Lucky Day

The big kids went with Lala and Papa this weekend to Fuch's Flowers in search of some shamrocks.

Lucky for them (and me) they found some.

I suppose I should probably put it in a cute pot because that black one is pretty bad (it would actually be more fun to go up to the pottery painting place and have them each paint their own pot, huh?). But lucky for me, it doesn't matter what kind of pot the shamrocks are in...they still bring good luck.

(This has nothing to do with good luck, but check out the pile of dust, glitter, broken hair rubberbands, dog hair, and matches that i swept up this morning from our laundry room and kitchen/dining room. Sick.)

This came:

We live by a river and I kind of have this recurring fear or 'vision' (which sounds SO dumb, but welcome to my world inside my head) where our car goes off the road for some reason and into the river. With just me driving. And all 3 children. It makes me shiver just thinking about it. But believe me, I have definitely thought about it. My original plan was to not panic, undo all the kids' seatbelts, instruct Maria on how to swim up to the surface (cuz she's an awesome swimmer) and then wait until I could roll the windows down and I'd escape with the babies in my arms while Maria swam.

Isn't that a good idea? Because the river is totally warm enough that Maria wouldn't be shocked or scared at all.

And of course, being pregnant, I'd be in perfect condition to swim with a panicking 4 and 2 year old.

And then I watched Myth Busters and the only way I could really escape if my car was underwater was to break my windows. So Dan got me this car tool. So that I can break the windows, swim free and then do lots of things like blink a flashing light for help (because I'm sure no one would see us go off the road), whistle, and cut stuff.

Anyway, getting the car tool in the mail was super exciting. And has probably already saved my life and I don't even know it yet.

But then it was time to go get Alice from 'school.'

She goes to a Mother's Day Out program at the Presbyterian church:

And when I pick her up, she comes running and smiling, "Mama!!!" I love it.

And every single time, I realize that I have really missed her! Only 3 hours away from her, but that's enough for me.

She shows off her art to her friends, runs around a little bit....

...and then decides it's time to go, so she heads to the door.

And then we go to get Jamie.

Lots of times, a friend and I take turns staying with the babies in the parking lot (Charlie is around the same age as Alice) while the other goes up to get the boys. It's a lot of steps, people. And I'm pregnant. Psh.

Jamie crawls in and always smiles and coos to Alice as if she was still a tiny baby. I love it.

I also love that he can buckle himself in.

Even though 1/2 the time I have to redo it because the straps are totally twisted.

But he's always so proud anyway. Ah, I love him.

We drove home today and he told me that he didn't like today's snack (surprise), he played monsters at recess with Wyatt, he listened "really good," and they sang a song.

When we got home, the kids jumped out of the car and into slush:

I'm sick of winter. I'm sick of the snow being there in the morning, but turning to slush by 10:00am. Gross.

Jamie headed for the door, and when he got in....

....he threw his coat on the ground and kicked his shoes and socks off so that our entry way looked like this:

And this is how it looks every day after school.

But anyway, I got inside and then got super excited because I forgot that right before I left to get the kids, our mail carrier rang our doorbell and was holding this box:

I love boxes from Zulily. It's a website where they offer discounts on lots of really wonderful brands. I frequent the site.

But since it's kind of a discount website, it usually takes a couple/few weeks for stuff to arrive, so when it does it's always a surprise.

And today, the surprise was a pair of "Little Laundry" shoes for Maria (Little Laundry is the kid version of Chinese Laundry. SOOOO cute).

It makes me nervous because they are really big....but better a little big than too small, right?

There was this hilarious number for Alice (I think she'll wear it on her birthday...because it totally screams "PARTY!").

This maternity dress for me - I have no idea where or when I will wear this pretty dress, but it was not very expensive at all, and I don't have a LBD in maternity size!

The kids scored some bath toys,

and some books.

And all this stuff from Zulily was under $100. I love Zulily.

And along with the box of goodies, possibly the best selection of catalogs ever:

And by the time I was done looking at all the catalogs, dog-earring pages of things that I want to order (but never will because the total would probably be something like $3,000), picking up the entry way, getting Jamie a few snacks, and cleaning the kitchen...it was time to get Maria who always makes a day happy and fun. So we all loaded in the car to get Ria. And then we went for yogurt.

So today was super lucky.