Worst Day Yet!

I've now had my worst day as a parent. The day started out OK, normal, like all other Saturdays. Cindy's soccer game was at 9:20, so I took her and left her with her coach while I went back for the rest of the angels. Will's game was at 9:50 (have you ever watched 3-year-olds play soccer? It's hilarious!)

Anyway, I was carrying 2-year-old (he needs a name on here...Drew) I was carrying Drew to the van, and my foot slipped off the side of the sidewalk. I fell, and as I was going down so many things went through my mind! I had flashes of granny almost ten years before slipping while carrying my 2-year-old cousin, and twisting her leg, shattering everything from the mid shin down. I could see Drew falling head-first and was trying to catch him. I felt my foot and ankle twist horribly. I tried to reach my hand under Drew's head so he'd have a softer fall and only managed to twist myself worse. His head hit and I grabbed him up at almost the same time. He was crying and scared, I was in shock and scared. Granny came and got him, and I just sat there.

I finally got up and tested my foot and ankle. It seemed sore, but not horribly bad. Obviously, nothing was broken. I went to the van where Granny had put Drew, and he was still sniffling, but generally OK. I couldn't believe he wasn't hurt worse. (I've kept my eye on him ever since for signs of trauma, but he's still just fine.) So we went to the park for a day of soccer.

After Will's and Cindy's games, we all had lunch, then went back for Annie's game. She played well, the other kids played in the volleyball sand, and on the playground where I could see them. Granny sat in the van in the shade with Drew so he could snooze. When the game was over, I was able to get all the kids' attention and tell them let's go. We were gathering up chairs and sweatshirts. Will came running over from the sand with his shoes in hand, and as I was telling him to sit down so we could put them on, he dropped them at my feet and headed for the van. The others came along and ran past, and I picked up the shoes and started moving to the van. I noticed my foot becoming much more sore and harder to walk on. It took me a while to get there, so I assumed all the kids would be in and ready to go when I arrived. But they weren't. Kevin and Will had never made it to the van. Great. We thought they couldn't be far, so the girls started running through the park and I started limping, yelling their names and looking for them.

Kevin was found very quickly and I saw Kristy dragging him towards the van. So I concentrated on looking for Will. I could hear the girls at different locations yelling his name, I was doing the same. It's a fair sized park with 15 different soccer fields marked off and approximately 1500 kids with their parents and families running around and playing soccer. In the whole time I was looking and yelling, becoming more frantic with each step, and not one person looked at me or asked if there was a problem. After all four of us had walked the entire park each, I was almost hysterical. I couldn't believe this was happening.

Then Granny called my cell phone, "Cindy found him over here in a tree." I went towards the van and saw, in the corner of the park, a giant evergreen with shadows moving around inside it. I looked in and found Will playing with a rather large boy and thanked God we found him. I don't know who the boy was or if he was just innocently playing with a child about 10 times smaller than himself, or if he had other intentions. Right now I'm happy we found him unharmed. He, of course, is oblivious...they were just playing with sticks, and he told us all about their game.

On Sunday I came down with a stomach virus...penance for dropping one child on his head and losing the other. It's days like these that make you appreciate what you have!