Parents of the year award

So my Darin and I try to have a date every week. Sometimes this may or may not include bringing the two little lovies in our lives. This past Saturday night, they were invited to join us (interpretation: didn't think to get a babysitter in time.)

Our 4 1/2 year old has grown out of naps UNLESS she is in the car around 4:30 in the afternoon.  Then she thinks it's sleepy time in the van. She then refuses to wake up once we are inside the restaurant and it gets ugly.. super ugly for all involved. This leads to tears, tantrums, trips to the restaurant lobby for her to "get it together" and refusal to eat. She's a DOLL when she wakes up from naps. She gets it from her father. Ok, I the worst nap-waker-upper in the world so I'll claim that beautiful trait of hers. 

Anywho.. she started dosing off on the way to Mishawaka on Saturday at 4:30.  My attempts to keep her awake were failing so Darin gets an amazing idea to pull over at the 7-eleven. 

And get her out of the car to stretch and wake up?

No.

To change out the DVD to something that would keep her awake?
No.

To get our 4 year old a diet coke. 

Well yes, actually. =/

Yes.. you read that right!  My stellar mom idea was to go the candy route.. but Darin thought the diet coke would work faster. Um, he was right.  A few sips later and she was drunk on Diet Coke and in her happy zone. Her non-grumpy-in-the-restaurant happy zone.  We couldn't stop laughing at her!

We had a great time at dinner and a few shops and were heading home for the evening.  A little background information on our little Joya Jae.. she is quite the back seat driver at 2 years old. Her little quirky back-seat-driver-ness started on our 7 hour trip to Iowa in July.  Every time (and I'm really not joking about EVERY time) we hit the breaks on our trip she would ask, 

"What happened?"

We'd explain why were applied the break and 2 minutes later when we would break again she was ask again, "what happened?"  

It's really not annoying at all.  =/ So on Saturday night on our way home from our family date night Darin stopped at a 4-way stop.  She  of course asked us what happened and we told her we had to stop at stop signs.  Then she replied, 

"Dang-it."

Darin and I looked at each other and wondered if we'd heard her right and tried to contain our laughter so it wouldn't egg her on to say it again. 

So I guess she was momicking me a bit because Darin informed me that I say "dang-it" quite a bit. Oops.. guess that little trait came from me as well. Adie has never been a big "word-repeater" so I guess I didn't watch it as much. My feisty little Joya Jae is going to be a tad different, I'm afraid. 

So now that it's proven that we are the best parents ever with buying our 4 year old a round of diet coke to keep her awake and teaching our 2 year old very important phrases like "dang-it".  You can feel a little bit better about your parenting today. 

Your welcome.

Can't leave you without pictures because no blog entry is complete without them.. here is actually something we did with the girls that doesn't include forcing caffeine beverages and teaching naughty phrases to our girlies.. pumpkin pickin'.