My Ya-Ya's

Tuesdays....they have to be one of my favourite days of the week right now. It is the "extra" day I've negotiated for me and Bean to just hang out together. We've fallen into a pretty sweet routine. We drop Schmoo off in the morning and head down to the gym. Mama gets her exercise fix and Bean gets to play in the daycare. It's a different group of kids on Tuesdays in the daycare, mostly little ones, so Bean sticks to himself....usually inside a foam fort that the daycare ladies build for him. But he's happy to be there. Then we head to the grocery store to pick up our Tuesday groceries. Sometimes this includes a muffin, sometimes it doesn't. And then we head home.

The afternoons are my favourite part. We gotten into a comfortable rhythm with my two friends D & C, who also have a free day with their four year olds (and in C's case, her baby). We all congregate at either my house or D's house in town and just hang out. The three four year olds play together and the three mamas take turns snuggling the baby and sitting around solving the world's problems. Okay, maybe not the world's problems, but our own. There's no stress. We eat, we chat, we visit. Our three kids play so well together now that there are hardly any interruptions for a motherly intervention. Our biggest concern is keeping an eye on the time so that all three of us make it out the door in time to pick up the older kids from grade one.

So today, as we were sat around my front room, I was reminded of a scene in the book "Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood" where the main character is remembering her mother hanging out with her 3 closest friends when all their kids were little. Just hanging out, laughing, drinking cocktails. It made me think of our Tuesday afternoons. Ok, we don't drink cocktails, but it is a small pocket of time each week that we can count on eachother's company. When we can be totally relaxed and just share our ups and downs. It won't be like this next year. The four year olds will all be in kindergarten and Tuesdays will be different. So for right now, I'm cherishing my Tuesday afternoons. Sure it takes a bit longer for the vacuuming to get done or the laundry to be folded, but I finish my day a little bit brighter. Thank goodness for my Ya-Ya's.