You either laugh or cry...

But eventually you learn that crying is not going to do anything, so laughing has hopes of being much more effective.

And I got to practice that today.

This morning I woke up, got the kids up, and started on our morning clean up. (Sorry flylady, by the end of the day, I'm so worn out the last thing on my mind is taking care of "hot spots".) Amid the clutter on the table and on the counters were lots of drawings the girls did last night before bedtime. The collection of drawings consisted of Joelle's attempts at ponies (which look more like Dachshunds with extra long legs), some mermaids, scribbles, more mermaids, Jordan's assortment of flying unicorns. And of course lots and lots of horses.

All those drawings meant all that paper. I love how my kids are artistic and creative, and love to express their creativity. But sometimes it does get frustrating when you discover that your printer paper supply has once again been raided because all of their art paper has already been used up.
So this morning, while sorting through and filing the best of last nights creations, and tossing the rest, I was having a little pity party over the low paper supply.

Again.

And for some reason I thought it would be cute to jokingly take the pity party public; on my Facebook and on my Twitter both.

I should of known better.

We finished clean up, and I started to make breakfast. Jordan was in the other room reading, and Joelle was outside playing in the front. Jordan went outside, and reported that Joelle was playing with rocks (not out of the ordinary) when she came back in. Not thinking anything of it, I continued with breakfast.

When breakfast was done, I sent Jordan to fetch her sister. Jordan went outside, and immediately came back in.. hesitated...."Mom, come look and see what Joelle did"
(Oh great.... for once Jordan's remembered not to be a tattle tale and actually come and get me.)

No matter if she had of told me or not. Nothing really could of prepared me for what I saw on the hood of my car.

Look closely. Right in the middle of the hood.

See it? Guess what it is yet? Or how all those beautiful etches in the paint got there?

Remember, Joelle was playing with rocks earlier. I guess she got the idea to draw on something other than paper.

Unfortunately my car became her new canvas.

It took me a second or two to realize what it was, and what had happened. And a few more to respond. I turned around and saw Jordan's eyes were as big as tea saucers. Then I turned and looked at Joelle and saw that she was smiling in her 5 yo childishness because she was proud of creating something different. Then she saw the look on my face and she knew she was in big trouble.

My first thought was to cut a branch off the tree, but didn't. I called her over, and with every ounce of will in me to stay calm, I explained to her that drawing on the car was wrong, that it hurt the car, and she should never do it again. Poor Joelle was so crushed because she was in trouble over something she wanted to proudly show me. Hugged her, and then sent both girls inside to eat.

Then I started laughing hysterically. It took me at least 10 minutes before I laughed enough to calm down and go back inside. And everytime I looked at Joelle, or had to look outside and saw the car, I wanted to start rolling again.

I knew I should of been mad, but I couldn't help it. It was so funny!!! And it serves me right for jokingly asking God if we could make a ream of paper last more than a week. Besides, it's only a car. This one has over 200,000 miles and a few problems anyway. God's got this taken care of or has another car waiting for us.

My lesson for the day: Don't look at a blessing and turn it into a gripe. It could, and probably will, get worse.