A very, very big blessing

I've had one of those days where it's hard not to see God's hand in how it all played out. I've been grateful all afternoon that despite they day being inconvenient, being a big change to my planned week, being much more expensive than planned, at the end of it, we're all alive and healthy.

Let me back up a couple days. You might remember that I had Lasik surgery on my eyes. When they do that surgery, the slice a flap in the cornea before the laser the eye back to good vision then put the flap back over the eye. Over time, that flap heals. Tuesday evening, in a freak accident, Ellie threw her arms around me for a piggy back ride at the same time that I moved my head and her little finger nail ended up slicing across the front of my eye. As it turns out, one of the two, sharpest, non-medical instruments is a child's finger nail. She could have punched me in the eye and it would not have hurt that corneal flap, which was still healing from the surgery. But she caught it in just such a way that it wrinkled the flap, causing me some pain, discomfort and slightly blurred vision in my right eye. The eye docs at Robbins Laser Site got me right in, put a therapeutic contact on my eye and told me to come back Friday so they could see how the eye was healing.

This isn't the end of the world except this doctor is an hour from my house. And I have no family around to leave my children with to run such errands. And I had planned to go pick $1 a pound blueberries on Wednesday, which I moved to Friday, which I've now moved to Monday and will most likely have to move again. And we're going to North Carolina next week for Bob's family reunion so I have a million things to do. A three-to-four-hour detour to Webster every couple days with my kids just wasn't sounding fun.

So, today, I left my kids with my neighbors. I've mentioned them before. They are pretty incredible. Our kids play great, and I know in their home there is nothing that my children wouldn't be exposed to that I wouldn't approve of. I trust the care of my children to them entirely. After my eye appointment today, I was gassing the car up when I had a feeling that I really needed to have our van looked at before we left next week. I chalked this feeling up to a mental reminder of everything I needed done, grabbed my cell phone and called Patrick Pontiac in Henrietta -- a car dealership Bob does ads for and whose service department is absolutely excellent. I asked if they could look at the van next week. They told me they were completely booked, but asked if I could get it in right then. Ugh, I thought, but sure. I called Josh and Kelly to ask if it were ok that I would be a little late so I could get an oil change and have the van looked over. Naturally, they figure the chances were pretty good that my kids would be involved in some sort of game of Star Wars make-believe at their house whether I was there or not. So, I took the van and Josh kept the kids so Kelly could go run some errands.

I bought a book to occupy myself ("The Death and Life of Charlie St. Cloud" of which I finished 220 of 270 pages) and waited and waited and waited. Finally, the service guy came and told me one of my front tires had a puncture wound (not knifed like Bob's, more like a run-in with a curb that I don't remember) and they were surprised it hadn't blown out. The other front tire was cracked. The van had no other major issues that I wasn't aware of, but the tires were a big deal. I knew I probably needed new ones soon, but wow, that bad? I felt grateful that I'd felt the need to stop and that they could work me in.

Probably around the same time, my little guy decided for whatever reason to pop a rock in his mouth. Josh heard him coughing, and wondering why he would suddenly be coughing after a day of perfect health, checked on him to find him choking. Josh picked him up, beat on his back and got the rock out. When I got home, Josh told me about it right away, apologizing that he didn't watch him better and that they didn't usually have little things like that on the floor. He didn't want the kids to tell me that he'd beaten on Robbie, but he had hit his back to get the rock out. All I could think of was how grateful I was he was with Josh, a state trooper with a tour each of Iraq and Afghanistan under his belt. Josh knows how to handle emergencies. All he could think of was that I'd be upset that the boy choked, and all I could think of was how grateful I was that Robbie was with someone who could handle the emergency and save him. If not a rock at the Bacon's, it could have been a Lego at my house. I wonder if I would have been as effective in saving Robbie's life.

So, I kind of think God had his hand in my day and I'm grateful. I sincerely think the Holy Spirit whispered to me to check right away into getting the van looked at. I don't think the people really had space in their schedule to fit the van in, but they did anyway. And I got to sit and read a book. And my son was with someone who could protect him today in a way that maybe his own mother couldn't have. I gave my kids extra big hugs tonight. And they hugged me back -- safe, warm, wiggly, alive little bodies who God protected today.

I can't help but be very, very grateful for those very, very big blessings.

A glimpse at my day

Thought one hour of solid exercise would carry me through the day with uplifted spirits.

And then:

Ellie: "You are a bad mother to me!"

Me: You kids get off the top of that thing (little tykes climbing toy that daddy brought home) before someone falls and gets hurt!" (insert crying because no one can get down on their own.)

Ellie: "Mommy, I'm hungry!"
Mom: I just need to get a few more of these weeds. Here, eat a bean...wait, (Robbie!) stop picking those peppers!"

Ellie: "Mommy, why are you sleeping? (to her mother, sitting in the middle of a pile of clothes to be folded with her head lolled back, sound asleep...)

Ellie: "Mommy, please, please, please can we get the Swan Lake dance music?" ($6 on iTunes will buy you 21 of Tchaikovsky's ballet suites from Swan Lake, Sleeping Beauty and the Nutcracker, btw...)

Eleven kids at soccer practice all want to play on offense. I have the largest team, an even split between older kids learning to work together and little kids who like to sit and pick clover. We can play a mix of six kids at a time.
"Nate. Nate. Nate. Nate. Nate. NATE! go to the goal!" "Stephen. Stephen. Stephen. Stephen. Stephen. Stephen. STEPHEN! go to the goal!" !#@$Q@#%@#$ (insert 9 other names, repeat.)

Jack becomes the chief whiner, mostly because he comes home with me.
"Mom, that was the most boring practice ever. I just want to kick the ball." Later, "Mom, you want to know what the problem is with defense? You just aren't in on the action." I swear if I hadn't heard him say it, I wouldn't have believed a 5-year-old was capable of coming up with that thought.

Bob took Jack fishing before soccer. They brought home a fish in a bucket, which the kittens, true to stereotype, tried to eat:

Bob: Amanda, where did you guys put that fish?
Amanda: In the back room on top of the washer.
Bob: Um, the fish isn't in the bucket.
Amanda: Could it have jumped out?
Bob: I guess so.
(we look, then suddenly...)
Amanda: Oh my gosh! Look, there he is! (points to the floor, far away from said bucket).
Bob, reaches down and picks up the dead fish, rinses him off and puts him in a baggie: "Poor guy. I'm going to put him in the fridge. Show this to Jack. Tell Jack he jumped and we can't eat him."

Then the kittens knocked my cucumbers (future pickles) onto the floor, busting two open. Growl.

The dishes are piled, I need to balance my checkbook. And finish folding the laundry. And go grocery shopping. Yet here I am.

Goodnight, folks!

Overheard:

Jack and Ellie have done yard work with me for the day and have asked to watch a movie. If they can agree on one, sure, I said.

Overheard:

Ellie: Jack, I don't like Star Wars.
Jack: But Ellie, look, there's a princess. Princess Leia, see?

Ah, the art of manipulation at work...

Legos and Kittens and Potties, oh my!

Jack has been saving money FOREVER. Ever since we informed him that he was old enough to work and buy his own things. No more asking and receiving, just plain, hard work and reward. OK, I'm not sure bringing in the mail every day counts as hard work, but it is a chore that I appreciate getting done and at 10 cents a day per chore, he works hard at it. At that rate, you can tell he really had to WORK for this. I think Legos are ridiculously expensive, but I suspect that isn't the point. He wanted this. He made a goal, he worked and worked and worked (huge thanks to Chris and Rhonda Elliott who hired him one day to do some work they really didn't need help with and then paid him $10 in silver dollar coins. It was just one of the kindest and best things to do and was a huge boost to his savings plan!). Today, we went and picked up his set. He is counting down the hours until we sit down and put the X-wing fighter together. I know, you're all excited that I get to do fun stuff like this.

We got a kitten! I have resisted the pleas around my house for a cat for years. If you scroll back in these posts to last fall, you will recall our failed few weeks with a very cute stray. But then Robbie came along and he is OBSESSED with cats. He LOVES them. There aren't enough cap letters in the alphabet to get that point across. So, for his birthday that is coming up, Jack suggested we get him a kitten. So when free, litter trained, 12-week-old kittens showed up on Freecycle, we went to look. I went to pick up a short-haired gray female. But Kit, as the kids named him, waltzed in looking for them as they looked for kittens and wouldn't leave them alone. I knew because Kit was seeking the kids' attention that he was the cat for us. We picked up his sister, who we call Daisy, for Aubrey. I wasn't wrong. They're great kittens (thus far, we are only four days in) and Kit is wildly tolerant of Robbie hauling him around. I probably don't need one more thing to take care of, but I think Kit and Daisy are pretty charming. The only member of the family who isn't thrilled is Jimmy. It isn't that he doesn't like the kittens; he does. They don't like him and giving them attention has ratcheted up his already needy-for-attention demeanor. I have a very hard time explaining to the dog that I have always been more a cat person than a dog person and I'm sorry that I like petting them better. Poor guy.

Finally, and I don't have a picture of this one, but Robbie pooped in the potty today. I can say that on this blog because, a) it's my quasi journal and b) you're my friends. I want to remember this in case it never happens again. After a long day that included a trip to Niagara Falls, the above trip to Toys R Us for the Great Lego Purchase, we came home for a quick bath. As I was getting the kids in their PJs (well, Robbie, the other two wrangle themselves) he was holding his oh you know, and acting like he had to go potty. So, I asked him. He enthusiastically said yes and we ran to the bathroom with Jack and Ellie hot on our tails. He sat there like the king of the world, did his business and then clapped for himself. Naturally, we joined in.

I swear if he potty trains himself he will become my favorite child.