Happy days...

If I had known how happy it would make Lucy for me to be a Mystery Guest, I would have done it a long time ago. I went yesterday right after the initial drop-off and stood outside the door to her classroom until her teacher summoned me in. Let me tell you, I've been less nervous on job interviews. Four-year-olds can be a tough crowd. She finally came out and got me, and when I went in, all the kids had their Madeline and Pepito hats on and their eyes covered. (Indulge me for a moment: It was just the CUTEST thing!) I went and sat in the Mystery Guest chair, and they got to open their eyes. Lucy was over the moon. She ran to me and threw her arms around me (and also? Don't think I'm not really savoring the moment. I know there will come a time when the last person on earth she wants to show up at her school is me). She got to sit in a special little chair next to me. Her teacher said, "Lucy, what is our mystery guest's name?" and she said, "Alice." Then her teacher said, "Well, what should we call her?" and she answered, "Mommy." (Yes, neither one of us does very well under pressure.) We finally all settled on "Madame Daniels." I brought some little things to pass around, such as a mini creche, some pot pourri, and a sign with "RSVP" on it, we talked about French words we already knew, and she was my proud little helper.

Then we herded everyone over to the table and passed out the French-bread-and-chocolate-bar snack. One little boy said, "You know what would make this snack even better? If you put two pieces of chocolate with the bread." I offered to become his honorary mother on the spot. Then Lucy's teacher asked me to give the correct pronunciation in French of various words, which I willingly did since she admitted she doesn't know French, therefore, she would never know if I was saying it correctly or not. So...a big success all around. When I was tucking Lucy into bed at night she said, "Mommy, I was so surprised when you were the mystery guest. And happy. I'm going to have a good dream about you tonight. When are you going to do it again?"

In other news, I don't want to complain, but I must go on record to say how much I loathe winter. Detest and despise it. My Spring countdown officially begins on December 27. I'm scanning the stores for Easter merchandise just to give my spirits a little lift. The all of two people who might have been reading my blog last year already know this since I wrote at least four entries on this topic. And yes, I still repeat to myself, "There is no after the snowsuit. There is only the snowsuit."

But to get me through these dreary winter days where I'm stuck indoors and can't go outside and don't want to go outside when I have to, this CD is helping me along. I highly recommend it. It's all piano music and has lovely spring-sounding, happy songs on it such as "Frog Park," and "Captain April."

And lastly, yes, Elaine is still with us. She hasn't been in the news much lately, I guess. She has a little best friend at church named Isabell, aka Issy. The lady who took care of them in the toddler nursery at church on Wednesday told me that she had smelled an unpleasant smell and asked the two girls, "Is one of you smelly?" and Elaine said, "Issy did it."

That's my girl.