Pregnancy brain (at its worst), Walmart, and my knight in shining armor

There is something magical about sleeping children.  Maybe it's the silence, the quiet, the lack of noise, the still, the calm...  :)

And it is lovely to wake up to to their smiling faces.  Days are brighter, and though much noisier, they are full of wonder and excitement.  You just never know what might happen...

It all started out like any other normal Tuesday morning.

I heard the floorboards creak and the door slowly open.  Two big brown eyes topped by a wild brown mane peeked over the edge of my bed.

"Mommy, is it time to get up?"

I convinced him to snuggle with me in bed just for a few minutes while I woke up my brain.

I checked the clock: 7:17 am.  I panicked!  Chase was supposed to leave at 6:00 am for an early meeting in Lincoln!  I rolled over throwing out my arm to see if he was still in bed.

Whew.  Nothing but a pile of pillows.  I must have been sleeping hard not to hear his alarm?  Oh well.  It's Tuesday.  It's TUESDAY.  I have to get up!

At 7:20 am, Connor and I rolled out of bed and Spencer greeted us with a, "Mama!" as we headed to wake Lily for school.

This was the day I was going to try something new - grocery shopping during preschool so that I only had the two boys with me.  That meant that in the next 40 minutes, I had to get everyone dressed, teeth brushed (maybe?), feed them breakfast, pack the diaper bag, load everyone and everything into the car, and get Lily to school by 8:00 am.

A few minutes in, I caved and decided the boys could ride to Grand Island in their jammies.  I'd change them in the car in the parking lot of Walmart.  Food was more critical than clothes just then.

PB&J's all around for breakfast. Except there wasn't enough bread for me.  Lily and I managed to get our teeth brushed, and I even made a super healthy smoothie for me to drink on the drive to town since I fed everyone but myself.

All three kids, backpack, diaper bag, smoothie, snacks, cups, coats, blankets, and all manner of everything anyone could possibly need (so I thought) was rushed to the warming van (I even remembered to start it early so it was warm - GO ME!).

We were only 7 minutes late to school - praise the Lord that Mrs. Leonard has grace for preschool parents new to this whole school thing!  I have GOT to start setting an alarm for 7:00 am on school days and not relying on the kids to wake me.

The boys and I settled in for the 30 minute drive to town.  I connected with my sister-in-law on the way and even took a minute to check in with Chase to make sure that he'd made it to his meeting.

As I pulled into the Walmart parking lot at 8:40 am, I was feeling like I had this parenting/Mom thing down - at least for the moment.  I mean, I had rocked this morning!

I lumbered/crawled my 6-month pregnant self into the back seat of the van, unbuckled the boys, and wrestled them into their clothes.  They were hungry again (it had, after all, been a whole 50 minutes since they'd eaten), so I promised to buy them a banana at the start of our Walmart run, and then they'd be happy for the duration.

Both boys were clamoring to push the button to open the van's automatic door when it hit me like a ton of bricks:  my purse.

My purse, wallet, all of my credit cards, cash and checkbook were on the couch.  At my house.  Thirty minutes away.  And my boys were on the verge of pitching the fit of a lifetime because they wanted their promised banana.

No big deal, because Chase works in GI! I thought.  ...Except for that *&#@* early meeting in Lincoln this morning...

"Nananananana," Spencer (15 months) repeated over and over and over again while trying to weasel his way past his big brother to be the first out the door.

Frantic, I called Chase again.  "My purse is at home!" I say in terror.

He laughs.

Sharply I reply, "Honey, I need a SOLUTION!"

Chase will be back to town in an hour and a half - he's already on the road.  Except that I have to leave town in exactly an hour and a half to get back to pick Lily up from preschool (it's a 1/2 day preschool).

He instantly turns serious and agrees to call a coworker of his to see if she would drive across town once I have a cart full and pay for my necessities.

Still being accosted by my sons regarding the promised bananas (who are these children?  Did I somehow switch kids with Donkey Kong?!?), I scrounge through the glove box and bless my lazy, forgetful, 2-months-ago self for putting those three $1 bills in the glove box rather than taking the time to stick them back in my purse.

Humiliated I head into Walmart.

I get the call - she graciously agreed to come across town to bail me out of my predicament.

We head to the banana stand and get the two most-yellow bananas we can find.  Why are they always either solid green or yellow/brown?  Is a banana ever perfectly ripe for eating in the store? 

$0.47 later, my boys were happy and I began filling my cart.  We spent a little over an hour meandering through the store getting a little of this and a bit of that, never sure if Chase's sweet coworker would think me foolish as she watched my purchases being loaded onto the conveyor, or if she'd simply smile and understand because she is the mother of multiple children as well.  (Ok, so I knew she'd do the latter, but seriously. How embarrassing!?!)

I'm just about to text that I need her to start heading my way when I get a call from Chase - the drive didn't take that long.  He's within 25 minutes.  Can we wait that long?

I check the time, and we CAN.  It will be PERFECT!  I loop back through the meat, cheese, butter, milk, and dairy aisles to return the items I'd just picked up, knowing I'd be looping back by again in 15 to 20 minutes to grab the same things.  No sense in leaving them warming in my cart an extra 20 minutes.

Eventually, the boys helped me unload our finds onto the conveyor, and I watched as my husband rounded the corner when the checker was 1/2 through our haul.

Never in my life had Chase looked like such a knight in shining armor!

Dark, handsome, pushing an empty grocery cart to load my bags into, and (most of all) with methods of payment in his pocket, he entered the scene to much elation!

We made it back exactly in time to pick Lily up from preschool, she unsuspecting of our adventure while she learned about the letter "N."

I try not to blame too much on pregnancy, but as I'm almost into my 3rd trimester (the 4th time around) it's getting harder.  Pregnancy brain is real, people.  And there are consequences.  If ever it should hit you with such force, I hope there's a knight in shining armor (perhaps with a credit card) to come bail you out.

Hard

Sometimes life is just hard.  Not like, "I burned supper" or like "my clothes don't fit right" hard.  Not even "my kid is sick" hard or "I'm not sure how I'm going to cover my car insurance this month" hard.

Those things are hard too.  But sometimes life is like "I don't know which move to make but I have to make a move" hard or "I hate that tightening in my stomach when I see that phone number again and again" hard.  Or even like "I don't know how I'm going to cover my car insurance this month, let alone all of the other bills piling up for months in front of me" hard.  

It's like life just knocks the wind out of you sometimes, but you can't stop.  So you stumble on, breathless, praying your foot falls on solid ground and not in another hole because you already twisted your ankle.  Twice.

I'm ok.  Chase is ok.  Our children are ok.  Nothing is wrong in our world.  Except that people all around us are facing hard things.  Really hard things.  Not #firstworldproblems.  Many of them, most of them #sinproblems.  And while we try really hard not to take on burdens that are not our own, we also walk through the valleys with these people, because we love them.  And that's what love does.

That's not to say that these dear ones committed the sin that has them facing their particular difficulty.  For many that's not the case.

Instead, many times, these people I love are left picking up the pieces after someone else's "mistake," "screw up," "bad decision," or whatever other word you want to use for sin.

There are times life feels so rosy I can almost forget we live in a broken world.  

Not tonight.  Tonight everything feels very broken.  

Like, can't anyone figure out that the decisions you make affect those around you, and that matters?  Can't people see that so often it's the innocent that really pay the price?  What darkness is this, what lies play in people's minds that convince them to do these things - often over, and over, and over, and over again?

But then, I know the answer.  

"For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of darkness of this age, against spiritual wickedness in high places."

Ah.  That blasted devil.

So life is hard sometimes.  Truly hard.

And we soldier on.  Because as long as there is the breath of life, there is hope.  Because as long as the sun rises again, there is hope.  Because somewhere, deep in our deepest souls we know we just can't give up.

And so we continue to walk through the valley, knowing that somewhere, perhaps just on the other side of that rise, there is a mountain.  And when we finally claw our way to the top, it will all be worth it.