A Date with Charis--Our Grand Date! (Saturday, Jan. 22)

When Charis was born, we offered to Jim and Monique that we would babysit for them every Friday night so they could have Date Night.  We haven't made it every week, and it's now changed to Saturday night, but we've done it quite regularly.  We have treasured these times with Charis even more than Jim and Monique have enjoyed getting out.

Since Kol wasn't even a week old yet on Saturday evening and since Monique needs to rest, we offered to take Charis out for a Grandparent Date so they could stay home and have Date Night.  Charis was all dressed up in pony tails, stick-on "earrings" and a purple sweater when we arrived.  We bundled her up and decided to commemorate our first official Grandparent Date with a photo--but Charis wouldn't smile.

So we used grandparent psychology.  "Dada's going to take the picture, Charis.  Don't smile!"  "No, don't smile!"  "No, no, no!  Don't smile!"

Gradually a tiny smile began lurking at the corners of her mouth.

And suddenly she burst out laughing!  Such a belly laugh she has--we all had to join in!

Finally we were able to get a picture where we were all smiling happily, although we couldn't hide our big grins at the success of our scheme.

We headed over to La Olla, an attractive little Mexican restaurant near Jim & Monique's house where Charis has eaten before.   While we waited for our food, Charis and I wandered around looking at the ceramic suns decorating the wall in the darkened dining room off to the side.  "This sun asleep!  This sun awake!"  Charis had lots of fun, dare I say it, in the sun!

After that she dipped chips in the salsa for Didi, ate all her guacamole, and asked Mimi to feed her her refried beans.  When she had inhaled those, she inhaled all of Mimi's beans!  When those were gone, she ate her shredded chicken.

I don't remember what we were laughing about here because we had so much fun all evening.  Charis has grown into a fun companion, as well as an enchanting one.  Our waitress just loved her!  It made me think how blessed we were to be the ones taking her home at the end of the evening!

Thank you, Jim, Monique, and Kol, for letting us borrow Charis for such a special evening!