Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.

~James 1:2-4~

Yet another day in the life of “Lucy” and her brood. It started, as usual, with both kids waking up at the same time. As usual, I took Evelyn into my room so that I could keep an eye on her while I fed Paige. Everything went smoothly until, while changing Paige, she had an “accident”. Of course it occurred before I could get a clean diaper under her. Pee everywhere. Blast those non-absorbent plastic change pads. There was no time to give her anything but a sponge bath because Evelyn needed her breakfast.

Speaking of Evelyn, where was she? She had suddenly disappeared. I peered over the edge of the bed to find her on the floor, in front of the vacuum cleaner (which she knows not to touch), pieces everywhere. I disciplined Evelyn then tried to put the vacuum back together. I couldn’t.

I was sorely in need of a coffee by this point. Poured the beans into the coffee grinder and pressed the button. Nothing. Frantically, I tried again. Nope. Nothing. I plugged it into a different outlet. Still nothing. This is a crisis of epic proportions. Trying to push back my rising panic, I began to plead desperately with God.

Don’t ever tell me that God isn’t merciful or that He doesn’t care about the little things because just when I was about to lose it completely, He answered. I have never been so grateful for the whir of a coffee grinder in my life.

Fast forward a couple of hours. After all that kerfuffle with the grinder, my coffee is barely touched because Evelyn has decided that her mission for the day is to poke and prod her baby sister every single chance she gets. The morning has been mostly spent running interference. How many times do you have to discipline a child before they understand that their actions are wrong?

Lunch time. My husband had promised to do the dinner dishes the night before. He hadn’t. I needed some of those dishes. With a sigh of irritation and a lot of not-so-nice muttering about how much I love hand-washing dishes, I began to fill up the sink with water. I glanced at the stove to find that our oh-so-nutritious lunch of Mr. Noodles was more than ready. I dished it out, forgetting about the running water. When I looked back, the sink was overflowing everywhere. The counter and floors were soaked.

I started to clean it up when Evelyn came into the room. Her shirt was very, very wet. She took a cloth and headed back into the living room. What the heck? I peeked around the corner, only to discover that the floors in that room were soaked as well. While I was making lunch, Little Miss Evelyn had apparently decided to spit out her entire cup of juice, mouthful by mouthful, all over the living room and dining room floors.

I dealt with her, sopped up some of the mess, and then sat her down to eat. Midway through the meal (if you can call it that), she informed me that she needed to go to the potty. With a sigh, I took her upstairs. I’d forgotten that the toilet was clogged and I don’t know where the plunger is. Awesome. Lucky for Evelyn, we have a back-up potty. As for me, I guess it’s a good thing I didn’t get around to drinking that coffee. How many more hours until the hubby gets home from work?

The kids are now napping. Hooray! But the dishes are waiting, the laundry needs to be folded, the plunger needs to be found, and the floors need to be mopped. First, however, I need to get that hours-old coffee into my system … and maybe pray for a miracle for my toilet!

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Update: The toilet randomly unclogged itself. See? Prayer works! I’m so relieved (pun intended)!