I Can Do That

Whew, this day was a marathon...and I survived it. Maybe it felt like a marathon because somewhere in the crossover from yesterday to today, I didn't get that break of sleep that I so desperately needed and wanted. It started out as a pretty exhausting, yet awesome Sabbath. We have no hot water...again. But this time, not due to frozen pipes, but because the hot water tank was shot. The water out here is incredibly hard, and our tank is incredibly old, and the mix of those two elements creates the need for us to replace the heating elements in our tank about every 9 months. The hard water just wears through them. So we're sick (STILL!) and we have no hot water. My husband needs to attend another ward at 9am in the NE of Calgary for a Confirmation, which means that me and my three kids need to get ready alone (not so unusual, since Tyler usually has early morning meetings anyway), with no hot water. So I get up a bit early in order to run up the hill in the snow (yes, literally) to my in-laws house to use their shower before my husband has to get up an leave. I think to myself that at least this way I will be on time for church because we're getting started on this morning so much earlier than usual. (haha). So my husband leaves and I start on the task of getting us all ready. We did it. We were 5 minutes late for church, as usual, and I had ample choice of seating since no one else in our family was around. So it was me and the three kids through Sacrament Meeting. That was exhausting. But I did manage to get snippets of spiritual upliftment from our High Council speaker. Lucy was giving the scripture in Primary today, and she did awesome. It was a coincidence that it just so happened to be her favorite scripture too. Mosiah 2:17 - when ye are in the service of your fellow beings, ye are only in the service of your God. Max joined us to watch his sister and we talked a bit about him moving up into primary in a few weeks...I hope that transition goes well. I know he'll like being with Lucy again. But there are no toys in Primary. Anyway, I'm side-tracking. It was a full Sabbath, and a somewhat relaxing evening. We decided to kick it at home since our kids are STILL sick (20 days and counting now!) and let them get an early night. I got kids into bed and flopped down exhausted on the couch at 9:30, fully intending to fold laundry, but I fell asleep until 10:30. Little did I know that would be the best sleep I'd get all night. I was in bed by about 11:30 and was woken up to a very upset Maxwell at 12:30am. He didn't know what was wrong, and then decided he had to go to the bathroom. So we did that. Then he realized that his ear was hurting...a lot. So we got some tylenol and I wondered how the rest of the night was going to go. He had a drink of water, a wipe to the runny nose and back to bed. Only to call out again at about 1:05. His ear was still hurting. "I know buddy, it'll take a few minutes for the medicine to work. You need to try and get some sleep." "Ok mom." He calls out again at 1:20. Still hurting. 1:35, still hurting. 1:45 I finally bring him into the bed with us, because I'm tired of getting up and walking down the hallway. He sleeps like that for a few minutes and Tyler and I decide to carry him to his room to finish the night. No such luck. He cried out about 2:10, still hurting. So Tyler grabbed a sleeping bag to sleep on the couch and Max was back in the bed with me. The idea was this way everyone would get a good night sleep. Good idea. Max finally settled by about 3:45am and slept. So I finally did too. He woke up at 6am because he was too hot, but fell back asleep quickly till 9:45am. Mom, however got to get up at 7:45am because although it was a huge blessing that all the up and downs of the night did not disturb Lucy or Logan, it did not mean that those two were prepared to sleep in at all, like the rest of us were hoping for. So I woke up to a cheerful but very persistent little boy saying, "Da, da, da, da, da!"
In theory today would be a relaxing day to recover from that night, but the doctor had to be called, and kids ears had to be checked, groceries needed to be bought, parts for the hot water tank had to be bought and the tank needed to be fixed so we could have hot water again...sometime. These are the things that I was running around doing because Tyler was at home working on a HUGE project and trying to clean up the hot water tank and drain it so we could fix it. The Doctor visit proved successful as Logan and Max were both diagnosed with ear infections. Prescriptions were written and filled and as we were checking out at the pharmacy, the silver lining of the day presented itself...in the form of a gingerbread santa sleigh kit for four sleighs, with all the candy, icing and cookie pieces needed for $12.99. Pretty perfect FHE, especially since the kids had been promised earlier in the weekend that we would put our tree up today, but sickness and hot water tanks had prevented us from going to Great Grandma's house to pick up the tree and decorations.
The most amazing part of the whole event is that I was exhausted ALL day. My muscles ached every time I stood up or walked down the hallway, as if I had just climbed to the 40th floor of a skyscraper. But I was patient. I had some reserve of energy that I didn't know existed. I was able to stay positive and just 'get-er-done'. "What's that, I need to completely rearrange my kids' entire room because that's the only way we can get access to the hot water tank in order to fix it? ok, I can do that." "What's that? I need to use a crowbar to scrape rusty hard-water deposits off the bottom of my hot water tank and vacuum them out with the shop-vac while trying to entertain my 9-month old and keep him from putting all the dirty tools in his mouth? ok, I can do that." "What's that? I need to unload my groceries, TWICE, and stand in line at the grocery store, TWICE, because the credit card machine wasn't working, TWICE, with 2 of my three sick kids after racing around the store to get the groceries done in a record breaking 15 minutes because the baby is sleeping at home while dad is getting some work done? ok, I can do that." "What's that? I need to take 3 sick kids to the doctor's office alone and get ears checked and kids weighed and boots and coats on and off and on again and take the prescription to the pharmacy and wait for 25 minutes with a baby who is ready to be in bed already, but has to wait until we get this medicine before he can go home and then I have to stop at the post office to mail the letter Lucy wrote to her cousin yesterday because she was so excited to do it, and I just didn't have the heart to disappoint her because people were tired? ok, I can do that." "What's that? The hot water tank is fixed but hasn't had time to heat the water yet, so I have to heat water on the stove top and in the microwave in order to bathe my children's snot-crusted and icing covered faces and in the process of running the microwave constantly for 20 minutes cause it to short out and stop working...yes, no microwave + figuring out how to warm bottles for my baby and wondering to myself if this brown rusty colored water that comes out of the taps after having the water turned off all day is really cleaning my children at all, or is just going to result in making them look like they have a winter tan? ok, I can do that."
I don't know where it came from, but I did it. Actually, I do know where it came from, and I'm grateful. I did not do this day on my own...that's for sure.