Date with my Best Girl

Katie has been so patient with having to share my attention with her brother, and she is always loving toward him. Still, I know it has not always been easy for her, especially since it was just the two of us for so long. With that in mind, I wanted to take her on another mother-daughter date this month. We had a perfect opportunity: Tangled, Disney's new film about Rapunzel, came out in theaters today and Bill was home to take care of Eric.

Although Katie has been to live theater several times now, she had not yet been to a movie theater. I was excited to give her this first experience. She loved it! She has learned to be super quiet in the theater, and so she even asked me if it was okay to make crunching sounds while chewing her popcorn. Sweetie pie! In fact, outside of eating a piece of popcorn off the lobby floor (EW!!! I thought we had established not eating off the floors when she was 2 ?!?!?), she did GREAT at the movie theater.

Afterward we briefly went into the mall to pick out a pair of Christmas jammies for Katie and Eric, and then we went to Golden Spoon for some frozen yogurt. A very fun date!

We really enjoyed Tangled, which was both cuter and full of more substance than I expected. This version of Rapunzel's character is extremely appealing, and even Flynn the thief-turned-sympathetic-helper was winning despite his occupation. Despite a couple of odd and modernist elements, like the gang of villains who turn out to have soft hearts full of unclaimed dreams (such as playing the piano or....becoming a professional mime?...what?), I felt this film was nonetheless charming. It probably helped that I was getting to see it with one of the people I love most in the world, and that she was so excited for it and laughing.

 Katie is ready for our date. I always tell her that she should only ever go on dates with someone who thinks she is one of the best people in the world. It is important that parents set the standard for dating. We actually believe that dating is only for the purpose of getting married; it should be more like courting. We make sure Katie knows that we would never want to her spend time with someone who would ever treat her less well than her parents do or who would ever try to part her from her family.

 

Katie admires the huge Christmas tree at the mall.

Katie with our bucket of popcorn in the theater while waiting for the movie to begin. I usually don't get popcorn anymore, actually, but for her first time I wanted to give her a really classic experience.

I loved having this special time with my girl and reforging our bond. Of course when I came home, one of the first things I did was scoop Eric off of Bill's lap and cover him with kisses!