Super Mommy Saves the Day

I am an outdoorsy type of woman. So is the hubs. Consequently, so are my children. It didn't matter if you had tubes hanging out of you or not, whether you could walk or not, or even if you were having a bad day, if mommy is outside, so are you.

If I was mucking in the garden, the Bug was in a playpen. As he grew older, he graduated to the swingset. And eventually, I caged the poor little duffer inside our trampoline. Don't worry dear internet, I never bounced him too high. Shalebug loved being outside as much as I did and still do. So it was a great pleasure the day Grampa brought over one of those jogging strollers.

You see, dear internet, we live in the sticks. The sticks mean no pavement. No pavement means a lot of gravel. Wheelchairs and baby strollers don't work so well in freshly graded gravel. But a jogging stroller cuts through the grit like a hot knife through warm butter. So the Bug spent hours in his new jogger. It opened up a whole new world for the two of us. It meant that I no longer had to bust my ass packing his wiggly-yet-strong little body up and down our very hilly yard. Yea for me!

So one fine, sunny afternoon, I put the Bug in the jogger and told Fric and Frac to watch him. (That's mommy speak for "If you hurt him, I will punish you until you beg for mercy.") Do you see where I'm going with this, dear internet? Being the wonderful, cautious, safety-oriented mother that I am, I proceeded to leave the Bug in the mercy care of his four and five year old siblings, while I marched on down to the garden.

Now our garden is about 200 meters away from the top of the steep hill which I left my disabled child perched upon. While strapped in a baby jogger with three large wheels. While under the supervision of two preschoolers. Who were told not to touch. (Telling kids not to touch is like bait to fish, they have to try to take the bite.) At the bottom of this hill is the garden, me and a very large Spruce tree.

So there I am, Ms. Safety-first momma, pulling weeds from the overgrown jungle I like to refer to as my garden. When all of the sudden a quick motion from the corner of my eye catches my attention.

That's right, dear internet, Fric and Frac struck again. They decided it would be fun to push the Shalebug down the hill to see how fast he could go. (In their defense, they tried to run along side him, but were foiled by untied shoelaces.)

I looked up and darn near had a heart attack. There is my child, who can't even sit by himself yet, barreling down the hill at 60 mph, heading straight for the damn Spruce tree.

After some quick math, and even quicker thinking, I realized there is no way I can stop this tragedy from unfolding. So I did what any good momma would do. I placed myself into the path of oncoming traffic. I put myself in between certain carnage and my child. I took one for the team. I raced to the tree and instead of the Bug crashing into the needles and being scratched to death, he crashed into me. I am infinitely softer.

Crisis averted. No harm, no foul.

At least that is what I told myself as I was picking Spruce needles out of my ass for the next day.

*Fric and Frac claim to this day that neither of them touched the damn jogger. However, I am no fool. I see the evil gleam in their eyes.