Mama-on-Days: Stepping WAY outside of my comfort zone.

Have you ever done something so crazy (to you, anyhow) that you can't believe you did it?  

Sometime last Spring, I wrote about how I was signing my mother and I up for a Girlfriend Mystery Tour.  We showed up at the meeting place on Saturday morning not knowing what we would do for the day.  It's sometimes hard for women to take the time to get together.  The tours were started as a way for women to take time to have a completely fun day where they didn't need to plan anything.  All they had to do was show up.

Our first stop was at fancy restaurant for brunch.  The restaurant was beautiful-and the hotel was amazing.  They just opened this summer near the Mall of America (largest mall in the US for you non MN friends.)  And also where I put myself through undergraduate selling fried chicken and ice cream-while wearing a green camp shirt, kerchief, and socks pulled up to my knees with black shoes.  Sexy. I really need to remember that when I think my job is tough now!  So far, so good.

Stop #2: A showroom for Quartz countertops.
I was a little skeptical when we stopped here-I could use some new counter tops but really?  Then they poured a glass of wine and everything seemed fine.  The showroom was beautiful, I learned that they were a local company and all of the products are made here in Minnesota.  They had two women give inspirational speeches and then let us do a little jewelry shopping.

Stop #3:  Improve Comedy Club:  I have forgotten how much fun it was to go to a comedy club.  So funny.  We are LOVING this girlfriend tour-everyone is so friendly and fun.

Stop #4:  Trapeze company.   Yes.  I said, we stopped at a trapeze company.  Never, in one million years did I think that this GF tour would involve trapeze swinging. First there was a brief performance-and then they opened it up to the group to try trapeze swinging.

That's pretty high up in the air.  

 I have a pretty intense fear of heights which I try to ignore.  One of my grad school placements had a day where they put us on a Ropes course.  Have you done one of these?  I became petrified on the rope ladder for the first obstacle.  I froze for about 45 minutes halfway up the ladder.  I don't know that I really ever realized that I was scared-I just thought I wasn't strong enough to climb the ladder.  I only realized when both my arms and legs were covered in 2 giant 5 inch bruises how scared I had been.  

Here's the funny-or sad thing-I don't think I would have ever considered it normally.  But then I thought it would be a great thing to post a picture of myself hanging from the practice swing (low to the ground) since I knew I would be writing about this day.  So I convinced my mom to come with me to take the picture.  But then I thought, what if i could "conquer my fear" and just climb up the freakishly narrow ladder and just swing a couple of times.  So that's what I did.

Notice me climbing up the ridiculously long ladder and then joking with the shirtless trapeze artist.  The hard part was probably climbing the ladder-because I knew once I was up there I wasn't going to climb back down that ladder.  When he said "up" I was able to jump forward and swing.  Probably not too gracefully as I was screaming at the top of my lungs.  But at least I'll know where those vocal nodules came from.  

The best part was that my mom, who is 75, also did it.  She was the oldest person to try this and everyone was so excited.  She got to sign the wall and they took her photo too.  I love my mom!

Stop #5:  After my stomach stopped heaving, I was really hoping that we would stop for some type of liquid refreshment.  But it ended up being better: we stopped at the Izzy's ice cream location.  If you come to MN-you need to try it-plus they give you a little extra Izzy scoop on top so you can try 2 different flavors.  

Last Stop:  Dinner at a Meditteranean restaurant with belly dancing, a celebrity impersonator, and a horn player for dinner music.  Which reminded me that time moves muuuuuch more slooooooooowly when a horn player is plaaaaaaaaaaaaaying a Keeeeeeeennnnnnnny G tune in front of your face.  Ack. So awkward.  

That was my Girlfriend tour-it was amazing.  Who's up for an SLP Internet Girlfriends tour next year?