The extravagance of a stroller.

There are so many places to start this story. I guess the best place would be to start at the beginning....

Back in July I found out I was pregnant with baby number two! In about the same amount of time it took for reality to hit, I also became very sick. I spent the rest of that summer in bed, or on the couch trying to cope the best I could. By the time I started to recover, Jordan and I were starting to discuss and pray about whether or not we should move back to Colorado. We decided to move, and began packing and preperations for our cross country journey. We arrived in Colorado on Dec. 5th, moved, and then had just enough time to celebrate Christmas and New Years. So, needless to say I haven't had much time to think about the fact that I am pregnant, and my life is about to get a little crazier!!

I decided that after the New Year I would have a bit more time and could actually sit down and think about all I needed to do to get ready for our second boy, Greyson Daniel. Since we are having another boy, our list of things we need to get is cut in half! No need for more blankets, bedding, clothes...you get my point. But as I sat down last week I realized that there was still a lot more on my list then I had money to buy. I started making a game plan. We could borrow a crib, a swing, and a few things from some good friends. I could easily find a few items second hand. I could even live with out a few items for a while. There were however a few more pressing items that had begun to stress me out.

1- A dresser

2- A double stroller

3- diapers (for those of you who don't know I use cloth, which will deserve its own blog one of these days :)!!)

For those of you who read my "getting over myself" blog, I was struggling to finding a cheap dresser. We came up with a solution, however I won't bore you with the details.....well, because that's not what this blog is about. As far as the diapers go.... I'm still working on this, and that is ok!

Now, the stroller. Oh the stroller. There is only one of me, and soon to be two of "them". As you can see, a device to haul two kids around is going to be quite the necessity. There are a lot of double strollers on the market. If you've never looked, please do, you will be shocked at the variety as well as the price tag!!
I began looking at second hand strollers. Most of them were old, clunky and still way to expensive. I looked at new "cheaper" ones, and those were still $200 - $300!

A friend of mine had recently purchased one of the best strollers money can buy on clearance at a local sporting goods store. She had decided to go with a different brand and was selling it for about $200 less then one would go for brand new (which this one pretty much was). She generously offered to sell it to us for less then what they would ask for it on craigslist, but still it came with a hefty price tag. Jordan and I discussed our options. How would we pay for it? Was it really worth it? But, before we went to bed that night we decided it just wasn't going to be possible.

Early the next morning, I got on the computer to do my morning social networking and found that I had an email from a friend. We had been emailing a bit about things we needed for the baby because she was wanting to send us a gift. Her email stated that she really wanted to help with something we were needing and to just let her know what that was. Even though Jordan and I had decided that we couldn't afford the stroller, I thought I'd mention it.

I left the house, ran some errands, and essentially forgot about the email. On my way home I got stopped at a light where a homeless man stood with his small cardboard sign asking for help. I watched as 5 cars lined up in the the right hand left turning lane....as far away as they could get and still get to where they needed to go. I actually needed to be in that lane as well, but as I pulled up I felt a twing in my heart. I thought to myself, "How awful. No one wants to pull up next to this man because they do not want to feel guilty about not giving him money." Selfishly, I didn't want to give up the few dollars I had in my wallet either because who knew when I would have them again? I couldn't believe that these thoughts were going through my head. Who am I to not share what I have?

So, I pulled out of my lane and headed over the man and passed him a few dollars. The light turned green. As I drove away I remembered what a very generous friend of mine had said a few days earlier. After already borrowing so many things from her, she kindly offered us more. In response to my sarcastic comment of "Why don't I just take your house and your car while I'm at it?!", she simply said "You know everything that I have is yours." This is how I needed to be. Even if I didn't have a lot, what I have is not mine. I wanted to learn to be more generous, less selfish, even if it meant giving away the last few dollars out of my wallet that I could have used to buy a secret Starbucks that Jordan would never see come out of our bank account (love you sweety).

When I got home, I had forgotten about this whole revelation in the chaos of feeding my 2 year old and getting him down for his nap. I got back online and began chatting with my mom about the stroller, she offered to help pay for it, but still I knew that we couldn't cover the remainder. I proceed to check my email and found an email from my friend saying that she was putting $200 in the mail to go towards the stroller. Tears welled up in my eyes as I read those words...as they are now just thinking about the love and generosity being shown to me. In less then 12 hours of decided to forget about the stroller, we had more then enough to cover it on its way! I spent the next hour in tears over the amazing ways God can use people to bless us. He could have provided a used stroller, or a little extra money for an "okay" stroller....but NO....He provided through my friends and family the best stroller money can buy! I feel extravagently loved and blessed by God, my friends, and my family. Life is good.

Thank you to all the friends mentioned in this blog....you know who you are :).