Priceless

We had an unusual Saturday yesterday (not that any of our days are usual or that I even know what that would look like).  My husband bought a second-hand Atari console with like fifty games.  We have never purchased any video game console for our children beyond their school computer, but go figure, when we finally decide to go for it, we get one a century old.  Okay, slight exaggeration.  It's cool though and comes with all the good games of my youth: Pac-Man, Centipede, Frogger and the like.

After driving to the middle of nowhere to pick up the purchase, I remembered it was nearby an ice cream shop we passed (also in the middle of nowhere) on our way home from a camping trip we took two years ago.  Yes, this is how my brain works.  I couldn't remember exactly where it was or what it was called, but I remembered it was a red building.  You may be looking at my post the same way my husband looked at me when I suddenly suggested we find it and have ice cream there.

I did call my sister to see if she was near her computer and could hook us up with general directions.  Try as we might to describe our journey home from camping, she was unable to locate anything useful.  So we stopped to buy a map and then began retracing our steps back to the campground hoping that we'd pass said ice cream shop on our way.

Guess what?  We did.  It was right where I figured it'd be and it was red.  Not to mention that the ice cream and atmosphere were delightful!  The cost of ice cream for the whole family (including my cherry crisp ala mode and C's banana split) was only $10.  Take that Baskin-Robbins!!  Granted, B-R is way closer and what we save on gas to get there probably makes the difference in cost these days.

The weather was fabulous and so we sat outside and when we walked around the grounds, it was lovely.  Well, it was lovely, right up to the part where S and I started being eaten alive by swarms of red ants because we had our flops on.  But that's not the direction I was hoping for this post to go, so moving on ...

It was late afternoon by the time we got home from our day driving around in the middle of nowhere.  Kids were tired of being in the car, so they went out to ride bikes and scooters out front.

Without warning, Z ran in the house to tell us that J had gotten hurt, "Bad!"

Both C and I ran outside to see what was going on when we spot J pushing her scooter back towards the house, crying in pain and her chin was dripping the dreaded b-word (blood).  Z took the scooter to park it in the garage and C picked our little girl up -- unconcerned for his own shirt -- as he carried her into the house.

Up on the counter by the sink, I carefully began to clean her wound and we realized that it wasn't stopping.  Also, it looked deep.  I mean, with five kids -- three of them boys -- we see our fair share of scrapes and bruises, and most of the time, we stick a Band-aid on and toss them back outside to play.  But maybe because she was a girl and it was part of her face or maybe because it did look really bad, we made the decision to go to Urgent Care.

Unfortunately, we were 22 minutes late.  So we had to go to the Emergency Room instead.  Now, of course, I'm thinking about the co-pay difference between Urgent Care vs. Emergency Room, but if we thought it was bad enough to bring her to Urgent Care, did I not think it was still urgent enough to bring her to the ER?  So I bit my lip and we entered the ER, knowing that whatever happened, it was going to be $100 just to walk out of this place.

J sobbed in the waiting room, less from pain and more about her concern that the ER meant she'd need surgery.  I'm not sure where she got that from, but she was convinced she was going under the knife.  Poor thing.

Our teen daughter offered to come with us as well and I was glad to have her there to help J stay calm while I did paperwork.

Long story short (sort of), they numbed J's chin, cleaned it out really good and ultimately decided against stitches.  The doctor did seem to go back and forth a bit, so at least I didn't feel so dumb like the answer was obvious and I was just an overreacting parent.  Before we left, they put some medication on her wound and bandaged her up.  While we waited for the bandage, though, J started to get really bored waiting to leave.  She started apologizing for random things and one thing she said was to her sister.

She said, "S, I'm sorry you missed your friend's birthday party tonight."

Because, in fact, S had offered to go with us instead of her friend's birthday party.  Her response was what made the whole $100 co-pay a lot easier to swallow, because as a mom, I live for these moments:

S said, "It's okay, J, you're more important to me than a party any day."

Don't you just love it?  Sacrifice, love, care ... all bundled up between two siblings at just the exact right moment!!  And these are our children.

I'm glad, too, that J didn't need stitches.  Really, I am.  I don't mean to sound ungrateful.  Ha!  I just like getting my money's worth.  I feel like I did.