A Day That Will Live in Infamy

June 17, 2011.....A day that will live in infamy. At least to me......
 Lawson's 3rd Birthday. The theme was "My Favorite Things" which at the time was snakes, lizards, sharks, alligators, the colors blue and green, and really random foods like powdered donuts, pizza, popcorn, chicken nuggets, and cheese puffs ..... Our schedule for the day was slammed. First we had a photo shoot with Steph. The pics turned out beautiful and I treasure them!! Garrison, who was 2 months old, stayed at home with his Ree Ree (my sister Ariel, for those who don't know Ree Ree) while Lawson and I were out running birthday errands and spending the day together.

 We had a full day! After pics we had to run and get the popcorn machine for the party, run several other errands around town, then go to Monroeville and get some last minute party stuff, balloons blown up for the party, and pick up pizza from Pizza hut to bring back for family dinner at 5:30. First thing first, popcorn machine. While there Lawson runs directly into the handle of a mulcher, it hit him right in the eye and clotheslined him . After he got up and quit crying he insisted that I go inside and tell them what had happened to him at the store. Why, I don't know, but I complied. It was slightly embarrassing considering I was at Handiman, but whatever made the injured birthday boy happy, I guess. Then we ran the popcorn machine back home....I unloaded it and Lawson, fed Garrison, dropped everything off, and loaded Lawson back up. I jammed it into reverse and gunned it back (I was in a hurry, you know). BAM! Lawson yells "Momma, what did we hit?" I just yelled a dirty word that I will not type out.  For the record, it was not one of the dirtiest dirty words. Just a little dirty. 
I had rammed my sister's VW Bug and seriously dented the whole door. I told Lawson that I had run into Ree Ree car. Of course, he "Why?"  followed by about 30 more questions in rapid succession. So, I pulled back in and faced the music. I can't remember exactly what I said, but something to the extent of...."Um, I just backed into your car. Sorry!" I called Chuck and told him. Thankfully, he wasn't mad at me. He has lots of patience with me and told me it was OK. Gotta love him!

So, off Lawson and I go to get everything done. Once in Monroeville I had to try to find somewhere to have the balloons all blown up. Winn Dixie charges $1.50 per balloon if they provide the balloons and .$99 if you bring your own balloons.  No thanks! So I went to Wal Mart and bought a big pack of balloons for cheap and had them blow them up for $.50 a piece. So we get all the party food and our balloons and head for the register. The balloons are all tied together and tied to my wrist, where the Wal Mart lady insisted I tie them so I wouldn't accidentally let them go. I am pushing the cart with Lawson sitting in the seat part and we are zooming around at mach 90, heading to pay. We have exactly 10 minutes to pick up the pizza and head home to Camden if we want to make it on time. All of a sudden, the balloons come untied and fly to the ceiling. There is no way they can get them down. Lawson starts screaming, "My b'oons, my b'oons!" He cried and cried. Seriously?? We were not leaving without some balloons.... So we went and got more and the nice Wal Mart lady blew them up. We waited...and waited....While waiting, Lawson has a tee tee accident. Great. Finally a big bouquet of green and blue balloons comes towards us. Yay! Needless to say, I held the strings and did NOT tie them around my wrist. We paid and booked it to the car. I am throwing groceries in the car like a maniac. I stripped Lawson down to a new pull up and loaded him in his car seat (of course I didn't remember to grab an extra pair of clothes for him during all the morning chaos). We get the pizza and are running 30 minutes late! So,  in the interest of full disclosure, I headed to Camden VERY quickly. We were close to Beatrice when I see blue lights. Yep, I got pulled over. I  will admit that I had a flash of crazy where I thought, hey maybe I can turn down this dirt road and run. But I didn't. I am proud to say that I would never do such a thing with my little boy in the car. Haha.
I roll down the window and give him my license etc.I started spilling all about everything that had happened that day. The wreck, the balloons, the fact that it was my little boy's birthday.  As he walked off I said, "Sir, is there any way I can not get a ticket?" I don't remember his exact reply because about that time Lawson's window starts rolling down (apparently I did not have the child lock on) and he starts yelling "Sir, sir can my Momma not get a ticket?" (The sir sounded like siw, siw by the way). I wanted to die. The poor cop is being asked by my 3 year old son, who is dressed in nothing but a pull up, if he can let me go without a speeding ticket. Needless to say, I got the ticket. I guess I should just have been grateful that he didn't call Child Services on me.  So I was even later getting home than I would have been. The whole family was there waiting on us. I had to tell my dear Hubby that I had also received a speeding ticket on the way home. Guess what! He still didn't get mad at me. I think he felt truly bad for me.


To this day, Lawson still reminds me about running into Ree Ree's car...."Momma, remember when you hit Ree Ree's car?" As if I could forget.
He also says, "Now Momma, don't drive too fast. You don't want to get ANOTHER speeding ticket, do you?" Although, that is probably more in response to the one I received this past December than the other one.

All in all, I was kind of glad the day came to an end. The next day we celebrated with a little party and it was great. Thank goodness.


My Husband is full of patience with me.
My sweet little Lawson is almost 4 years old.

My cup runneth over
~Shana~