Of course...

I am so far behind on the blog, but I keep missing these great opportunities to share the wonderful craziness that occurs in our home on a daily basis. :)  Sooo.... I decided I'm just going to pop them in, in between all the 'catching up' blogs. So here's an account of last night's drama... sorry, no pics this time.  I should have, though... if I'd been in a better state of mind, it would've been GREAT to capture!

Wes headed out of town last night to visit a university Bible study that is going on in another part of Spain... just to see what/how they do things.  He traveled about 3 hours away to join them, so I knew he would be gone well into the morning hours.  That afternoon, we had found some curtains for the house, but they needed to be hemmed.  I had planned to take advantage of the quiet house that night and get as much sewing done as I could.  Before I start a "project" I like to make sure the house is clean and settled, so I had spent several hours doing dishes, cleaning the counter tops, sweeping and mopping the kitchen floor.  I was feeling so good about everything being clean and in order... totally ready to start my evening of sewing... I had 8 curtains to hem!

So, of course, about an hour after Wes left, the boys and I were finishing up dinner.  I told them to put their dishes in the sink, and I picked up Carolina to walk upstairs and put her to bed.  As I was walking up the stairs, I heard a huge crash... it was like slow motion.  I couldn't get there fast enough.  I heard another crash and another... and then glass shattering and Jonathan screaming. 

When I got to the kitchen door, there was food/glass/cans everywhere.  The pantry was tipped over and resting on a chair like a huge wall blocking the entrance of the kitchen.  Jonathan was on the other side of that "wall" holding his head and screaming.  Shattered glass and food and "the wall" separated me from Jonathan.  Jonathan was crying hard; but there was no blood, so that was reassuring. :)  All the kids joined me in the kitchen doorway, and Carolina wanted to go in and "explore", of course.  SOOO... I sent Weston and Nathan upstairs to "play" with Carolina until I could figure out what to do.

I had no idea what had happened, but I had to try to get Jonathan out of there without getting cut by glass.  I mean, it was EVERYWHERE.  I finally had him crawl under the table. When he got to me, his pants were covered in glass from crawling... but it was also in his hair and on his shirt.  Whatever happened, he was near the glass when everything shattered. 

He was still crying, holding his head; but I made him strip off his clothes before I led him to the couch.  While I was picking out all the glass from his hair, I realized he had a huge egg on his head.  He finally told me he was hanging on the pantry door, and made it fall over.  Of course.  He kept saying, "I'm so, so sorry..."  Yeah, me too. :)  I got some ice (thank the Lord I could easily get to the freezer!) and made him lie down. 

I decided to leave the mess and try to get the rest of the kids in bed, b/c I realized that Carolina was screaming at this point.  She wanted to come downstairs with me, but Weston was doing what I told him and wasn't letting her.  Chaos. 

I put Carolina to bed, and while the other boys were getting ready for bed, I returned back downstairs to survey the damage.  I put my Crocs on to protect my feet and tried to lift the huge pantry to put it back into place.  It had fallen, but had been stopped by the corner of one of our kitchen chairs.  The chair had punctured the door of the pantry, and the pressure of it had twisted the bottom of the door off.  I was afraid it might not hold and then it would crash to the floor, breaking the REST of the stuff there and the chair.  But, no matter what I did, I couldn't put it upright, of course.  I wasn't strong enough or tall enough.  Talk about frustrating!!!

Well, my Weston is a pretty big 7 year old (just a few inches shorter than me!), so I thought maybe we could do it together.  I made him put his Crocs on, and we tried and tried... crunching glass and squishing food that hadn't yet been squished. :)  Nope... we couldn't do it... of course.  I gave up, and had him change his clothes again and get back into bed.  

When Wes left, he had taken our cell phone with him, and all our phone numbers are in the cell.  It usually works well and we never misplace numbers that way... except that he had the cell and I didn't have a single number to call.  I had thought to call Paul to see if he could help me lift the pantry and put it back.  When I realized I didn't have his number, I called Wes.  I explained what had happened, and Wes said, "Of course... only when I'm gone does something like this happen... of course."

So, he tried to call Paul, but couldn't get him... then he tried several of our other friends here and couldn't reach any of them (of course.)  So, I just decided to try to get the boys in bed, make sure Jonathan was ok, and clean up the best I could until Wes returned at 2am in the morning... then he could help me put it back up. :)

After I put all the boys to bed; and I checked Jonathan for signs of a concussion, I remembered that Paul usually keeps his Skype on all the time.  I went to the computer and wrote him about 5 sentences, seeing if would answer.  Nothing.  He must be busy.  I decided that Jonathan seemed ok.  I knew I would need to try to wake him every hour or so... but, he was tired, so I let him go to bed and go to sleep.

After getting boys settled in bed, I went back downstairs to see how much I could clean up.  As I was picking up the largest pieces of glass that I could reach, I heard the phone ring... upstairs, of course.  I couldn't get to in time, so I missed it... when I got upstairs, I went through each room but still couldn't remember where I'd left the phone.  The boys said it sounded like it was coming from downstairs... I thought it was upstairs.   When I didn't find it upstairs, I went back downstairs to look again.  It started ringing again, and I KNEW it was coming from upstairs.  I ran back upstairs, but still couldn't place it... then I realized.  It was coming from behind Carolina's closed door.  Of course.  In my haste and craziness, I had left it in there when I put her to bed!  So, I woke her up by going back into the room to get the phone (funny how the phone didn't wake her up, but the door did.)

It was Paul.  He had been in a meeting, but saw my Skype.  I told him what happened, and he said he'd be right over.  I did what I could in the kitchen until he came.  He walked into the kitchen and said, "Whoa."... yeah, exactly. :)  He had to moved some stuff behind the pantry (which I couldn't reach) in order to pick it up.  Every step he took made a crunching noise from all the glass underfoot.  He made it look so easy and just lifted that pantry back into place... if only I was a little taller and a little stronger! :) 

We realized that it had fallen forward and caught on another shelf.  When that couldn't hold the weight anymore, it pushed the fridge over and it all gave way.  Thank the Lord the chair was there to stop it from going further; it would have crushed Jonathan, otherwise!

Once we got the pantry back to a standing position, the mess didn't seem quite as overwhelming... but, I still knew it would take me the rest of the night to clean it up.  So much for sewing.  It's a good thing I had cleaned and mopped the kitchen earlier that night, right?... yeah, OF COURSE...