Mama Said

Today was a big day for me.

With the end of summer, my Wednesday morning women's Bible study began anew today.  This was my first attempt at trying to get two kids (and myself) fed, diapered, dressed and out the door all by my lonesome.  Prior to today our best time had been 10am.  Today we had to shave an hour off of that time.

And on top of all of this, Wednesdays have been, for over a year and a half now, my grocery days.  Typically this means getting my list and coupons organized before heading off to church in the morning.  Now, that may seem like no big deal, but for an avid coupon-shopper like myself, the process of scouring the ads, flipping through the coupon binder, searching the on-line coupon databases and printing any coupons I don't already have on hand can be a lengthy chore.  And this, also, had to be done before nine.

Thus, during both Emmett's 1:30am and 5:30am feedings (breaking his most current pattern of waking only once - at 6am) I found myself on the internet sorting out my grocery deals.  And, therefore, my work done ahead of time and Emmett satisfied with said food for the time being, the three of us actually made it out the door on time with Bible Study bag, diaper bag, purse, coupon binder, charity donation and, well, each other.  Things were going great.

Two hours later we're leaving church and heading to the store.  Things are still going great.

I pulled into the grocery store parking lot, near a cart stall (this is so crucial when toting an infant in a carrier, a curious toddler, and a coupon binder), got everyone out of the car and situated.  Micaiah settled down rather quickly after being told she had to walk this time, rather than ride in the cart, and we were on our way into the store.  After gliding through the doors, I find myself singing along to the lyrics on the radio, "Mama said there'd be days like this.  'There'll be days like this,' my mama said.  (Mama said.  Mama said!)" All the while I'm thinking, I hope it's not one of those days for me, because things are going great so far.

And that's when I open my coupon binder to pull out my carefully organized (printed) list, which required two hours of VERY early morning planning and quite a bit of frustration with an uncooperative printer, with necessary coupons held neatly together by a binder clip and . . . it's not there.  Nowhere at all.  In fact, the only possible location for the list at that precise moment was sitting serenely on my dining room table.

Meaning we had to go back through the sliding glass doors, get everyone back into the car, explain to the now-sobbing toddler that while Momma is just as upset about this as she is, Momma is managing not to throw a fit (although she wants to), drive home, grab the list, turn around and try it all over again.

Sigh.

Mama said there'd be days like this.