Saturday Dec. 2nd.

Oh My Gosh.


yesterday was the most insane day EVER! I drove all over the place, and at this time of year, it is a complete zoo wherever you go! Even at the Lowe's parking lot, you could barely drive - at 2pm. Aren't all of those people - in need of Lowe's merchandise - supposed to be WORKING with the merchandise at that time of day?!?!?

I went to lowes to deliver some items. I am on a "Salt Lake Freecycle" internet loop..where people offer and request things they do/do not want or need. A mother of a 7yo girls had said her dd needed some new clothes and small Christmas items. The little girl had hurt her face badly on a construction site, and had outrageous medical bills, preventing her mom from getting a lot of the things she needed. So, I made the scary trip down the crazy freeway (do you know 60MPH really means 81MPH?) and into a strange city where I have never been, to meet this woman and give her some things Victoria has grown out of. My girls were SO moved when I said "Go look through your things - we are going to help a litle girl". They found cute clothes, 2 winter coats, a darling Christmas dress, lots of cute hair things, and a few small toys. I was also able to add in some Christmas bows and ribbons, and a few toys cars and pens for their 5yo boy,too! This mom was so moved that she cried, and I cried, and it was so - CHRISTMAS!!

then, we headed back home, where I received approximately 39 phone calls, before having to run out of the house again and take kids to a school roller skating party. There was not a single mom there that I knew, and ben had to work, so it was SO long and lonely. the kids had fun, so that was good, and the time finally came to leave! During the skating, i called some friends and cancelled a trip we had scheduled at 8pm to the "Festival of Trees" i LOVE decorating for Christmas, but today could not do everything, so we planned to just meet them for a late movie. I left in plenty of time to get kids home and settled, looked at the gas gague, which seemed a little low, but I was low on money and thought "I can make it".

mistake #426 of that day.

i forgot to mention that my cell phone had died about 2 hours earlier. i had even been checking it during the day, "knowing" that I would need it, and it always was fully charged. I don't know WHAT happened. so, we are on the freeway again, and the poor car starts chugging and lurching a bit, and the power steering is dying, so I managed to move over to the shoulder before we rolled to a stop. now, it was cold out. 22 degrees or so. the car had not warmed up yet, and my 14yo was in SHORTS - b/c he knows he gets hot when skating! so, there we were. chilly, no gas, zillions of cars whizzing by, and no one stopping to help. no cell phone, either. oh, joy.

so, I try to get the phone on one more time. it worked! I sent my husban the following message: SOS VW on I-15. Out of gas.

HIS cute little Razor phone makes a V look like a U. so he had no clue that I meant "Beside the VW lot on I-15". he thought hm. she is on I-15. out of gas. he did not know if I was stuck in the middle of traffic, or what. I am sure he imagined me weaving through traffic as I ran to the side of the road or something. I made the 3 girls in the backseat cover up with the one blanket we had, and had gabe put on my mittens. I had an extra scarf for Christian to cover up his legs, but he said he was fine. it was getting more and more cold, and finally we decided to pray! hm! gabe soon spotted a man strolling through the car lot. we all yelled help out an open window, and he came over and let me use his cell phone. he was very sweet, and ben said our friend Chip was on his way. woohoo! chip arrived shortly after we played a rhyming game, and got a little gas into the tank - the nozzle on his gas can broke off, so the freeway got a little extra, too! we managed to get to a gas station where I put in a little more, and were soon on our way home! nobody left again that night!