Raising Our Family And Trying To Remember It All: October 10-16

Such a crazy, busy week. It started out pretty boring with the usual work and house stuff. However, that changed Wednesday afternoon. I was getting Aubrey and myself ready to go to dinner with Todd who was on his way home from work when he calls and says he's been rear ended less than 2 miles from home. He said he was fine, he was just waiting on the police so I called the family to share the news and then took off to check out the damage. When I got there, I was surprised to see Todd's truck had pretty minimal damage compared to the kid's car that hit him. It looked like just Todd's bumper and hitch cover got the damage, but the other car was pretty smashed up. He told me the guy was 17, had a provisional license, and said he just didn't see him, despite Todd being at a dead stop waiting to turn left. While Todd was talking to the police officer, I started chatting with the tow truck driver who told me that the driver admitted to him he was changing the song on his iPod when he hit Todd. Fantastic. The police officer told Todd that all the kid has to do is get his insurance company to write on letter head that the damages were being covered and they would drop the ticket. Really?! Because that's the way to teach a new driver a lesson. Todd did go to urgent care afterwards to get checked out and luckily no serious injuries were found. Sadly, the same can't be said for the truck. He took it to a body shop the next day and they realized its more damaged than we thought. The impact pushed the bed of the truck into the back of the cab so there is possible frame damage on top of the bumper and towing hitch. So far the estimate is almost $4000 and that's before they really tear it apart to analyze it. The parts have been ordered so once they get them in and start tearing it apart, they are anticipating that estimate will go up. We just paid that truck off in March of this year so its pretty frustrating to know we've lost even more value and can't sell it because of some kid not paying attention. But, we will count our blessing that Todd and the other driver both walked away and called it a day. Todd is still pretty sore at this point, but still no serious injuries have popped up so that is another blessing.

Saturday we spent the morning volunteering with our community group at an agency called Samaritan's Feet here in Charlotte. They gather and distribute shoes throughout the country and world to those who need them. We spent the morning going through a shipment of 600,000 fake Nike's that were confiscated by Homeland Security (never knew this was in their job descrption) and donated for the agency to hand out. It was not fancy work, but I like knowing that we were a part of it.

Saturday afternoon found us at our friends' cookout. Our friendship with these people has developed over the past 3 years after I met Fran at work. She and I ended up being pregnant around the same time so Aubrey and her son Landon are only 4 months apart. Fran's husband and Todd get along great so when we get together, we always have a great time. This cookout was crazy with so many little kids and the adults chasing after them, but it was perfect. When you think about spending great time and with family and friends, events like this are exactly what you imagine. The only drawback was that by the time we left, we were exhausted. I was supposed to go to a birthday party later that night, but by the time we got home, I realized I had overdone it for the day. I had swollen a great deal from being on my feet all day, plus my back and shoulders hurt. Those coupled with the exhaustion put me out for the count. Sunday was spent doing a few light chores and then being lazy.

Hope everyone has a great week!