MOA Shopping/Birthday Event

We brought our oldest to the MOA for her upcoming 12th birthday (which at the time of this writing took place yesterday). We had a fun filled day of rides and shopping for the birthday girl. I wanted my dear husband to experience the joy of shopping with his daughter. Which, as a side note, he did so good I think he should take over the role! Let me state first that our oldest is a very conscious and responsible shopper. She has something in her mind (like her dad), she goes in and searches the whole store for it and finds other things along the way (like her mom). If she is not sure that the item is something she wants (even when mom and dad are buying) or will wear forsure, she will remember it so we can come back later. I think that is very mature for a 12 year old, when she purchases something she wears it and it was purposed, not just a whim. So we are shopping and she goes from section to section quickly and all I can see as I sit on the comfy couch for pregnant ladies (and dads who bring there books while their daughters shop) is my husbands head moving swiftly around the store attempting to keep up.
In order to get the full picture of how precious this day will be in my memory you have to know what the other two beautiful children we have were doing. Our youngest daughter was picking out her own outfits and bringing them to her brother or myself to show them. When she wasn't looking at the clothes she was trying on sunglasses (very large sun glasses I may add, that took over her entire face) and showing them to her brother who was commenting "oh, that one is my favorite" or "that one even looks better then the one before" or "I really like those things on the side of that one" (those things may I add were decorative rhinestones). Her very good big brother was also helping her pick out outfits that actually matched. Which is very impressive in and of itself since his clothes don't match most of the time. While the middle of our family (as of right now) was being a good big brother to his little sister, he was timing his big sister on his new watch his daddy had bought for him the day before. So as I sat there watching all of this going on I had my son telling me mom it has been 7 minutes, how much longer do we have to be in here or how long is she going to take. I want it noted, thanks to little brother, that his big sister made it through her favorite store, looked at everything, noted in her mind the outfit she may come back for in less then 10 minutes. It was timed by her brother and as he was taking note that-that was far too long to be in a girl store I was thinking WOW! she's good. I attempted to explain to him that-that was an amazingly speedy trip through a girl's store with an almost teenager. He wasn't convinced. So we got to go to the next store...
Believe it or not we only went to two girls stores and our oldest was done shopping (which was good because so were her dad and brother). Limited Too our 2nd and last stop took a bit longer, a half hour. First, it is larger and second I had to take Talya to the bathroom (all the way over at Macy's). Eventhough I told my son that we were going he was so busy timing his sister (he was at 9 minutes, which was absurd in his mind for length of time to be in a store) and my dear husband was so into shopping with our oldest that he didn't hear me either. So by the time I got back with our youngest, I had frantic shoppers with bag in hand (she has already wore the outfit twice and shoes 3 times), searching for their lost family members. And as my son let me know, because of that we were in that store for 30 minutes! So a total of 37 minutes of shopping at the MOA, with a 12 year old, in her favorite stores. Someday my son will realize what a major deal that way, but right now, that was 37 of the longest minutes of his life :)!! He better hope the baby we are going to have is a brother, so he doesn't have 3 sisters to shop with someday!!
All in all it was a fabulous day. I got to walk around, sit around and accompany our youngest on the kiddie rides while my dh and other two children went on the "big kid" rides. And I made it through without even having a book. I was so happy I didn't have to go on the rides, bonus for being pregnant. I used to love rides, but now they don't like me. My dh was so "rided" out by 8:00 it was time for us to leave and go have dinner. Flautas at Chevy's for me-Yum!!
What an adventure, what a memory! We are so blessed and I am so grateful for my lovely husband and 3 (soon to be 4) beautiful children. I love being a Mommy (and to think there was a time in my life that I didn't want to have children, I think of all I would have missed out on and how lonely my life would have been-it's enough to almost make me sick!)!