look, when you're adult, little things like being able to pour through an Excel Spreadsheet without being interrupted a bunch of times is really amazing. It's only slightly better than being able to clean the kitchen without someone following you around dropping new crumbs.

Explaining that paragraph to younger me would be SO difficult. But here we are, acting all grown-up and stuff.

ANYWAY.

I was still working when the parade of chaos returned from dropping off Alexis today. My home office is upstairs with a perfect view of the backyard. That's by design, of course. It lets me keep an eye on small people while they play outdoors and it gives me a chance to stare at the pond about 150,000 times per day. Watching fish is oddly soothing.

So the parade of chaos poured out of the car and immediately ran into the yard to play.

Mila ran up into her playhouse for a bit and then checked for frogs in the pond (they're out for the year, by the way, which means IT REALLY IS SPRING HOORAY!). She poked around at the fairy gardens, looked for blooming daffodils, and then found her way to the middle of the yard. The whole time she was adorable and fantastic with her ridiculous rain boots, unicorn and rainbow leggings, and sparkly unicorn t-shirt.

And then the chaos tripled. The girls next door burst from their garage, all sorts of excited because Mila was outside. Mila was excited as well. It was extremely justified because I consider those girls to be in "our bubble" and they are the best playmates. Mila, as is customary, screamed, "Can I play?" to nobody in particular before running full speed to the next yard over.

As she shot into action, she pulled a mask from ... somewhere? I DON'T KNOW WHERE. Leggings. T-shirt. She didn't run inside the house or to a car or anything. She just had a mask hidden ... somewhere. I SERIOUSLY CAN'T FIGURE IT OUT. But she put it on, happily played for a few hours, and here we are. It has been hours and hours and I'm trying to figure out where the hell my 6-year old stashes masks so that she can play at the drop of a hat.

Maybe it's best that I don't know.

But I really want to know.