The weekend that wasn't

This past weekend it snowed. Again. It snowed the weekend before, too, even though that was the "May Long Weekend," the three-day weekend when Albertans traditionally plant out their annuals and seedlings because the threat of frost has finally disappeared for a while. But I didn't get to plant out my 32 heirloom tomato seedlings last weekend. I didn't get to work in my yard at all, which was a major blow for me, as the Alberta growing season is so short that you *have* to get everything in the ground by the May Long Weekend, otherwise, it won't have time to grow and bloom and fruit before the frost returns on September 1st.

Instead of playing in the yard all weekend as I had planned, I've spent the past two weekends cooped up with my in-laws, in a too-small house, with a toddler who's started throwing tantrums, and a dog who's started going stir-crazy and has taken a vocal dislike to my father-in-law. I'm starting to go a little stir-crazy myself. We've tried getting out of the house as much as possible: with Sunday brunch at the corner diner, trips to the mall, the zoo, and the museum. And there's always our fail-safe outing to the farmer's market and the bookstore to play with the branded toy train who-shall-remain-nameless. But we've run out of outings that are manageable for a toddler and two octogenarians, and we're all starting to get a little mouldy and cranky around here. By last Sunday things had gotten so dismal (thanks to a couple of mishaps with poo and a toddler who was on a food strike) that I think I was in tears three times before dinner time -- and I still had a whole day left in my three-day weekend.

So, on the final day of my three-day vacation, I boycotted everyone. I banished myself to the basement with the dog, who was starting to go feral because he'd been alone down there for days because he won't stop barking at my father-in-law. And you know what? We had a pretty good time. I played fetch with Remy in between unpacking the last of the boxes from our last international move two years ago--and from our previous international move two years before that. Remy started to act domesticated again, an, for the first time in four years, I saw the china my grandmother hand-painted for me when I was a girl. And even though the sky outside was black as pitch the robin's egg blue of that china lifted my spirits right up.

How do you deal with disappointing weekends? Do you have a trick for turning lemons into lemonade? Or have you had any surprising saviours on a dismal day?