Some Days... You gotta laugh to keep from crying...

That was my day yesterday... As a rule, Wednesday's are our hectic days, anyway... The kids have their "enrichment classes" at the charter school, where they get to take extra-curricular classes with other home schooled kids, like farming, and PE and art, woodshop, metal shop, computers, science, etc... They really enjoy meeting up with friends and doing new things other than what we do at home, and I enjoy a morning break usually at my mom's. While #'s 3 and 4 are done at 12:30, the oldest has a woodshop class until 3:00, and then we pick him up and head home to throw something together for dinner before we leave for CCD at 6:00.

Well, this week to add to our Wednesday fun, I had a doctor's appointment. I figured it was 'creative scheduling' since the kids would be at school and mom would only have to watch the baby. But, THIS Wednesday morning, after I loaded up the van and jumped in to start it to take the kids to school, low and behold, that "weak battery" that we knew we were going to have to replace soon, decided it had seen it's final start... My neighbor, bless his heart, came to our rescue, attempting to jump it back to life, even cleaning the connector cables for me, and still, to no avail... and it turned out to be HIS 76th birthday!! I felt so bad! even though he said he didn't mind... So, I call my mom and ask if she can come stay with the baby while I use her car to take the kids to school, it's 9:20. School started at 9:15 and the kids are freaking out because they are late... mom shows up at 9:40 and jumps out of her little Nissan Sentra and I jump in. The kids are 30 minutes late but they make it to class. I go back to my house to get mom and the baby (we wouldn't all fit in her little car at once...) to take them back to her house so I can shower and get to my doctor appointment by 11:00. Good thing I cancelled that 10:00am ultra sound two days ago... It is now 10:30 and my doctors office is across town, probably 20-30 minutes away...

I jump in and out of the shower, throw on my dress, realizing I forgot my slip (oops... don't tell my mom...), comb out my wet hair and head out the door to the doctor's. Arriving 15 minutes late, I explain my morning and all is well as I take a seat and wait to see the doctor.

When my name is called they check my BP (116/48) and my weight (4 lbs. less) and head for the exam room. My doctor enters with his usual smile asking me how I'm feeling, and we begin to talk about my "issues"... "so, you're not checking your blood sugar?"

*sigh* "Doc, I'm not trying to be a 'rebel patient', I'm really not... but my issue with pregnancy has always been my blood pressure, and my BP right now is so GOOD, it's ridiculous! "

he says, "Wow! (looking at my chart) that's better than mine! "

I continue, "but I'm 42 years old, I have just a few weeks left and this is my 5th baby... I really can't handle all these tests, and counseling and extra stuff... my insurance doesn't want to cover diabetic counseling 100%, I don't have time to make MORE appointments or the patience to check my blood. I followed your simple instructions to cut back on sweets and carbs, more protien and exercise, and I really feel great! Especially about my BP..."

he said, "You lost 4 lbs. What happened?"

"You guys made me paranoid about this blood glucose thing!! I admit, I probably wasn't watching the sugar and carb intake as much as i should have, and I just cut back... and tried to exercise more... It apparently worked..."

Although he would like to have another look at the baby with an ultra sound to check the size again before delivery, he understood why I really don't want to, unless it's completely necessary.... We discussed possible VBAC and he said after 3 c-secs, he really wasn't comfortable with 'trying' to have a VBAC. IF my water breaks and my body naturally begins to go that direction, while waiting for a scheduled surgery, okay, but otherwise, we will schedule surgery on my next visit on the 20th. I'm okay with that...

So! No more tests, no more diagnostics, no more specialists, no more ultra sounds (unless there's an emergency...) Surgery will be scheduled sometime the first week of November...

So, I get out of my appointment, grab something to eat and head back to mom's at about 1:00. At mom's I pull out my ingredients that I brought to make the cookies that I said I would take to my daughters CCD class that evening. As I unpacked, I discovered I left my recipe at home, so I call my sister to get it from her again, (it's her recipe...). As I'm writing it down, it occurs to me that I left the CHIPS for the chocolate CHIP cookies I was going to make, at home!! sheesh!! NOW what?! My sister, bless her heart, came to my rescue, volunteering to make them for me... Whew! One less thing on my list! Now I will just have to stop at the store on my way home to purchase drinks to go with the cookies...

We pack up from grandma's into her little car (we were jokingly calling it the circus clown car because I'm sure we were quite a site piling in and out of it! lol!! ) and head BACK to the school to pick up my oldest from woodshop at 3:00. When we pull up he proudly walks out carrying this HUGE CD/DVD rack that he just finished in class! Of ALL days for him to bring this home!! lol... so he spent the next 5 minutes trying to STUFF it in to the trunk with all of our other stuff that we already had in there (baking stuff, my personal stuff that I took to get ready for the doctor, the baby's potty seat, the kids binders, etc...) lolol... That finally accomplished we head down the road to the store to get the drinks.

At the store we get the drinks and I used my coupon for the "free milk" that I got the previous week when I bought several boxes of a certain cereal. The coupon said "FREE 1 gallon of milk valued at $5 or less". The lady was annoyed because the milk rang up at $4.99 and the register only deducted $3.99.... "Well, that coupon is for the $3.99 milk"

"But it doesn't say that. It just says, $5.00 or less..."

"well, it's only a dollar... "

"So, are YOU going to give me a dollar?..."

She sent me to the "information booth" where THAT person didn't know what to do, so she ended up coming over and doing it herself, anyway... oh well, lady... sorry to mess up your day... wanna trade? ; )

We get home close to 4:00 and pile out of Grandma's circus clown car and unpack the trunk, CD/DVD rack and all! : ) Frozen dinners tonight! I find a message on my phone machine from earlier in the day reminding me to bring snacks for CCD and asking me to call back to confirm. But when I did, there was no answer. Oh well... I was prepared... Hubby got home from work and took my battery out of my van and headed to the auto store to get a new one. $70 later he returned to put it BACK in my van, only to have it STILL not start... Great! So, leaving a very grumpy husband with a mad baby that didn't want to be left behind, at 5:30 we grab the drinks out of the fridge, pack the circus clown car back up and head to my sisters to pick up the cookies she graciously baked for me!

I go to my daughters 1st grade CCD class to find they have a sub teacher. A dad, bless his heart is trying quite unsuccessfully to calm down a class room of 42 wriggly 1st graders... oh well.. goes with the rest of the day! lol... I VERY tiredly sit through class waiting for "snack time" at the end, when I discover BECAUSE I didn't call that lady back (that left a message on my machine) she had ANOTHER mom bring snack, instead! so now they had DOUBLE... Okay, whatever... I had signed up for THIS day and I just hope they don't expect me to bring snack AGAIN at another time... I already thought that snacks AND drinks for 40+ kids was WAY TOO MUCH to expect one mom to bring to class... and I purposefully chose a class right now so I wouldn't have to worry about it later...

After class we head home where I am TOTALLY spent and exhausted! Hubby has calmed down and we discuss that we will just have to call our mechanic in the morning and see what he tells us about the van and deal with the fall out if and when it comes...

Thankfully, when I called and saw my mechanic this morning, the problem with the van turned out to be pretty minimal, with having to replace the alternator fuse. The alternator was fine (Thank you, Jesus!) My mechanic (a very honest one!) was only going to charge me $5, but I gave him $20, because I was SO thankful! We were honestly expecting a 3 digit price... We went and picked up Grandma so that she could retrieve her circus clown car, and when I thought I could finally sit down and try and get some school work done, I just couldn't... My motivation out the window, the kids took advantage of my lack of enthusiasm for school and I took advantage of the baby's nap and went in to my room and flopped on the bed, myself, for a good hour, hour and a half... When I got up, I had enough energy to do the dishes and monitor my oldest as he graciously made dinner for us : )

So, yeah, it's been a hectic few days, but God is good, and we've come out, once again, on the other side... Much to be thankful for... And if you've stayed with this story this long, it's probably because you can TOTALLY relate! Thank You, Jesus, for trials and challenges, for answered prayers, for your continual reminders that you walk with me through it all...