Sometimes a picture just can't do a day justice! These beautiful girls holding their precious operation Christmas child shoe boxes, all packed and labeled seems so sweet and so innocent...but, what it really is- a sweet happy ending to a fairly rough day! Armed with our picture lists and pencils all 5 of us hit up Target to fill our shoeboxes. It had already been a bit of a long day...poor Jack was struggling with the stomach flu and Hailey had a long day of school in already. But, since we aren't ones to let life hold us back (aka...too dumb to just change our plans) we persevered! We met the sweetest lady who had 3 children who were all grown and gone, but who had actually been on the ground helping to deliver the shoeboxes and was able encourage us all and reduce this momma to tears with her beautiful encouragement that these days are truly precious...an encouragement that I would need to cling to just a few hours later! After the craziness of buying our presents we headed off to McDonalds to play and eat. Jack, who had seemed to be doing much better, took a turn for the worse and ended up throwing up at McDonalds. And, as any mom knows- the minute throw up is added to the mix you know your day is going to take a turn for the worse! We hurriedly bundled the rest of the kids up and packed the remains of their food for them to eat in the car...Since we hadn't had a chance to play in the play place yet I had some not so happy little girls. Then, the unthinkable happened- Hailey dropped her hamburger in the parking lot! As we pulled away most of the kids were in tears and this momma was just ready to be done with her day. Thankfully, it was a 20 minute drive home and that gave each of us a chance to get our emotions under control. :)
As the day ended it didn't really get a ton better...sure we smiled nicely for a picture, after we threw huge fits and fought over who got to put the purple unicorn in their box and who got the pink ponies vs. the orange ones and poor Jack threw up one more time. As I finally tucked them into bed, placed my exhausted little self on the couch and had a good little cry all I could think was "I'm not even sure it was worth it". But, looking back at the picture I can remind myself that it was- it was worth it! all the tears, all the pain of cleaning up vomit, all the little kiddie fits and the exhausted momma. It was all worth it! Because, hopefully my kiddos aren't just buying gifts for little kiddos across the ocean...maybe, just maybe they are learning a little bit about thinking of others. maybe they are teaching their mommy a bit of patience and a bit about what's important in life. maybe it's not just about packing shoe boxes. maybe its about something more. And maybe that something more makes it all worthwhile :)
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