this one

This one freaked me out bad. We already had a minivan and a (big enough) house and a family insurance plan. So expanding our family should have been simple. But life was busy and chaotic and filled with poop and I wasn't sure I could give my heart to another just yet. 

This one came into the chaos and fit right in. She learned to walk and then run and then whip and nay nay. One of her first sentences was, "Everybody calm down." Now, almost four, she leads our pack of weirdos in all her weird glory. 

This one says things like, "Mom, I can help. Cleaning poop is my middle name." And then I resign that this part of motherhood is probably not for me and I just let her do her thing. Cleaning poop is not my middle name. It's not that I wanted to hand the job over, it's just that you might as well leave it to the expert. 

Adding this one to the family has been such a joy. Sure, there are added stresses- I have to make sure six people have regular dental visits and clean underwear now. But, the joy. There is so much joy here that we are currently wearing halloween costumes in front of the Christmas tree. It's January 27.

This one wears what she wants and eats what she wants and tells the much older and bigger than her people in this home to get it together, and listen, I am just tired and a little appreciative that someone else around here is trying to be in control. So this is how we live. #YOLO, man. 

I am so very thankful to be this one's mom. She has brought immeasurable joy and laughter into our home. I can't help but think, nevermind- I can't help but know, that this one was part of God's masterful, wild, and crazy plan for my life. 

Tell me I'm not the only one that has this one. Let's hear it. Did God freak you out and then fix it?

I am all in for God's crazy plans exceppppptttt I'm about out of seats in the Toyota, soooooo... 

Picture this

Picture this:
3 kids in the car with Mom and everyone has to pee.
If you get out at a fast food joint, inevitably it is assumed to be supper time, regardless of the actual time of day. You leave $25 poorer than you were before everyone had to pee.
If you stop at a gas station you have to strategically maneuver past the pop and orange candy slices and pray there are no venereal diseases lurking on the toilet seats.
So anyways, pick your poison and stop the car for twenty minutes of torture.
Although we've really outgrown the likes of the small stall, if one wants to urinate in the big stall they must keep one hand on Waylon at all times and complete all other business with the other. One slip of the hand and he's got the latch open and he's headed for the orange slices. And you've got your pants down.
On rare occasions (okay, it only happened once, last Monday) you'll hear a cute little girl say "Mom I think there's a camera in the toilet" and you turn to see that alas, your phone slipped from your coat pocket during the pee rodeo and it's now sitting in three different sources of urine at the bottom of the basin.
But don't forget to keep a hand on The Wanderer at all times, even during phone retrieval, or he'll be at the orange slices and you'll still have a phone in the toilet.
Add to the equation his fear of automatic hand dryers, and you get to hear shrill screams and wince as he plugs his ears with germ infested hands every time an innocent bystander tries to dry their hands. Or during the entire time you're trying to dry the pee off your cell phone.
Get everyone back in the car and start passing the hand sanitizer. Drive to the cell phone store as fast as you can.
The end.