Today someone at the grocery store said...

[Melaine]

....that I was a great mom!

I thought I should share this because I have whined about horrendous things strangers have said to me in the past and I was frankly having a fairly difficult week this week.

Here's why it's in the BP: I haven't been feeling good, haven't been sleeping well, and have just felt FIRST trimester-y and not at all SECOND trimester-y. Monday I was extremely put out because my midwives had told me I couldn't give myself the progesterone shots but that I could come to the office 10 minutes away to get them. Then I got to the office and they said NOPE I had to go to the office 25 minutes away and then when I got there I had to wait a half an hour on top of that. (And I have to do this every single Monday morning while the girls proceed to touch every germ-y surface in the waiting room. UGH).

Yesterday I wasted about 45 minutes on the craigslist no-show which definitely didn't help my attitude.

When leaving the house this morning, our beagle, who is normally pretty good, made me chase her back and forth across the house for almost 10 minutes before she would go in the kitchen so we could leave. This morning I had 7 stops to make, and on the first stop I realized I had left my cell phone and wallet at home (because I was so annoyed at the beagle!) Then it started raining. So back to the house, running late, through the rain, etc. etc. hit stops 2-5 smoothly.

Then I had to take the girls to get the first professional haircut (big milestone for them and the poor stylist who had to spend way longer detangler than cutting). It went really well actually and the girls got their nails painted, lollipops, sparkley clips, and balloons when we left (I have to recommend Sharkey's....they loved it!). Finally, our last stop was Kroger, where DD2's balloon FELL OFF THE string. Not her fault, but she burst into tears, of course.

So she was teary throughout the next 15 minutes of shopping until I realized that I could get a free balloon from the florist. But guess what? DD1 then starts crying because her balloon is a different color and NOT AS BIG! Oh my gosh!!!

This is when I got down on hand's and knees and had a candid conversation with both of them about how sometimes things are not exactly what you want, but you still need to be cheerful about what you DO have, which is a perfectly nice, albeit smaller and green balloon. (We have this some conversation almost every day about ONE thing or another). And this is when a saintly middle age gentlemen behind me shocked me by saying,

"You are a great mom, I like how you told them that".

Thank you sir!!! So, not really a BP but I still wanted to complain about all that junk in the middle so it seemed not to fit in the lounge!

[elephantmeg]

awwwwwwwwwww! what a great job!

[larig]

that's awesome!

[lorinick]

Wow that's so nice.

[crl]

So nice! Sorry about all the other stuff.

Catherine

[JoyNChrist]

Such a great story! A man did that to me in Target a couple months ago when I was having a really rough time and doing my best to be patient. I almost cried - it just made me feel so good.

And you ARE a great mom!

[Melbel]

What a nice, friendly acknowledgment after a couple of aggravating days.

I have had those comments at grocery stores and other places over the years. After thanking them for being so kind, I promptly get the heck out of there before the kids do something to change their mind, lol.

[erv917]

That's really sweet, what a nice compliment. A fellow mom of young kids was sharing a story about a similar experience at a mom's night out recently, and we were all saying that we should make mental notes to "pay it forward" someday and make sure to take a minute to say some kind words to a frazzled-looking young mom about what a great job she's doing. It really does mean a lot.

[TwinFoxes]

How wonderful!

[DrSally]

Oh, so sweet!!