Surprises for the Girls

Just 'cause I thought it was a cute pic!

The Sunday of Labor Day weekend definitely has the potential to be such a lazy, relaxing day. Alas, that was not to pass for the Mobergs today--but we had a pretty darned good day anyway, including a couple of surprises for the girls.

Despite our having arrived home really late last night from our shopping day in Bismarck, we woke the girls pretty early this morning to eat breakfast and get ready for church. One of the day's surprises involved meeting our friends Chris and Heather and their son, Keaton, for dinner at 11:30 A.M., so we didn't want the girls sleeping in and eating a late breakfast and having no appetite later on. After church we spent an hour getting started on a thorough house-cleaning in preparation for the evening's surprise (more on that in a moment) and then were off to Sanford's for dinner and visiting/catching up. (By the way, while there we saw our neighbors Chuck and Reba, whose visiting family [Chuck's mom from NE and Reba's sister from MT] we got to meet.)

Afterwards we headed to the Prairie Hills Mall for "Dollar Days." I got a great deal on a shirt from Herberger's, and we got to visit with Susan's aunt Mary, her daughter Laura, and Laura's son, Kaden, at Kmart (where a woman helping us at the checkout counter wore a name tag with the job title "People Coach" on it . . . what exactly is that, anyway?!). We got home to a phone message from my sister Sandy, so I phoned her and had a nice visit with her (as did the three girls, who kept her entertained with their comments). Then we went back into house-cleaning mode, getting every room vacuumed, dusted, and put into good order in anticipation of the next surprise.

As a college student, Susan used to babysit for a family whose daughters eventually babysat for our children years later! That family was in Medora, ND this weekend (from Grand Forks, ND) for a wedding, and they arranged to meet us this evening for supper, and we chose not to tell the girls. Suzanna, Abigail, and Hillary were delighted to walk into El Sombrero for supper and be greeted by Megan (daughter) and Idette (mom)! Judd (dad) and Alyssa (other daughter) were waiting for us at the table. Perhaps needless to say, there was much squealing and hugging before we could sit down, and then much visiting and catching up throughout the meal. Afterwards, they came over for a tour of our home before heading back to Medora to catch the musical. (The day o' cleaning was for the possibility of their wanting to see our house--good forethought, eh?)

Hillary, Alyssa, Suzanna, Megan, and Abigail

We ended our evening with a 45-minute walk around the neighborhood and some HGTV and Food Network before bedtime. Great day!