I have a stamp with that on it, and it is so true! Let me relate my experience of Saturday evening:
I was sitting at the computer, writing my sermon for today. The girls were watching television, Dan was downstairs working on a recording, and William was outside on a "hunt", which he announced started at 8 PM. He had come in and out of the house several times since then to tell us the progress of this hunt. Let me add that William, at 9 years old, has a huge imagination and almost always has a running dialog going, like he's narrating his own movie. This kid is almost never quiet unless he's asleep. So I can usually tell exactly where he is because of the noise he makes.
Around 9 PM I became aware that the usual sounds of William playing outside (lots of gun noises, yelling, and the sound of his bike going up and down the driveway and sidewalk) were absent. I had the front door open so I could easily hear him while he played. We have a very safe neighborhood, but I still don't allow my kids to venture out of sight of the house. I went out and started calling him. It was dark and there was no answer. His bike was gone. I started to feel a bit anxious, so I got in the car with Laurel, who started to get VERY worried about her brother. It was touching to see this, as Laurel and William are usually at each other's throats all the time. We drove around the immediate area looking for any sign of William's bike. No sign of him anywhere. So I went home, told Dan that William was missing and called the police at around 9:15.
Let me say this is not the first time William has had the police called to find him. When he was about 4 he was riding his tricycle outside and decided to follow a woman and her two children as they were walking by. Why this woman didn't tell William that he should turn back and go home, I will never know. But he was only one street over, where my husband found him. Which is why I looked first, before I called.
This time, as the last time, our neighbors realized quite early that something was wrong and they all hopped in their cars and started looking. Dan took his car and started looking. The police sent out cruisers in all directions and one officer came and started looking through our house trying to find William. She said a lot of kids hide in the house, thinking it's funny. I knew he wasn't in the house because the usual noise he would make was absent, but I figured it wouldn't hurt to look again.
Around 9:45, I was out front talking to the police officer, giving a complete description of what he looked like, what he was wearing, etc. and I looked down the street and spotted a small figure on a bicyle pedaling my way. It was William.
At first he said he didn't want to talk about what happened, but with gentle coaxing, we found out where he had gone. William had earned some money that day by picking up
sticks in the yard. So all by his ownsome, he decided that he wanted to
go to Target to buy a Lego set he's had his heart set on for some time.
So he hopped on his bike around 8:45 and set off for Target...3 1/2
miles away!He was upset, not because anything bad had happened, but because he had gone all the way to Target, found the Lego set, took it to the cash register, only to find out he didn't have enough money to buy it!
Needless to say, we were all so thankful that William had returned that we didn't yell at him, though we made him promise to never ever do that again. The police officer was impressed that a 9 year old had managed a 7 mile bike ride in the dark, but she also told him not to ever do that again. After William had gone inside, she turned to me and told me that we had one "ballzy" 9 year old!
After that we had had a TALK with William and tried to make him feel the enormity of what he had done. We even had his sisters come in his room and pointed out their tear-stained faces. We finally had gotten the kids in bed around 10:30, but it took me a while to calm myself down, plus I had to finish that sermon and practice the hymns on the piano that I would be playing at church. I finally got to bed at 1:30 AM. I was just drifting off to sleep when a knock comes on my door and Emily tells me that she has thrown up in her bed. So by the time I get that mess cleaned up and have got her settled on the couch, I am wide awake again. I end up staying up until 4 AM before I could finally sleep.
Sunday itself was relatively uneventful. I took Laurel and William to church and Emily stayed home, running a temp, but at least not throwing up. My husband was sick with the same influenza we have all had with a nasty cough, so we didn't go anywhere for Mother's Day, not that we ever do anyway. I don't cook on Mother's Day, but what usually ends up happening is that I go out and get a bucket of chicken. Since I had one child not eating, another child who wouldn't eat bucket chicken anyway and a husband who had already heated up some hot dogs and ate a very hearty lunch in the middle of the day, I just said, "NUTS!" and heated up leftover Chinese for myself.
So that's my Mother's Day tale. People often say, "God couldn't be everywhere, so that's why he made mothers." I don't think that's true. Instead, I am glad that God can be everywhere when I can't be...he certainly was looking out for William on his "excellent adventure." And it's always heartening to find that we have neighbors that are willing to come out of their homes and look for a lost child.
No stamping got done this weekend...but I did make it to the Great Lakes Mega Meet, which is a big scrapbooking show, on Thursday, so at least I got myself some nice Mother's Day gifts. I met BFF Paula and her friend Mary there and we had a blast. You wanna see?!?!
First I will have to state that when I go to these sorts of things, I keep a spending limit in mind. I pretty much stayed close to my limit, so I am proud of myself, but...I was thinking I would probably make it out of there without spending ANYTHING and that certainly didn't happen!
The first place I spent money was at the SEI booth:
These word albums see to be very popular and I was happy to get 40% off one of them. I loved the paper pad and had to have the buttons to match, which Paula and I are splitting since she also bought the same pad of paper.
I only bought one stamp, at the Judikins booth:
This is a background stamp the same size as SU!'s...love the fine crackle pattern, so different than anything I have from SU!. The ink cleaner is my favorite...I'm just about about of my original bottle, which I bought probably 12 years ago. It's very good at getting all kinds of ink off my stamps and I haven't been able to find it locally for a while.
The next stop was a booth called Stamp On It. They had lots of cool embellishments:
I loved these tiny dragonfly brads and these eensy weensy paperclips! Plus I bought these:
These are pearlescent chalks...I've seen them on a few blogs and I decided I would try a set and they were $1 off!!! How could I resist?!?!?
The final and most expensive purchase was at the Spellbinders booth:
I just loved the coffee pot and grinder, then those tea pots caught my eye. I had to have the apron and it was just a natural that I also purchase the chef's hat and the eensy spatula and oven mitt too, right?
I also need to thank the lovely person who sent me this:
Thank you, Terry Suzuki, for the lovely give of chocolate with macadamia nuts AND the lovely card and die cuts. I've never gotten the alure of macadamia nuts before, but I must have gotten really old stale ones, because these were FANTASTIC! Were...'cause they came earlier this week and [cough] they are all gone now...what can I say? I was STRESSED!
Well today I really need to take my new goodies, get them settled in their new home downstairs and stamp. Ta!
