Have you ever seen bridled joy?

Ainsley woke up feeling crapatocious, so I schlepped the kids out of the house so she could rest. Went to Lowe's first to spend a coupon and let both kids climb on the tractor mowers, then tried to find a McDonald's with an indoor gym since it was too cold and rainy to go to the park (and I didn't feel like hanging out at a mall). I was a little worried because it was basically a series of little-boy hamster tunnels suspended fifteen feet off the ground, and the last time we had hit the Chick-Fil-A playroom, he freaked out and asked for help I could not give (a four-year-old helped him down). But today he had a ball! Climbing all over the joint, screeching, zooming down the winding tunnel-slide, back up again, over the netted portions, lookit me, red faced, huge smile. The picture of unbridled joy.
Erin had fun, too. Climbed up a few steps, wandered back and forth, chatted.
I was even able to convince Ryan that we shouldn't eat there, but rather go to the Carter restaurant. (Carter's his stuffed panda, figured the kids would like rice and chicken, expressly.) Ryan spied Carter everywhere. On the doors, on the walls, on the trash can in the bathroom.
Dad came over to watch my new PDQ Bach video, and because of the cold, blustery evening brewing outside, I was going to build a fire, but then Ryan decided he needed to play chasey chase with Grandad, getting all red and hot, so I figured the fire would be overkill.
Stayed up until 11:30 to await the in-laws, back from Costa Rica, to kick their Costas downstairs to get some sleep.