To Keep From Losing it Sometimes.....

As I looked up to see my eldest' head tipped back, drinking the maple syrup from his plate like a man wandering for days in the desert, only to at last discover the one and only glass of ice cold refreshing water, I thought, this is going to be a treasure of a day.  I think all mamas know exactly what I'm talking about...a day so beautiful in mommyhood (that's motherhood for those of us knee deep in diapers and tantrums still) that your "little blessings," are now promoted to "treasures".  It's just going to be that kind of day.  I can tell it's extra special partly because it's only Tuesday and it's already been a full week of treasuring. 

To those unfamiliar with the terminology, I will address particular situations where one such term is not only used, but necessitated.  OK...I'm standing in the grocery line and as beads of sweat marshmallow size sweat pours down my face, I fumble through my purse to find my wallet, intermittently throwing one child or the other a snack, just ANY snack, to stave off the coming fireworks.  I know it's there, I just had it.  Oh. my. word. Where the heck it is?  As I'm starting to slightly panic, Korah here's a graham cracker, the precursor to my weekly nervous breakdown at the grocery store, Eli please sit down, do not climb out of the cart, I notice a line is starting to build behind me.  Oh Lord please help me.  Eli sit down now.  No you can't  open the applesauce right now.  And DO NOT touch your sister.  After what feels like hours, I find my wallet and it's at this point as I'm already holding up an entire store and my youngest is now breaking down from hunger, thirst, exhaustion, or because it's a Tuesday, I realize my son is dumping all the tomatoes and any rollable produce out of the cart, clearly an experimentation in gravity vs. velocity.  My son is such a little scientist, how sweet, what a little genius.  I am going to cultivate that inner scientist.....right into the car where I can strap his little tail to the seat and get the heck out of here!  It's at this point, smiling, down on all fours at the end of the check out lane, picking up tomatoes and kiwi, that I look lovingly and fondly at my little ones for all to see, and say, "What a blessing? Right? I love these little people and they are such sweet little blessings I get to have.  Now please sit down little blessing, and stop throwing the food out of the cart like you are being raised by a pack of wolves.  And no, you cannot pee pee in the bushes right now, it will have to wait."  For me, that is a blessing moment.

A treasure moment is finding yourself on the third floor of what you thought was a used book store,(bad idea anyway) but soon discovered it is more of a used book stand, highlighting as an upscale ladies' boutique with expensive, fancy items at little hand level, no elevator, pouring rain, infant baby bjorned to your chest and  a potty training two year old who after running around in a mad dash to look at everything, little rat paws swiping this way and that, stops suddenly with a look of desperation, grabbing his bottom.  He is pooping.  Oh crap, he is pooping.  he is going to poop right here and I have nothing and no way of getting them and the stroller down the stairs in time to use the frog potty in the car.  And poop he does.  BAAAAAAD.  And because with most things in life I have always been a "go big or go home," kind of girl, he is in straight underwear from day one.  No pull ups.  Sooooooo, as I stand hunched over my child in the pouring rain with my baby dangling/wedging between my chest and the child I am trying to clean, only to realize I have no back up clothing and will be throwing this pair of underwear away, I think of my little treasures. 

And that is what today looks like it might be promising to be-a treasured day.  A day where I will refer to my children as little treasures, for fear of all out losing it.  It will be a grace-filled day for a graceless and tired mama.  Just keeping on keeping on. Keeping on with my treasures.