A little of this....a little of that.

STUPID! STUPID! STUPID! That's how I feel. Do you know what this is a picture of? My left foot! Sunday night, I had put the little one's to bed after a very busy day. Finally, after about 5 or 6 "GO TO SLEEP" shouts down the hall to them, silence formed and shortly afterwards, I could hear the sweet, harmonious sounds of their light snoring. Now, I could relax. That is, until the doorbell rang!

Amanda was coming home from her Dad's house and she rang the bell. I leaped out of my chair to make a mad dash to the door before she pushed the button again. All this so that my three little munchkins wouldn't wake up. Well, as I turned the corner, someone had a the audacity of putting a WALL in my way. My left foot slammed full-force into the wall. I stubbed my toe in a manner that I had never, ever done before. The pain blinded me for a second and my scream not only woke up Scott, who had gone to bed early, but woke up the 3 little ones. Don't ask me how, but I managed to make it to the door and unlock it before staring down at my foot. When I did, I was shocked to see that my 4th toe was now pointed in a totally not-supposed-to-be direction and the pain was shooting down into my entire foot. Scott wanted to go to the emergency room, but all I can think of was that I wanted to get to bed hoping it would all go away.

Fortunately, thanks to Presidents' Day, there was no school the next day. Scott had brought the little ones into my room before I got up and he left to work. It took just a couple of seconds before I was quickly awakened by little feet clammoring over me, and then the shocker was when one of them, (again the pain was too much for me to remember who) stepped on my foot and a piercing scream filled with pain hailed Amanda to come running. I looked at my foot and it was swollen so much that my attempts to wiggle my toes were futile, not to mention the huge bruising that covered the entire top of my foot.

Amanda gathered the troops as I called Scott and told him he had to take me to the E.R. For a brief moment, I tried walking on it to go to the bathroom, but the only result from my efforts were tears from the pain. I crawled to the bathroom, pulled myself up, did what I had to do and crawled back to bed.

Scott made it home and we were off to the emergency room where we sat for 3.5 hours before being seen. The end result was a severe break at the base of my fourth toe. The doctor informed me that nothing is done for broken toes except "a buddy tape", a post-surgery boot and crutches, then kindly sent me on my way. He reminded me that broken bones take 3-4 weeks to heal and that I should remain off of it for at least a week. HA! I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. I cried. This also ruined my hubby's sky diving escapade that was to be this weekend. He doesn't want to risk both of us having something broken. I understand his feelings and agree, but it still saddens me that it has to be postponed. I know he was so looking forward to it.

So, today, here I lay, surrounded by muffins, coffee, the remote control and my laptop while Scott takes over the helm. I have to admit that it has taken everything in my power not to get up to help him. He is awesome with the kids and could easily fill my shoes, but it's that "Mama" thing that doesn't stop reminding me that I'm supposed to be doing the dressing, feeding, etc. in their lives. After a pain pill that filled me with that warm, fuzzy feeling, I have resigned to the fact that soon enough I will be back to my job and that I will be beating myself up for not having taken advantage of the little break. No pun intended. Tomorrow he goes back to work, and so do I. So, please say a prayer for me, if you can. I'm not sure how I'm going to take Kai to school and walk with the 3 of them and crutches.

Going on to another topic. I haven't posted since Valentine's Day. It was a great day. My 3 little sweeties were all dressed in their Valentine attire and were filled with sugar to their (well, almost) heart's content. Did I tell you that all 3 are very sensitive to the effects of sugar? And that there is not a "crashing" afterwards? It's almost like it's injected into their blood system when they eat candy. Within minutes, their little mouths are non-stop talking, or whining, or crying, whichever comes first. This is followed by lots of active movement both in the arms and legs, even while sitting.

At the end of a great day, and seeing smiles from everyone when they got their candy and ballons, things settled down. I made dinner for the kids and they were off to bed so Mama and Daddy could celebrate their Valentine's Day.

Not sure if ya'll remember, but Adam had given us a gift certificate to Ruth Chris Steakhouse for Christmas. We made sure to ask if the certificate included babysitting service. It did! So, what a better night to take off then Valentine's day. Scott and I got all dressed up and off we went for an absolutely, scrumptious, classy steak dinner. Yummmm! It was perfect, both the food and the company. (Thank you, sweetie. You are my soul-mate and I just could not fathom life without you. It's Valentine's Day everyday for me. So sorry about the skydiving.)

I also wanted to share about our experience with our first asking for prayer request. If you don't know what I'm talking about, you can go back and read this.

When we were driving to the restaurant, I reminded Scott about our new practice and he said yes, this time a little less emphatically. I understood his feelings because really, you are asking something so personal of a total stranger, but at the same time, you are offering the most powerful tool that anyone could be given....for free. Prayer. And most importantly, it brings glory to God.

We were seated within minutes and they took our drink order. I ordered a Ruth Chris Cosmopolitan, which by the way are delicious. No, I'm not a huge drinker, but I like to have a couple of drinks with hubby, especially during romantic, childless, dinners.

The waitress brought our drink order and took our meal orders. We had agreed to starve ourselves all day in order to make sure we would be really hungry for this delicious meal so when they brought out the just-baked, hot fresh bread, we woofed that down between sips of our drinks. By the time our meal arrived, my drink had vanished and I was ready for another one. I think this is the only thing I would change about the entire evening, but oh, well. It wasn't intentionally done.

What am I talking about? Let me explain. The waitress came back with our meals and placed the extremely hot 1800 degrees plate with our sizzling steaks before us. My sweet husband said to our waitress, "Mary. We are going to say grace now. Is there anything that we can pray for you for?" She stopped and smiled, with a bit baffled look and quickly said, "Yes! Can you please pray for my son, Daniel? That would mean so much!" My eyes watered that God would allows us the honor to be used by him to lift a stranger up in prayer. Scott quickly responded to her with a "consider it done!" She began walking away, and before I could stop the words from coming out of my mouth, I call out her name. She turns around, I'm sure expecting me to say something about Daniel or the prayer, and instead (this is where foot is completely inserted in mouth) I say, "Can I get another drink, please?" UGH! I said it and then wished I could have taken back the words. I look down with embarassment as I hear her say, "No problem."

She walks away and Scott, knowing me as he does, knows how I feel. I look at him and I said, "Pretty dumb of me, eh?" He says...."Nahhh....it makes me look like the religious one and you like the lush who asks for a drink while she's asking for prayer." We both laughed. Definitely one of those 'wanna get-away' moments. We proceeded to say grace and had a wonderful evening.

Since then, we've been out to eat two other times, both times asking for prayer requests, both times receiving petitions. I've even made mental notes of what the requests were and have added them to my daily growing lists of prayers.

I spoke to my sister a couple of days ago, who is vacationing in North Carolina this week and told her about our prayer request experience and she began doing it up there. She, too, has started the practice and has received prayer requests. How awesome would it be that this form of evangelization spread and that worldwide people would pray for each other? God is at definitely at work.

Here's a few pictures of the Bombardier Valentine's Day. Enjoy!

P.S. My ever positive husband reminded me that I should be thankful in all things. "It is very possible that something as minor as a broken toe could have prevented something much more horrible during Saturdays's scheduled sky diving." Very true. Thank you, Lord.