The Mission

There are days when everything goes smoothly. When everyone has a pleasant attitude, gets along with each other, obeys, and does exactly what they're supposed to. Mostly.

And then there are days like yesterday.

Days when all 4 kids wake up more than an hour earlier than normal. When the baby who has had a nose like a faucet for 3 days and is on antibiotic drops for an ear infection suddenly has an infection in the other ear as well and is cranky and wants mama every single second and then still cries because of the pain. Days when the oldest is picking on his siblings. When the middle two are tattling on each other. When all the kids are irritable. When mommy is irritable. When everyone has way too much energy. When everyone is trying to be the loudest. Days when the stress level is way too high.

That is how yesterday started. Quite frankly, I wanted to plop the kids in front of the television, turn on a movie, and enjoy an hour of peace. I wanted to walk in the other room, without 4 sets of little legs trailing behind, and remove myself from the chaos. 

But I couldn't.

I just couldn't justify using the TV as an easy way out, when it wasn't going to solve anything anyway. Sure, it would have given me a few precious minutes without hearing a whiny Moooom! But before the end credits could finish, those little ones of mine would have been back to jumping off the walls. Literally.

What did I do?

Why, the only thing I could do, of course.

I called the whole team into my office and sent them on a mission. Oh, this was not like any mission they had been on before. This one was was much more dangerous and required greater skills. The outcome of the entire operation was dependent on the help of each person.

Thankfully, they were up for the challenge.

As soon as they got to the location, they were given the first task: Put the letters in alphabetical order. Yeah, it sounds easy enough, but they were working under pressure. If they didn't have all the letters (except for I, where did that silly letter go anyway?) within 10 minutes, lasers would be activated and shoot across the room! They worked together and accomplished the task, minutes before the deadly lasers were activated.

There was no time to celebrate though. They had to move on to the second assignment: Use the letters to make 3 words. All 3 words had to be together at the same time, so there was no reusing the vowels. And remember, that silly I was nowhere to be found. They had to think and do it fast, because knives were going to fly out of holes in the walls in 5 minutes! Those quick-thinkers made Zac, hit, and young and were able to turn off the mechanism before the knives came flying.

Just as they were reveling in their accomplishment, they were given job number 3: Return the letters to alphabetical order. Oh, if only they hadn't completely destroyed the setup to make the words! It was organized chaos as they replicated their first task. They had to work even faster this time though, as they had only 7 minutes before the floor started to crumble, and they plummeted into the hot lava below! They completed the assignment and saved their lives in the process. Whew!  

Task 4 required listening skills: Stand on the letter that the each word begins with. The only problem? There had to be 3 squares pressed at all times. The only way to break the code and stop the walls and ceiling from closing in and squishing them was by using teamwork. Each member had to listen carefully to the words. I read off the sequence (words like alligator, princess, moon, dinosaur, yellow) and the team rushed to break the code. They had to hurry though. If the sequence was broken for 3 seconds, the walls began to move! They listened carefully and helped each other find the proper letters in time.

I had been corresponding with them through satellite up until this point. But I knew what was coming. The next trap would require more experience, more expertise. That they might need my help was a strong possibility. I made the long trek there, in hopes of aiding them in the completion of the mission.

The goal was almost in sight. Failure was not an option.

There was nothing to do but press on.

They had one final job to do before retrieving their treasure. Find objects that begin with each of the letters. They immediately jumped to action since they had only 15 minutes before a giant boulder was released and came rolling through the passageway, flattening us in its wake! They rushed around, gathering the necessary items. Things like football, tiger, ogre, xylophone, corn, pillow, and Joker were found and placed on the appropriate tiles. 

Before we knew it, we heard a loud buzzing. Our time was up! The mechanism that was holding back the giant boulder was about to release! We were terrified!

Fortunately, there was a clause written in that gave an additional 5 minutes if an object were placed on a tile at the exact time the alarm went off. Whew! We were safe. For now.

We still had 3 more letters to fill: V, K and U. We scrambled around to find anything that could be used. 

U - umbrella! Jake returned with a huge one.

K - Ken! Alyssa ran to retrieve the plastic doll.

V. . . V . . . V?  Violin . . . vampire . . . vulture . . . Vietnam. We couldn't find anything that began with V. 

Wait - vacuum! Jake ran and got the play vacuum, placed it on the square, and stopped that boulder from rolling flat us like a pancake. We did it!

And . . . we unlocked the vault and got to the treasure. Finally! 

It was a dangerous mission, but well-worth the risk.

The only thing left was to construct a rocket and get out of there before anything else could happen.

Mission accomplished.