Sweet Little Thing: inspire me monday




The other day was a story to go down in the annals of possibly all time most amazing trips with my three very young children to Hobby Lobby EVA. My emotions were all over the place on that trip. Hope, resolve, speedy and decisive decision-making. Decisive decision-making? Ok then. 



More emotions: pride over the "awwww how sweet" looks from fellow patrons to super awesome crafty store. Although sometimes I might misconstrue those looks and what the people really mean while seeing me pushing a cart with 1 child hanging off the front of the cart with his head going upside down, and another one sitting in the cart trying to pull the other ones ear, and then there is the littlest one in the front of the cart seat thingy thing who is trying to get up and stand on the seat.....I'm thinking what they might really be thinking is "what kind of crazy coffee did that mom get into to think that she could get away with this stunt of successfully shopping for a birthday party. That girl done lost her mind!!!!"



More emotions: anger, frustration, impatience, happy, embarrassment, exhaustion. And finally eye-opening, God-breathed, goosebump-inducing, throat-swelling life lessons.

So we make a mad dash to the fabric section so I can find fabric stuff to make a flag banner thingy. Mind u, I'm not crafty! Sometimes, though, I live in this alternative reality. Maybe some of you have heard of it.its called Pintrest. We started in the birthday section on one end of the fairly large store. Children escaped and were wrangled back. Bday section was not floating my party planning boat.






So we briskly stroll over there. We are on a time crunch. No dilly dally. Keep almost 5 year old motivated to walk faster and not hang on the side of the cart which subsequently causes me to slam into middle row displays. Dang girl, drive straight! 



The burlap looks expensive. 8.99/yard. Get outa here- I ain't payin that much! So we are looking for other options. 



"mom, I have to go potty".......says a little voice. 



(me praying that I turn around and see another mom with a smal child with a similar tone of voice as my own sweet Chase).......to no avail.it's Chase.



(in my head I want to say....just pee in your pull up) some of you are gasping for air at such a dasterdly parenting thought- I know! But alas....I knew I had to take the potty training high road. 



So we high tail it back to the other side of the store to the bathrooms. 



Just in the nick of time. Both big boys run in and pee. Its a flipping total body workout to take your kids into bathrooms, bending, twisting,lunging your way to pulling pants down, holding chase up to the potty cuz these pottys were clearly all made with the idea that all women who shop at Hobby Lobby are tall, ex-WNBA ballers. Mind you while balancing the baby on the hip. Then to get all his clothes back on and over to the sink where again shorty Mc short bottom can't reach. So engage those mommy biceps and lifting and twisting and washing and hand drying. Many moms and grandmas pass through and just smile and seem to think,"oh how sweet I remember those days".....



Ok....back to the other end of store for fabric. Decide on fabric Shannon. You can do this! Searching,price checking,managing whiners about this and that and running here and there and "get over here's". rushed. Irritated with kids not listening too well. Overwhelmed by fabric. No where near a decision. 



Then Leighton says....."mom....I need to go poop!!!!!" 



Clearly when we were in the bathroom. On the other end of the store. Just 2 minutes ago....that clearly was not the right time. Now....2 minutes later. Now we are ready to roll! So we sprint back to the other side of the store. Baby is now standing on cart seat hanging on to my neck hugging me giggling over his stunt, chase rummaging for a snack in my purse. And we make it. I let Leighton go in alone while I stand right outside with thing 2 and thing 3. After opening the bathroom door and peeking in a bunch of times to make sure we didn't have to add a toilet bowl rescue to the story I just push the cart in the dang restroom.Forget the rules!!! Leighton is almost done and now chase in the cart and Beckett in the cart seat are fighting over the binoculars that Leighton had entrusted to chase during his bathroom visit. All of the sudden there is a big scream. Not from the two fighting but from Leighton.



"mom! Mom! There is a cricket in my underpants!" 



And I'm all...."say whaaaaaaaaat!" 



So I dash to the stall with the cart of the best merchandise no money can buy!in tow,to rescue 

The wonder-boy #1 with jumpy underoos. Cricket was in fact in the boys underpants but luckily they were not engaged on the Boy but were on the floor in a pile. So with my stealthy best gangsta mom move I flicked that thing right into the stall and gave my shoulder a little hip hop brush-off move (because really.....who else is gonna congratulate you in the bathroom for rescuing wonderboys and coming out complete with germ-free hands). 



(no, seriously......give yourselves a hand all you gangsta moms Rollin in the aisles with your favorite home-boys and girls!) wait, I'm still bein all serious on you now. If you mamas and daddi-os out there just give yo'selves way more credit and be proud of how truly awesome u are at this most important job you'll ever hold, your/our kids will grow up knowing how to love and be proud of themselves too. And those are the values/beliefs that can never be spoken, only shown)-insert fist-pump now if u hear me. 



Ok......so there we were bursting outa the restroom, sweatin bullets, the way a gangsta mom should, and dashing back to the fabric section to accomplish just one task during this roller coaster of a trip. 



"just one task Lord. Just one is all I ask. I wanted the burlap but I'll settle for tan cotton,Lord. Just let us get outa heaaa with one cart load of happy,compliant humans and a little clearance fabric to boot." .........oh and please don't let Beckett poop!" 



You would be amazed at how much God loves even our little not so important in the grand scheme of things pleas. Like moms who just need one task checked off the list matter to Him. The burlap fabric that matters to me, matters to Him. 



I think it's sort of like how I know that it it totally not a big deal whether Chase wears the super or spiderman underpants. Underpants are underpants right? But if his little heart tells him it's the superman underpants that he wants today and that makes him smile.....then by all means.....I wanna see that boy smile. His smile lights up the darkest day. I think that's how God feels about us. We are His kids. 



So, I'm done with my msybe not so trivial little prayer and we zoom over to the fabric lady with my boring non-burlap,cheaper fabric and I tell the lady what I've got up my sleeves with my birthday bunting flag banner and how I wanted burlap but it's like 8.99 and thats too much and stuff and first she just stops and half smiles/ half laughs at my cart of naughty merchandise. And I say, because I am now at the point of blunt, get me outa heaaaa- honesty, "what..... Are u laughing at me with all my kids in the cart thinking I'm crazy for doing this?" 



And she smiles and so sweetly and sincerely looks at them and says, "No,sweetie...........I am just taking them all in. My daughter has three boys very close to their age and ohhhh they are just oh.so.precious, aren't they?!"



She was in love with my cart. My cart full of monkey-acting, naughty-baby standing, escaping, two-time potty using, sweat-inducing cart. 



SHE WAS IN LOVE WITH MY CART!!!!!!!! 



( why wasn't I in love with my cart at that moment?) 



Why did I not see how beautiful my messy cart was? 



Why did I not thank the Lord for the cart that caused me to sweat my mommy-booty almost sheer off? 



Why did it take a sweet lady in the fabric section to remind of these things that I so often, in the rush to "get it all done", don't see?



My beautiful cart! 



My throat doubled in size. Tears welled. 



It's so full. 



14 items on the list didn't get checked and I didn't find the correct color table cloth for the party. An empty cart. 



But a full cart.

(This is what Ann Vonskamp in the One Thousand Gifts is talking about!)






Then the lady says "the burlap isn't 8.99 honey, it's $3.99.Less than this tan cotton you picked instead. Let's just go back and grab you the burlap you really wanted. She returns with my burlap. We smile and visit and pay. We stroll out of the store and  it's starting to make sense.  




And we arrive safely home with the best cart money can can't buy.



Ohhhh yeah. And I scored some pretty fly burlap. 



{Thank you, Lord}

now...while you for sure are the most awesome person today....

somebody really needs to pop my bubble here.

meaning the bubble that says i should be decorating anything in my house.

seriously...this is what i came up with for my bathroom about a month ago.

seeee-riously. this is how i hang crap at my house. my husband is so precise and particular and i'm all like, hey, just lob it up there, eye ball that sucker and call it good. mind you, there are no photos in the frames.nor is there any way to actually put photos in them. AND if you can get beyond the totally, ridiculously crooked nature of the frames, one might also notice how off-centered this "art grouping" is from the towel rack. which by the way.....why the bleepity bleep is there a towel rack there? like, wouldn't a shelf or something make more sense? it's been there for 7 years and it just dawned on me that i don't like it. by the way, make sure you join me for the next DIY post titled "Why Shannon Should NEVER do a DIY project-EVA-AGAIN". we will use this picture and many more as evidence.

and then, it was my sis-in-laws bday. Happy Birthday Valerie!

Leighton stabbed a knife in her heart when he asked me if Aaron (my bro) and Valerie were his grandparents......

The next day, he pulled the knife out and stitched up the wound by saying...when she walked into his room with her pretty new dress on....."valerie....you look.....WOW!" so it's all good now. i hope.

baby beach bum toes.

a few weeks ago, my totally handy man husband made us this.

this equals many hours of fun for the children, accompanied by many hours of sanity for their mother.

chase is just one cool dude for whom which i am guessing parents of future teenage girls in our circle may want to keep an eye on. always a sparkle in that boys eyes.

the next generation of cool.

some days....i run across these little strange things in my own home or, say, hanging on my fridge that just make me stop and go...really?

in more exciting news....

my middle child is almost completely potty trained!!!! yahooo!!! now we need to start working on writing his name which he wrote at the top of the page. thus the lessons.

then we went to this really cool fireworks stand.