When I Look Back on the Day. . . .

. .. .and realize I could've exploded or gotten frustrated a million times. .. .

but I didn't!

#mommywin

Today was a looong day. We left the house at 9am to head to Blanding.

Instead of getting frustrated in the one-way traffic by Halchita. . .. we listened to Under the Sea a million times (which is a pretty clever song, actually). Even though we were almost 15 minutes late to Sam's doctor's appointment. . ..they let us in anyway because they knew we traveled so far to come.

The doctor was super friendly and nice, and the nurses and reception ladies were really nice in trying to help entertain the girls and calm down Sam when he had a melt-down. One of them brought out bubbles and crayons for the girls to play with (so they wouldn't play with the stirrups on the check-up table .. .haha), and another lady rocked Sam while I changed the girls' poopy diapers. Another one helped me carry my stuff back to the exam room. I nursed in peace. An older lady came in to pick up some paperwork and offered some garden produce to anybody who wanted it. We went home with a bag of the most delicious tomatoes!

Then we went to the convenience store/bowling alley and had some pizza for lunch. Easy and simple.  .. .except when we're trying to leave and I'm literally chasing the girls around the aisles. Instead of getting frustrated, I pretty much just laughed. Especially when Lucy grabbed a bag of marshmallows and tried to eat one through the bag.

Then we went to the library. Luckily, their shelving system is pretty easy, because my kids pull off a million books at a time. A nice librarian named Nicole helped Laura find the one and only Sofia book on the shelves. That is L's new prized book for the next few days. A few tidied messes and changed diapers later, we went to the store.

Guys, shopping with three kids .. . .that's all I'm going to say.
But, I'm also going to congratulate myself in the fact that the only things that ended up in the cart that I didn't really need (aka, Laura sneaked them in the cart) were chocolate chips and poptarts. She was actually quite helpful in pulling things off of the lower shelves when I couldn't reach them (I was wearing Sam in the carrier). We only had one tiny accident when she got over-excited and plopped a carton of eggs in the cart. Luckily only one broke open, and it fell on the floor instead of in the cart. The nice worker who cleaned it up was also the same guy who helped us load the car (seriously, I LOVE that service! Every store should do that.). Oh! I'm also remembering that one of the workers asked if all these kids were mine, and I said, "Yup!! These are all my beautiful munchkins!" It reminded me of a story I read in a Conference talk this morning about standing up for womanhood and motherhood (here).

Then I left the car running while I stopped at the pharmacy to pick up a prescription. I was in there longer than I'd hoped, but all three kids were asleep by the time I got back to the car. And they all pretty much stayed that way on the drive home. [cue: another dozen listenings of Under the Sea]

We got home just in time to toss the pizzas in the oven for the missionaries for dinner.

Later, Jacob and I did Jillian--level 2 kills, I tell you. It was rough.

Is it okay to feel proud about how you remained calm and non-reactive during the day? Because today would be the day to feel that. =)