What I Did for My 15th Wedding Anniversary - a Photo Essay, More or Less

I know what you are thinking, and so to answer, Yes - I was about 15 when I got married. ;-)
Anyway....
This past Wednesday, hubby and I celebrated 15 years of marriage. As luck would have it, he was scheduled off work that day and there was nothing else on the calendar - no preschool, no music classes or doctor's appointments. Nuttin'. So we planned a family date.
First, to the Indiana State Museum. The ISM has been around for a while, but this building - its new home - was just opened in 2002. It is lovely. We went late in the day (3pm) and basically had the place to ourselves. It was great! We had never been there before and it was fun to explore.
Squint, and you can see Quinn and Keira just below the INDIANA sculpture. The artist is Robert Indiana, the guy who did the famous LOVE sculpture (you know, LO on top of VE....the O tilted). Anyway, it's cool.

Of course, the real reason we came here was for Celebration Crossing. Basically, Santa and a train ride. And since no one else was around at 3:30 in the afternoon, Q and K had the big man and the missus all to themselves. Of course, K is still leary of the jolly old elf, so she just waved. said "Heh-woh" (hello) about 50 times, and refused to get too close. Quinn, on the other hand, was more than willing to sit and chat for a while. And Santa was happy to oblige. Keira also wasn't much for the train, so Q had unlimited time there as well.
The staff were just super to the kids - from Mr. and Mrs. Claus, right down to security staff we saw in the elevator and the "train conductor" who made Quinn his own special paper airplane.

After visiting Mr. HoHoHo, we walked across the hall to the ISM's temporary exhibit, Speed. What. A. Blast. Again, we had the place to ourselves and we took full advantage. We raced self-made LEGO cars. I had the best time of the day, until you-know-who perfected his craft and beat my time. This, while I was off "drag racing" with Quinn. I didn't have the best time of the day there, but at least I was able to hold off my 4 year old, and later my hubby, in those races.

Above, hubby shows off his best time time. Below, father and son race their own cars.

There were many other fun games as part of this exhibit as well. Quinn declared it the most fun. Ever. Even more fun than seeing Santa. [gasp!] He can't wait to go back. Unfortunately, the exhibit is only there through January 21, so we'll have to plan quickly.

After an exhausting couple of hours at the museum, there's nothing like a romantic dinner of burgers, onion rings, and cherry cokes at Johnny Rockets. The kids especially loved it when the wait staff "performed" a little dance number to "Stayin' Alive". Keira was dancing right along. And squealing, too. In between cheekfuls of french fries.

The evening was capped off with a visit to the Holiday light display at the zoo. It was chilly, but a great walk nonetheless. It was so cold in fact, that Keira stayed mummified in her blanket and spoke only every so often to mutter the word "cold". She'd never been so still in the stroller before. The cold did not slow Quinn down at all - he was running here and there, crunching in snow and watching the barking seals, the polar bear and the tiger. When he finally started complaining about the cold, we knew it was time to go home.

A few minutes after getting buckled into the car, we had 2 sleeping kids and a peaceful ride back to suburbia.

If you've been married for more than, oh say 12 hours or so, you know there's no such thing as perfect. Especially as married life goes. But this day felt close.