When you put the facts together, it's not that startling.

Subtitled, "God loves Pain and Irony."

Ahem.

List of stuff that the fetus FORCED me to buy last week (stupid cravings):

1.  the biggest jar of Nutella you can buy at WalMart
2.  a half gallon of Chocolate English Toffee Aggie ice cream (AKA "heaven in a box")
3.  Ovaltine
4.  Nutty Bars
5.  the monster sized bag of I Can't Believe It's Not Crunch Berries (TM) cereal

"The" ultrasound is Monday.  You can bet that, regardless of the child's gender, s/he is going to have a candy coating.

At any rate,  Jon was at a history conference in Omaha--WAHOO!!!  Party in Nebraska! (sound of crickets chirping in the background)--and I was doing a pretty dang good job of gnawing my way through it all. Templeton the rat has NOTHING on me.

And then the unthinkable happened.  My blood sugar, which the baby doc has been having me randomly check for weeks due to the whole history of gestational diabetes thing, yada yada yada...my blood sugar, which HAD BEEN FINE, inexplicably went nutso. 

Go figure. 

Now I have the following staring me in the face:

1.  3/4 of the biggest jar of Nutella you can buy at WalMart.
2.  1/4 gallon of my favorite Aggie ice cream
3.  half a can of Ovaltine
4.  Nutty Bars (somehow, the Angel of Death passed over those)
5.  the sugar dust at the bottom of the cereal bag (I had help...the boys and I hoovered that one)
6.  Two boxes of Thin Mints (stinking Girl Scouts delivered them they DAY AFTER the axe fell)

Items 2-5 will end up being shared with the boys, but I find myself clutching at the Thin Mints and Nutella like they're the last of their kind.  Ridiculous, I know, but really...it's Nutella.  Wars have been fought over less.

I find, though, that I'm really grateful to have something to obsess over and whine about that isn't really a big deal.  It's nice that most of my errant thoughts are along the lines of,  "Woe is me, for I cannot have Nutella until August!"  It's like a reverse perspective check.  It's keeping my mind off of the things that are REALLY bugging me lately, like the fact that our visitation issues have gotten to the point that we're having a lawyer help us handle it...and Ethan is seeing a therapist because his anxiety over visitation is such that he wakes up and vomits during the night after the subject is broached...not to mention other things that have taught me that the grieving process isn't sequential and that I like to bounce back and forth between "denial" and "despondency."

So, like I said, I'm really grateful that I have shallow whines.  They're NICE.  I'm also grateful for the internet, which coughed up these tidbits of wisdom that, lately, I really like:

"Things we cannot solve, we must survive."  --Boyd K. Packer

(the next one's long, but worth it.  Also a Boyd K. Packer quote, and I love it!)

“The plan of redemption, with its three divisions, might be likened to a grand three-act play. Act 1 is entitled ‘Premortal Life.’ The scriptures describe it as our first estate (see Jude 1:6 ; Abraham 3:26, 28 ). Act 2, from birth to the time of resurrection, is the ‘Second Estate.’ And act 3 is called ‘Life After Death’ or ‘Eternal Life...’

“...In mortality, we are like actors who enter a theater just as the curtain goes up on the second act. We have missed act 1. The production has many plots and subplots that interweave, making it difficult to figure out who relates to whom and what relates to what, who are the heroes and who are the villains. It is further complicated because we are not just spectators; we are members of the cast, on stage, in the middle of it all!...”

“...If you expect to find only ease and peace and bliss during act 2, you surely will be frustrated. You will understand little of what is going on and why things are permitted to be as they are....

“...Remember this! The line ‘And they all lived happily ever after’ is never written into the second act. That line belongs in the third act, when the mysteries are solved and everything is put right. . . ."

And because I love the imagery....


"Life is just like an old time rail journey ... delays, sidetracks, smoke, dust, cinders, and jolts, interspersed only occasionally by beautiful vistas and thrilling bursts of speed. The trick is to thank the Lord for letting you have the ride."  --Gordon B. Hinckley





 Did I mention that the view of Cache County is AMAZING today?  I think I'm going to take the boys to the park and enjoy it...because I really am blessed.