Pick Your Battles

As a mother, I am both intrigued and amused by those words when I see them, or hear them from fellow mothers. Pick. Your. Battles.

It usually means they are about to embark on a tale about something completely crazy or embarrassing that their child made an attempt to get away with and the well meaning mother, in their ever growing wisdom, or exhaustion, figured it really wasn't going to hurt anything to let their child do it.

Which brings us to sweet little Tate. My little errand buddy. We once again found ourselves at Target this evening while the girls were at AWANA. With the mere mention of leaving the house, all the kids scramble to find some small token/souvenir to take with them. Doesn't matter how far we are going. Could be to the mailbox. Could be to Alabama. They are bound and determined to bring something along for the ride.

They learned early on that this needs to be a fairly small item, and a fairly small number of items...such as a single item perhaps. We are usually running behind schedule and there isn't much time left to grab half of their worldly possessions and stuff them in the van. Plus I have an unwritten "You must be able to carry it yourself" rule. I am usually grabbing shoes, coats, and calling my lost cell phone from the landline as we bumble down the stairs to the garage.

Of course Tate is no exception to this plea for a familiar item to join our journey.

"We need to run to the grocery store real quick," I may holler.

"Boo key come?," Tate asks innocently. (Translation: Blue Blanket)

"Time to load up to go to church...".

"Monkey come?", (Yes, his stuffed monkey...he says that one pretty plainly).

Ok, so getting back to Target. He had already agreed to wear his coat and sit in the cart for our errand so I was feeling pretty positive about the whole experience. This feeling rapidly left when I opened the door to the van to scoop him out and he made a quick scan to find something he could bring with him...

"My poos come?" he asked as he reached down underneath my seat.

"You're what?!" I shrieked horrified as his little hand pulled out Drue's hot pink purse with jewels on it.

He looked up at me sweetly as he was pulling the strap up over his shoulder and repeated in more of a statement, "My poos come".

I quickly fast forwarded the 2 possible scenarios of (a) denying him his request thus leading to a tug of war over the purse with him screaming and me jumping back in the van without ever setting a foot in Target...or (b) letting him take the cute little purse (which in no way matched his shoes) and writing a humorous tale for Mothers everywhere (well, the handful who read this anyway).

He tucked it next to him and let me strap him into the cart seat, where he stayed fairly peacefully the entire errand.

A surrender well worth it....

More Bible Funnies

The girls' devotion tonight was the story of Jesus calming the storm. His followers woke him up and were very scared and he spoke to the wind and the waves and they ceased. The application, of course, was that God is always in control and we don't need to be afraid.

I wasn't sure that Drue had been paying attention the entire time because she was fiddling around with their new "spy" camera.

So I said, "Drue...what was our lesson about tonight?".

"Ummm...about Jesus telling the wind and the waves to stop...and they stopped."

Ok. So she heard the story part. But had her little 4 year old mind been able to wrap itself around the application? I probed further.

"Good Drue. And what can we take out of that?". (Meaning...what is the lesson we are to learn from that?).

Of course, she took my question literally and thought for a second before answering, "We could take out when Jesus was napping...".

Interesting Description

David working late + me working all day + no food in the house + freezing temp that I don't want to drag the kids to the grocery store in = TAKE OUT FOR DINNER!

I chose Applebee's carside to go. The roads were a bit slick so it took a little longer to get there and get home than planned. Plus Tate decided to throw the remote at Drue's head right before we got into the car so I had to pause to comfort/discipline which also made us later.

We got it home and I doled out all their little meals. The fries were cold, my chicken sandwich left a lot to be desired. Then Drue took a bite of her macaroni. Instant wailing ensued.

I probed her to further explain what was the matter with her noodle entree and between sobs she said, "My macaroni isn't soft and silky!". I looked down at her dry, clumpy dish and thought her description had been right on.

Signs, signs, everwhere are signs...

Ok, so it's a small thing. But it bugs me. Can't help it.

After David gets something out of a cabinet in the kitchen...HE LEAVES THE DOOR OPEN! So, many a time, I have walked into the kitchen while he's in there and MULTIPLE doors are wide open with all our junk and disorganization exposed.

Rather than nag or complain too much about it, I have just started saying sarcastically, "Well, Daddy's home!!" as I go about shutting all the doors, perhaps slamming a few in the process.

The kids (and I) are still getting used to David's crazy schedule and long hours. It's hard for them to keep track of which night he closes and won't be home to sing to them, which weekend days he works, etc.

Tonight on the way home Reese said out of the blue, "I hope the cabinet doors are open."

Of course, I was puzzled by this statement. Wasn't sure why she'd wish them to be open since she knows it drives me crazy...so I figured I had heard her wrong.

"You hope the cabinet doors are open?" I repeated for clarification.

"Yes", she confirmed, "Because that means Daddy's home!".

Seatbelts are overrated (NOT REALLY)

I really do not consider myself to be a mother who intentionally puts her children in harms' way. We are down to having just one kid who requires assistance with putting a seatbelt on. Obviously, that is Tate. He can undo his buckle once we reach our destination but isn't able to buckle it yet.

It feels funny telling the girls to "hop on in and buckle yourselves". Drue still has a hard time on occasion. When her booster isn't positioned exactly so...she can kind of go a little crazy when it takes a minute to finagle her buckle til it "clicks".

When Drue's booster is in the middle seat, she can't get it buckled at all. That's where it was tonight. So I reached over and buckled her, then went and got in the drivers seat and started the car.

Tate's little voice piped up, "NOT I BUCKLED! NOT I BUCKLED!". Yes, I had forgotten to buckle the little dear...and if that weren't bad enough...this is the SECOND time in the past few days that has occurred! (I really need to move Drue's booster back to the backseat).

Because my mind thinks that once I have buckled one child in, my job is done. And it's kind of humbling that my 2 year old needs to remind me to buckle him!

Another "cute" story

The other night Tate and I went to Target while the girls were at AWANA. I have been wanting to get some clothes with my Christmas money. I am not usually too successful at buying clothes with the kids around because I am the type of person who has to try everything on and corralling them all into a 3 foot by 3 foot dressing room usually results in me banging my head against the side of it repeatedly in frustration and not getting anything tried on.

I thought I could successfully try on 2 items with just Tate along, and with minimal head banging. I took him into the large wheelchair accessible one partly because it was large enough for him to run around in, and partly because it doesn't have an opening at the bottom that he could escape through while I try to run after him half clothed.

Poor little guy. He is so verbal now that sometimes I only half pay attention to what he is saying. I will insert the words "ohhhhh" and "uh huh" appropriately and agree with something he's just said, "Yes you are a fast Superman", etc.

But when he really wants to get his point across he will calmly repeat the same phrase over and over and over....

Tate has already associated Target with where David works. So everytime we go to one he asks for David repeatedly. While we were in the dressing room he kept asking, "Daddy go?". "He's at work", I kept saying. "Daddy work?". "Yes, Tate". After I tried on a sweater and turned a few times in the mirror...I could hear that he had moved on to a different subject matter. "Mommaubooful....mommaubooful". I stopped and looked at him and said, "What did you say?".

He looked up at me and said more clearly, "Momma u beau'ful".

Of course my heart melted all over the dressing room floor...and then I watched him walk right up close to the mirror and say, "Tate cute!".

Gifts from God

The girls' devotion tonight was about how God made a special plan for their life even before they were born. It also talked about how God has given each of us a special gift. There are always questions to discuss also, so tonight I read, "What special gift has God given you?".

Reese's hand shot right up. I wasn't sure how much she understood about God's gifts so I half expected her to say her "webkin".

But she simply said, "God gave me a special gift of being sweet."

Awwwww....couldn't you just eat her?

Drue was next. I worry that she doesn't think for herself at times because she usually will just say whatever Reese said.

But she very sweetly, and very confidently said, "God gave me a special gift of being cute...".