"My laughing muscle's kind of tired."

Can I just tell you how hard we have laughed today? Em is up for a few days visiting the "crazy aunts" (aka me & Case).

Our itinerary for today looked a little like this: sleep in but not too late, go for a picnic on the drill field, leave from there to go to the outlets, come back & pick up something to have a picnic at Yahoola (we like picnics, ok?).

What actually happened looked a little more like this: I woke up a little before 9 because I kept having bad dreams. I had just realized before I went to sleep last night that I had somehow forgotten to watch my friends the army wives. So...I came downstairs to watch them online. Then Case (my little ass-skipper, yes that's right.) & Em sauntered downstairs soon after & watched it with me (my plan is working...I'm turning them into fans). So you would think that since we got up early we would have been ready to go shop til we dropped at the outlets. And we were ready & we did leave...around 2. Ok, so I may have changed clothes 9 times & Case may have had 12 drafts of a letter to Ryan's staff...but at least Em had it all together. So, yes, we hooked up with Nita-Wa, went to the outlets & shopped & just giggled til our hearts were content. Seriously I was afraid we were going to get kicked out of several dressing rooms. And by several, I mean like every one that we graced with our presence.

When we left the outlets (the first time), the real fun began. We met T-squared at Chick-Fil-A & as soon as we walked in the door, we saw the horrifying site of "Toofpick" the Clown. He looked like a pedophile. Then his friend the cow came out. And, let me tell you, if one more person had awkwardly offered me a balloon, I would have popped every last one of them. That was a little too much customer appreciation for me. And Em...well, she can't handle situations like this. She gets to laughing so hard that you just about have to vacate the building. Somehow we got through dinner & then traded vehicles with T-squared. Case decided last week that Gertie couldn't ford the river to get to sliding rock, so we borrowed trusty Ole' Blue for the outing.

As soon as the three of us climbed into Ole' Blue, something crazy came over us. We (& by "we" I mean I) started taking pictures. They all looked something like this:

So we ventured back to the outlets since we hadn't hit up every store yet. When we got there, we had a few more opportunities that would be absolutely crazy to pass up. Like this (note to Liberty, thank you for all of the joy and laughter over the past 3 years):

By the time we left, we looked pretty cute in Ole' Blue with our Ann Taylor Loft, White House Black Market, & Gap bags stuffed behind the seat.

Blasting Dixie Chicks with the windows down on the way home, I just about teared up just thinking of how wonderful the day had been...but then I decided to laugh some more instead. Earlier today, Em had informed us that she felt the need to be "scandalicious." So on the way home, I dared her to strip down to only her jeans & a bra; I didn't have to pull out the "triple dog," but I was willing to if it came to that. She agreed to take it off at the red light at the end of 400. So she did, and commenced to shimmying. That's all I have to say about that.

I guess all of this sounds really weird to anyone other than us...but it goes at least in my top 10 of favorite days ever.