Three-day weekends can be tricky.

They don’t come around often, so when one arrives, we’re determined to make the most of them. To live life to the fullest. To participate in every activity with the inane hope of getting caught up on rest at the same time. There are parties to attend, children to entertain, expectations to manage and weather to work around.

Or is that just my family?

My long weekend started out great. As promised, I finished Annalyn’s first-year scrapbook. It’s not perfect, but I sure do love it. It’s 30 pages, front and back, of cuteness – and I even got the whole thing extended and posted and screwed together (thank you, Mark). Granted, I did buy the wrong size page protectors for the last 10 pages, but I did not let that stop me. Nope, I just let that project illustrate my dedication to giving up on perfect.

And Mark and my mom thought it was great anyway.

On Saturday, we had quite a schedule lined up. And we started with a bang, thanks to a less-than-full night’s sleep. I’m not sure what was up with Annalyn, but she didn’t sleep well all weekend.

For those of you not ruled by naps, let me explain what that means for our tightly scheduled Saturday. First, she slept late (9 a.m.), which was awesome. It meant that Mark and I got to sleep later, making up (kind of) for the hours we were up with her during the night. However, that meant Annalyn’s morning nap came much later than normal. And as a matter of fact, she sat in her crib fussing for an HOUR before FINALLY falling asleep. By that time, we were close to running late, so her nap got cut short, and we hit the road to a birthday party.

Because there’s no better plan than to start an afternoon and evening with a tired kid.

The good news is that the chicken nuggets I nuked in our microwave took on magical characteristics just by being in the car. Annalyn gobbled them up like they came from the golden arches, something she hasn’t been interested in doing while sitting at the dining room table.

After the birthday party, we split up. Mark and my dad went to watch Angels and Demons. Mom, Annalyn and I headed to a kids’ music festival. Annalyn loves her CD and DVD by They Might Be Giants, and they were performing. Perfect, right?

Uh, no. As we sat, sweating, waiting for the band to set up, I’m pretty sure my mom was wondering why on earth I thought this was a good idea. Why wouldn’t it be a good idea to take a wiggly, squirming toddler who doesn’t toddle and make her stay within a 3-foot radius of our seats?

The highlight of the evening is a toss-up. I’m not sure what Annalyn enjoyed more: dumping half a bottle of water on her head and mine, cleaning the cement floor with a used baby wipe, ignoring the Grammy Award-winning band playing in front of her, or dancing her little heart out IN THE CAR ON THE WAY HOME.

As we like to say in my family, a good time was had by all.

Sunday was actually a day of rest, if you don’t count the torturous delightful hour and a half I spent in the church nursery. Sweating. Wiping noses with toilet paper, because apparently we can’t keep Kleenex in stock. And holding a darling little girl who cried for 40 MINUTES STRAIGHT.

And oh yeah, telling Annalyn to suck it up, because she needs to share Mommy. Yes, I’m your Mommy. No, Mommy can’t hold you. Mommy loves you. Eat your Goldfish.

And then there was a nap involved. For everyone.

No stress on Sunday night, because Monday was a day OFF. A FREE DAY! A day to do nothing! Or everything! Or . . .

My idea was to go to the zoo. But Mark watched The Weather Channel (because that’s what you do when you get old), and rain was a-coming. Instead we headed to The Legends, an outdoor shopping center about half an hour away. After spending that 30-minute drive arguing debating where we should eat lunch, Mark remembered that a new Mexican restaurant had just opened.

And since Mexican restaurant = chips and salsa = happy baby, it was an easy decision.

By the time we got there, it was after 1 p.m., so I was surprised to see several families waiting in the lobby. But our wait was just long enough for me to change a verrry dirty diaper in the restroom (where Annalyn freaked out on the changing table, apparently afraid she was going to fall off. I don’t know. This has never happened before. It was fun.), and then we were seated.

And we waited. And waited. And waited. Not patiently, either. Because it was way past Annalyn’s lunchtime. And there were no chips on our table. (And, oh yeah, she’s recently decided that she hates sitting in high chairs.)

To make a long story slightly shorter, we got up to leave, told the manager why, got promised a speedy and FREE lunch, sat back down, ate a decent lunch that still took way too long, and finally left.

We walked down to the water fountains, where a band was performing. After letting Annalyn cruise around the fountains and listening to a pretty good cover of Bohemian Rhapsody, I suggested we visit Carter’s, my very favorite baby clothing store. (Affordable + not-bad quality = happy mom) Unfortunately, it was starting to spit at that point, and since we have been caught in the rain at The Legends before, I let Mark convince me that a better option was to head over to Cabela’s.

Because what says Mom’s Got a Day Off better than many large stuffed wild animals?

In an attempt to redeem this less-than-perfect day, Mark decided we would go to a Chevy dealership and test-drive a Traverse. Our area dealers are participating in Mommy Madness, a blogger promotion in which you can test-drive a Traverse and get a gift certificate for a massage in return, so this sounded like a good plan. Even though at least two of us were realllly tired and ready to go home at this point.

But, in the spirit of the weekend, it was not to be. We walked around the lot (in the drizzling spit rain), checking out several Traverses. We even walked up to the door of the office and tried to walk in.

Only to find it locked. At ten till five.

Because in today’s economic climate, car salesmen really have too many customers to worry about the ones literally trying to WALK IN THE DOOR.

After glaring at the salesman sitting just inside that LOCKED DOOR, we got back in the car and went home.

It was quite a weekend. We also rented Valkyrie, caught up on The Office, ate pizza more than once, bought a video camera and had lots of family snuggle time. So overall? Not too shabby.

How was your long weekend?