Mother's Day.

I haven't posted in forever.  Partly because my most faithful commenter (Queen of Brussel Sprouts) has suffered a stroke and is recovering.  How I CRAVE her healing!  I miss that woman tremendously.  God is healing that precious woman and I'll just have to suck it up and pray my heart out.  The other part is that I've been tremendously busy taking care of my little ones, my husband and helping my bestie, who lost her husband a few weeks ago.

Busy times.

Yesterday was so magical, though, that I need to share it with you.

The day started out with a poke in the cheek.  Aquaman was standing by me saying, "Mom, MOM, mom, it's mother's day!  MOOOM!" while poking me.  He and Spidey were standing by my bed with gifts in hand.  Oh the JOY!  Paper flowers sprayed with perfume, a picture in a frame Aquaman made!  Coupons to paint my nails and to make cupcakes together from Spidey!

Superdad made sure I didn't have to even look at the kitchen all day.  I picked out the kidlets' clothes and Superdad got them ready for church.  I wasn't really looking forward to church, since four wiggly kids kinda doesn't seem like a gift to me, but, amazingly, all four behaved.

And the children's sermon came.  The associate pastor was asking what moms do for you.  Most of the kids answered with "make dinner" or something along those lines.  Our Wonder Woman sat patiently with her hand raised.  That alone is a miracle.  She didn't interrupt, didn't hang on him, didn't bounce up and down, just sat with her hand straight up in the air waiting to be acknowledged.  When PastorJ called on her, her voice was loud and clear.  "They keep us SAFE." she said.  A minute later she was listening to PastorJ talk about how God gave us moms and she ran to hug me.  A huge hug.  An honest hug.

Aquaman set me straight, though.  When PastorJ was talking about how much moms love their kids, he shook his head no.  THAT GOOF!  I asked him about it later and he told me he wasn't even listening and of COURSE I love him.

Bubbles overcame her Daddy-girlness just enough to give me hugs and kisses.

Magical day.  My little ones know I'm Mom.

I'm Mom.

To four.

Mom.

FINAL!

The first time we saw our daughters.

My first hug with my daughter!  It brought such joy to my heart I had to walk away and cry.  Wonder Woman sure did steal my heart quickly!

Superdad's first hug with Bubbles.  She has him wrapped tightly around her little finger, and it all started with that first hug!  Quite the Daddy's girl, she is!

That was the first day!  The next day the boys met their new sisters. . .

 Bubbles. . . on the phone, with Aquaman (looking mighty proud!)

 Wonder Woman and Spidey, why does this picture make me nervous?  And with both of her big brothers. . .

we are final!

pics to follow.  I'm too tired (battling illness) to share our joy at the moment, but i will as soon as i'm feeling better!

another fail I forgot to tell you about.

After our balloon ding dong ditch went awry, we decided to do one for another friend.  Spidey wrote a precious note (that I so should have taken pictures of) telling her that God loves her.  Aquaman drew a picture of her and our car speeding away.  We wrapped both around a candle I thought she'd like and tied it with a ribbon.

The boys placed the packet on her porch.

They ran and hid.  She came out and exclaimed at how thoughtful someone was.  Aquaman went zooming around the house yelling, "IT WAS US!  IT WAS US" and both boys gleefully raced around her yard.

She grinned (thankfully she loves us).

Aquaman began to yell for help.  He and Spidey stopped racing and walked to me.

Without Aquaman's shoes.

Yup, he'd gotten his shoes (his SCHOOL shoes) stuck in a puddle.  Our target went inside, got paper towels and a bag, then corralled my kiddoes whilst I plucked my way to the puddle, and retrieved the errant shoes.

FAIL.  That's right, our target ended up providing the kindness!

seriously, can we GET THIS RIGHT?

Two more epic fails!  It's a good thing I've known for a long time that plans rarely go . . . well, according to plan!

We went to a friend's house to play.  On the way home I slipped through the Stake 'n Shake drive thru to get any of my campers who ate dinner a milkshake.  Three fourths of the kids ate, but I ordered 4 anyway (OK, OK, five. . . one for me).  Bubbles decided to throw her hamburger, so we figured it would be a good time to do a ding dong ditch for some friends.  I called the mom to make sure they were home AND could have milkshakes.  (Remember when we tried to leave balloons?  Same fam).

Spidey was a bit upset that the mom knew, but was excited anyway.  So, I turned my mom-mobile around, got another chocolate shake and headed to our secret hiding parking spot.  Spidey and Aquaman divied up the duties and flew out of the car.  I watched them walk carefully to the door, where they disappeared from view.  A few seconds later I saw their little bodies running to a hiding spot we'd picked out the last time we attempted the ding dong ditch.

Then I saw the bodies running out again, and back.

And out again.

Aquaman's voice pealed through the quiet evening air, "IT'S US!  IT'S US!"

Spidey responded, "AQUAMAN!" (only he used his real name), "THEY WEREN'T SUPPOSED TO KNOW WHO DID IT."

Both my boys ran out and began frolicking with our targets.

It took 15 minutes (and the other mom) to round up Aquaman.

FAIL number one.

The next day we were eating dinner out and decided to buy some one's dinner.  Some one random.  Until I heard my name being called, looked up and saw an old friend.  We did pay for their meal (through the waitress, who was AWESOME), and went to scurry away before she found out.  Alas, Spidey smelled something.  He was sitting next to Bubbles.  Superdad took Spidey and Aquaman to the bathroom, I scooped up Bubbles and attempted to herd Wonder Woman (who is exceedingly hard to herd).  The funk pierced through my stuffy nose.

When Superdad emerged with our boys, I handed Bubbles to him.  He looked down and said, "Uh, honey?  Why didn't you tell me Bubbles is covered in poop?"  I looked at Bubbles.  IT WAS ALL OVER HER BACK.  I looked at my arm.  My sleeve had poop on it.  My shirt had poop on it.  BUT BUT BUT

WE WERE GOING SHOPPING!  I can NEVER make it shopping anymore (which does save a ton of cash, but then there's no way I can clothe my growing kidlets).

No worries, I always have a change of clothes and a bazillion wipes in the mom-mobile, as well as plastic bags.  We can handle this.  I found the change of clothes.  Wipes, wipes, wipes.  I usually have about three containers of wipes floating around. . . and not ONE to be found (except the window wipes for Wonder Woman to wipe her spit off her window.  It's gross.)

No. Wipes.

Superdad took her poop covered shirt off, used one of the bazillion diapers we had floating around to wipe her back, stuck my WHITE (did I mention I was wearing a WHITE jacket?) jacket on the back and bottom of her car seat and drove us home.  With the windows open.  When we got home I hosed that girl off.

Here's the thing.  It wasn't a huge blow out.  It was a CHEAP DIAPER!  Now I know why I've never used cheap diapers before!  Uh, not so cheap when you count in the extra wipes, extra clothes, extra laundry. . .

FAIL.

RANDOM ACT OF KINDNESS FAIL.

We are SO not good at kindness.

You already know how our first attempt went.  I still pray that the fear we caused that poor woman subsides.  Today we tried to do a ding dong ditch for some good friends.  The mission was simple:  tie two balloons to candy bars, ring the bell and run.

I'd called earlier in the day to "ask if they want to meet at the park" to determine when they'd be home.  Since my friend told me they would be home at 4:30, we assumed 5:15 was safe.  Nope, not there.  We figured we'd try again later.

I left the balloons in the car.

When we went back outside, one popped.

So I untied everything and then retied it all with one balloon.  No biggie.  We snuck back and tried again.

They still weren't home.
Seriously.
Not home.


So, we ran back to our van.  Only poor Aquaman accidentally let the one remaining balloon go.

random act of kindness means an APB for the superheroes. . .

The superheroes need practice with kindness.  Seriously.

Our first idea wouldn't work because the targets weren't home.

So, we ran to the grocery.  Superdad was annoyed.  He groused that we were going "so late".  He crabbed that we were buying flowers.  He seriously objected to giving FOOD WORKERS flowers because it's not sanitary.  Grumpy Superdad.

Spidey and I zipped into the grocery and bought flowers.  It took forever for my card to go through (just the buying food get gas discounts card).  The people behind us (in the express lane, no less) were NOT amused.  However, we dashed back to the car giggling away.  Superdad asked me to drive.

So, we drove across the street and fine-tuned our plan.  Aquaman would reach across Wonder Woman and hand the flowers to the worker AFTER we got our food and all of us would yell "THANK YOU."

Here's what happened:

She handed us the food.  I said "hang on a second" and pulled up a foot so Aquaman could reach.

In the dark, he pushed the flowers out STEM FIRST.

Wonder Woman let out a blood curdling, never-ending, terrifying scream.

I was scared.  Superdad was scared.  I think the poor woman peed her pants and thought we were killing her or something.

We drove away with me saying, "HOW COULD YOU YELL LIKE THAT WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?" and Wonder Woman insisting everyone LIKES screams.

Yeah.

Superdad said we needed to go home and that we all need more practice.  I agreed we needed more practice, so we ran back to the grocery.  Spidey and Superdad got another bunch of flowers, we drove to another drive through and tried again.

We did MUCH better.  We practiced how to hold flowers, how to yell, "THANK YOU" and properly shocked the worker with flowers.  Oh, but the flowers Spidey and Superdad got?  Yeah, they made my throat close up and my eyes run.  I'm glad they're not in our home.

Hopefully we'll get better at this.  It's VERY clear that kindness is not a superpower our family possesses.  However, hysterical mishaps?  Oh yeah, we're kinda good at those.