Soccer Mom for a Day

I usually don't complain about have an UNinteresting life. I think my subconscious may be cured due to having a Mom that always fixed complaints like that. I think maybe Mondays like today are humorous reminders from my God that things could always be worse...even when I hadn't thought they were bad in the first place. :-)

Today was the kids' first day of VBS at a friend's church in town. Note: I take them about everywhere I go--alot of the time I spoil them for lunch or treat them, so this was not the first time.
I packed up all four little ones in the car and left this morning at 8:30. They were all really nervous, since it was a strange church and they didn't know a soul. I'd volunteered to help in anyway I could (Phelisha and I previously worked there, so we knew the leaders), since I knew Jaelyn (3) and Caleb (6) wouldn't let me leave their side. It was a little chaotic to begin with since we were trying to find proper age groups, and I felt bad just sending Jacklyn (10) and Josh (9) off alone with a bunch of strangers in a 6th grade class since no one could find their 4/5th grade group. Jaelyn refused to go with the preschoolers, so she came with Caleb and I in the 1/2nd grade group. Surprisingly, she had a good time and listened, and did the projects well. Caleb, however, was not engaging and had an upset stomach throughout the morning. It ended up I had to leave Jaelyn to take him to the bathroom, and turned out he'd had an accident.
The worst kind.
I got him cleaned up, we get back to the group, and thankfully his clothes were rescued sufficiently and he was good for the rest of the day (what I didn't know was that on the other side of the church, Josh's stomach was doing the same thing).

After three hours of projects, games, movie, snacks, etc, I load up my four little ones and head into town to get water and dishwashing soap, and fill up a gas tank for the mower. In the middle of town, Josh says nervously from the back, "Jen, I feel like I need to throw up." I told him to hold on so I could stop at the coming gas station, but it was for naught. I didn't get the window rolled down soon enough to save the inside of the door, but good enough that I didn't have a too-terrible mess to clean up--amazingly, I've still got a good attitude about it all at this point! I bought Josh a 7up at the gas station, cleaned up the inside of the car door best I could with limited resources: 7up is sticky, but it sure kills the smell that would encourage three other kids to follow in the throwing up.
Off we go again. We went to Walmart, I bought the kids some Cheetos and Gatorade for on the way home since it was past lunch, but it wouldn't spoil supper. We were uneventul...until the next gas station where I was to fill up the mower tank. I filled both tank and car, left Jacklyn in charge, locked the doors and told her to unlock them for me when I came back. Uhem. Upon my return, I look into the back windows to see Jaelyn and Caleb fighting over a full 7up bottle, and envision it everywhere. About to react, I went for the door to find it's locked. I bang on the window and signal Jacklyn to unlock, but she's buckled in and trying to get them to stop fighting (from the front seat, mind you). She unbuckles herself, and this is when it went slow motion for me...she reaches back to get Jaelyn to stop and knocks the full Gatorade out of Josh's hands (who is also buckled in). So I'm standing outside a locked Chrysler at the pump of Shell, watching 7up at the point of combustion in the hands of a 6 and 3 year old, and a Gatorade bottle glug-glugging it's every drop onto the floor of the car.
The bystanders probably thought I was a nut. I cracked up laughing. Laughing, laughing, laughing! At the hilarious audacity of what just happened, as I stood to merely watch, helpless to stop any further catastrophe.

When I thought nothing else could happen, they actually did end up spilling half the bag of Cheetos. I hardly said anything. Considering I survived the day as if it was perfectly natural for all such things to happen, and we'd be home soon to clean it up, there wasn't anything more to say.

We're going again in the morning. The stomach bug is gone. I promised them cheeseburgers tomorrow...thankfully this hardly ever happens, and never so many things at once. I suppose we'll survive anything now, even without the football helmets. :-)