The season to rush, rush, rush, and then...rush some more.
And today was no exception to that. I had to leave work as soon as I was allowed to, drive 25 minutes to grab my kids from school, head home for 45 minutes, then get back in the car and drop Liam off at church for Tuesday night Youth Group. While he was there, Finn and I went to watch my nephew's Christmas program, then back to get Liam, then home at 8:45. (Husband had to work late...) Holy. Moly. It makes me tired all over again just typing it all up!
Luckily, there were some super amazing moments in all of the craziness.
First, because I'm doing the Runners World running streak challenge (to run at least 1 mile every day from Thanksgiving to Christmas), I decided that in the 45 minutes of light that I was home today, I was going to run laps around my driveway (it only takes 6!) and get my mile done in the fresh air. This also allowed my dog to get out and get some exercise today. And man, she's one happy girl when she gets to run laps around the driveway with me.
She was so super excited to be out there that she photo bombed my "self timer running shot". Turns out it was cuter that a picture of me running anyways!
So, after I squeezed in a run, shower, drying the hair and looking presentable, my 45 minutes was up. I rushed the boys into the car and we hit the road, headed to drop Liam off at church without a minute to spare.
At this point, it was 5:25 and getting pretty dark out. All of a sudden, there was a huge limb in the road and I had to slam on the brakes and swerve to avoid crashing into it. We live on a narrow, dirt road, so I wasn't going super fast, but it was still a bit scary. I kept driving past, when Liam, my 10 year old son yelled, "Mom! Stop the car. You have to go back. Someone might hit that! I can move it!" For a millisecond I thought, "We don't have time to go back! We're going to be late for youth group!" But, I pulled into the next driveway, turned around, and drove back to the limb in the road.
Liam and I got out of the car in our nice clothes, picked up all of the manageable sticks that were down, then, together worked at lifting and moving the giant tree limb. It wasn't easy. At all. But we got it off the road enough to make it safe for other drivers. I got back in the car and thought about how proud it made me that my son wanted to do that. I was in such a hurry to not be late, that I was just going to drive past it without a second thought. Kids can be pretty awesome sometimes.
We made it to church safe, dropped Liam off, and Finn and I headed to my 4 year old nephew's Christmas program. If you've never been to a preschool Christmas program, you really need to. There's nothing quite like it. It is the most hilarious and precious thing ever. Especially when your own 6 year old son is sitting on your lap the whole time, holding your hands. It truly made my heart overflow with giddiness for everything about the holiday season.
Then, we headed back to grab Liam from Youth Group. Arriving early, we had a chance to watch some of the games being played while we waited to take him home. They were playing some kind of game in the gym where kids were being pushed around on skateboard type things in order to collect plastic balls for their team. As I watched, I saw my son push around a boy in a wheelchair who couldn't be on the skateboard things. He participated with the other kids, but two times he left what they were doing to give that boy a turn in the fun. Once again my heart (and my eyes that time) overflowed.
My lesson from today was that even in the middle of all of the rushing around this holiday season, there is a LOT of awesomeness to be found. Look for it. And if you can't see it, figure out a way to make some of your own.
Sparkle.Pounce.Make the Season Sparkle.
-Kendra
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