a nice day, despite the persistent gloom

We have had a very nice day so far! First, we went to Nick's school carnival. It was sort of lame from an adult perspective, but Nick had a blast playing all the games and winning piles of cheap crap that will litter our home. :) He also enjoyed the bounce house - what kid doesn't? Plus, he got an awesome SpongeBob SquarePants tattoo on his cheek. We had a cheap and oh-so-healthy lunch there, consisting of a hot dog, Doritos, cookies, and Capri Sun. Sheesh. I didn't end up winning any of the silent auction items, because I'm simply too cheap! :)

We then proceeded to the Hampton Inn, where child development specialist and children's musician Jim Gill gave an intimate, interactive concert for a small but very appreciative audience. Nick had the time of his life! He smiled and laughed more than should be legal. :) Jim is incredibly animated, silly, and energetic, and the kids (and parents, too!) just ate him up. Nick and his classmates from Mrs. Tate's class were already familiar with several of Gill's songs, as Mrs. Tate uses one of his CDs in class. Everyone had a blast dancing, singing, jumping, and clapping. We ended up buying one of his CDs and getting it autographed, and we got a picture of Nick with Jim. They had door prizes, and we won a free two-topping pizza from Papa John's. Given that the day is already a nutritional bust (see lunch description above), we decided that we shall get said pizza tonight and just write off the whole day. I will start afresh tomorrow, and plan to be good for the remainder of the week.

Now, we're back home having a quiet afternoon and chilling out. Tonight's plans include eating pizza :), watching Lawrence Welk, and working on my next body sculpt class - I'll actually be teaching on my birthday, so I have to come up with a good way to torture my students so that they can suffer right along with me. :)