Hold on...This is a dental cubical, not a clown car!

There are just certain things you shouldn't do, but you do them because you have to.....For example, taking more than one child to any medical/dental appointment. I would even be fine with taking NO children with me, if it were at all possible to have the procedures done vicariously through me. Poke me, scrape me, clean me, whatever, just don't make me bring my kids....And honestly, it's not even about "crowd control" anymore, it's more about "crowdedness" these days.

So last Monday was Dentist Day. Now as many of you know there is an extreme amount of thought and preparedness that goes on before we even leave the house. Diaper bag: Check, Activity Bag for the olders: Check, Arsenal of Snacks and Juice: Double Check, (My Mind: Uhh, can't find it...Guess I'll go without it....)

O.K. we are out the door. First stop, drop Cole off at the Y-Camp and then fall to my knees thanking God that these appointments fell on a day when I had "1 less". Second Stop, Tim Horton's, where I shamelessly paraded myself and the other 3 kids in to get our Free Blueberry Donuts to go! That's right, we don't tend to pass up a freebie, even when they are whining in the car, "we don't even like blueberry", quiet...Daddy will eat them! Then off to the dentist for Blake and Abbey's appointments.

Upon arrival, the receptionist sees that it is "us" and quickly calls for an assist. It is now up to me and our dental tech to wrangle the 3 wheeled jogging stroller, complete with baby inside, up the steps and around all the other cubicles until we arrive at ours. Abbey promptly assumes the position in the chair, while Blake is stuffed around the corner to repeatedly peruse and open everything in the "prize chest". Then the rest of us cram ourselves in and let the cleaning begin. The whole event is a bit of a human puzzle and we shuffle around repeatedly during the process.

Tech-Me-Ginormous Stroller w/Baby....oops, now the tech needs out....

Me-Ginormous Stroller w/Baby-"Blake, get out of here!"-Tech....... and so it goes. Then we do it all over again with Blake in the chair and Abbey stuffed in the corner.

And for the grand finale, the actual dentist comes in. (Our dentist may in fact be the TALLEST dentist in the tri-city area, if not the world....) So he has the advantage of simply stepping over all the rest of us and wedges himself in between the chair and the tech, takes a look and we are good to go. Did I mention that I spent a large portion of the teeth cleaning, feeding Kasey multiple sugary snacks to keep her occupied...no?....well, I DID! AND RIGHT IN FRONT OF THE DENTIST! Finally, we were done. Hey kids! Who wants another donut?

Okay, Okay. Now this time you be Watson and I'll be Sherlock.....

We were robbed! That's right....pilfered, ripped off, rifled, pillaged....call it what you want. It happened to us! Last Saturday I went out to my truck to load the kids up to go somewhere. I can't remember exactly where we were going, but chances are it was Wal-Mart. Anyhow, I go to get in and I see that my center console is open.....hmmm.....This reminds me of a conversation that I had with Rob earlier that day, in which he asked me if I had been in HIS center console and left it open. (And no I hadn't. He has moved his "quarter stash" to a new hiding place so I have no need to look in there anymore.) So when I notice my console is open, I get that sick feeling and start to look around my truck. The first thing I notice is that my GPS is missing....disaster! (By now, everyone out there should know what my first thought was "Yikes, I'm gonna be in trouble....again..." Just go ahead and tack this on to my list of "careless" behaviors (I had left it unlocked) and let the shaming begin! As a side note, I don't really get "in trouble", it's just that look that he gives me. You know the one, a mingling of disappointment and frustration, along with a dash of "I told you so"....Yep, that'll do it...

Alright, so the GPS is gone, and fortunately that was all. They apparently weren't interested in the binder of Disney DVD's on the dash or the DVD player. And Thank God they didn't take the time to pry the t.v. screens out of the seat backs (this would surely have ellicited a response greater than "the look"). Rob was out with one of the other kids, so I had ample time to writhe around in my self-loathing and prepare my story.....Which wasn't so much a story as it was a confession, with "but remember the time you....."tagged on the end.

So, Rob gets home. I tell, I get "the look" and then we put on our masks and capes and spring into crime fighting action. I go out to the shed and grab the GPS box, complete with original packaging and receipt from 2 years ago (oh yes, I'm THAT good..) The babysitter arrives and we set off to troll the local pawn shops to reclaim what is rightfully ours! Cue the Law & Order theme song. So I direct him to the closest pawn shop and we make a plan. The plan has 2 parts. Part 1:Rob goes in, looking as ghetto as possible, and expresses a casual interest in their GPS selection to see if ours is among them. So with a slight drop of the pants and a swivel of his hat, he was ready to go. Part 2 of the plan involved me NOT going in..Rob's thought was that I would surely give us up by squealing, "That's mine! That's mine! That's mine!" before we had time to call the COPS. Good Plan. While Rob was in the pawnshop, I anxiously wait in the truck, giving my mom the play by play over the cell phone. I thought it would be wise for someone else to know where we were in case anything "went down". He comes back out and asks for the box. So this means it's in there, now he is going to go in and prove it is ours by matching the serial numbers. The store owners agree that, yes, it is obviously ours AND they even know who dropped it off. We still had to call the police to come out and make a report. We were unable to take it that day, but the pawnshop was ordered to put a hold on it until it went through the proper channels. Today the officer called me and told me that he had spoken to the suspect who, of course, denies having taken it....Apparently he found it by a fence on the corner of some downtown streets. Yeah, that's right, I must have forgotten to grab my GPS when I was done "working" that corner last weekend. Oh Please.....

However, this "innocent" suspect agreed to payback the $65.00 bucks that the pawnshop had given him for it, so that they would then release it to us. What a considerate "non-thief". Now, I don't know about you, but if I didn't take it, I ain't paying! ......guilty......He said that he didn't want any trouble.

Go Lock Your Vehicles, people... before you get "the look"....