to the person who bashed in the back of my van...

The back story: We have no idea who hit our van, but we have a good idea of where it happened. I didn't see the damage until after I left the house to drop Brian off at work and had pulled into a parking spot in downtown St. Paul. Not only did they break the left tail light, they damaged the bumper and made it physically impossible to open the back hatch. All three will probably need to be replaced. So if we are able to figure out where/when this occurred, we might be able to figure out who caused the damage. It is that person that I'm thinking of while I write this vent.

because of you I couldn't open the back of my van to retrieve my stroller when we arrived at the Children's museum today (and believe me, I tried to jam it through/over the seats to free it)

because of you I had to improvise how I would manage two kids, three coats, and a large diaper bag while playing at the museum (not to mention getting all those things in to the museum.

because of you I had to make due with no coats, no diaper bag, and no stroller for three hours

because of you I had to spend money on vending machine snacks instead of eating the things I had packed in the diaper bag

because of you I had to carry 65 pounds of kids so they wouldn't get all dirty in the parking ramp

because of you I couldn't put my over-tired 3 year old in the stroller and hustle to the car when Daddy called to say he was done plowing

because of you I had to try to make my 17 month old hold my hand while we maneuvered the through the crowds at the Mall of America

because of you I need to make an appointment with my Chiropractor to fix my back after carrying my kids too much today

because of you the money we were going to put towards finally purchasing a second car will have to go towards fixing the van

In the spirit of forgiveness and telling the whole truth:

because of you I didn't have so much stuff to keep track of at the Children's Museum (I tucked a diaper in the sling and put my driver's license in my pocket and away we went.)

because of you I had the option of using the stairs (We rarely used them though - there has to be 50 steps between each floor.)

because of you I could easily slip past the massive amount of people at Underwater Adventures and get to the tunnel faster

because of you we could use the escalators at the MOA and avoid waiting forever for an elevator

because of you when the escalator was broken and the elevators were packed we could still squeeze in and not have to wait another 5 minutes for the next one. (Only problem was that after we hopped on so did 6 other people causing the elevator to freeze and not move.)

because of you we could squirm our way out of the elevator and make our way to the parking ramp to use the good old fashioned steps

because of you I learned that I don't have to bring everything but the kitchen sink along for our adventures