$535 haircut

Yeah, never going there again;)  Not my idea of a great April Fools Day joke either! 

Yesterday after my haircut at the Sunridge Mall (and a very quick stop at a kids store on the very off chance that they have a dress that might fit Rachel..they didn't), I hurried to the van.  Dave and the kids had walked over to our neighbors' house for a birthday supper and I was going to meet them there.  I think I even started the van and then it struck me as odd that I could still hear everything outside.  I looked back and thought - "that's funny - the back glass is so clean I can see right out....wait a minute....there's a breeze....it's broken!"  So I got out and this is what I saw.

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Crazy huh?  There's even glass on the dashboard. I'm so very glad our kids were not in the van when this happened! We figure it must have been a pretty big vehicle because the bumper isn't damaged.  And the funny thing is that there is a security camera pointed right in this direction and it likely got a clear shot of what happened.  Someone must have hit it pretty hard to do this, and Dave thinks the skid marks look like he/she must have hit reverse pretty fast to get out of there. 

After I stood there stunned for awhile, I went to get a security guard and as we walked back to the van, he asked me why I was laughing about it.  He must have thought I was a bit weird.  But I had just read about some pretty ugly stuff that was happening in our world...and I think this gave me a healthy dose of perspective.  I told him a bit about Rachel too and later when Dave and John (friend) showed up, he told us some of his own story too.  And so we had an interesting conversation right there in the parking lot about God's work in our lives. 

We're driving a rental van right now - a Dodge Caravan and it doesn't have winter tires. And it's snowing like crazy in Calgary right now.  But there are so many things to be thankful for - car insurance for starters...a roof over our heads etc.."

I did end up starting my "one thousand things list" (a grateful list).  I'm aiming to write down five things a day.  The kids are really into this now too. The other day (or yesterday?) Ethan brought me a glass of water.  Then he said "Here mom.  You can drink this and then you can write it down in your book."!  I think our whole house can use some work in the thankfulness area - the kids aren't the only grumblers here either...so here goes.  To borrow an expression from a friend, I pray, "God, make this thanksgiving thing sink deep into our hearts.."