Knights in Shining Armor

There are so many moments lately I just want to wrap up and save to enjoy again later. I absolutely love my little family, and they make me so happy. And it is so very true that without struggle, we won't appreciate the joy. Boy, things have been hard for our little family over the past few years. We've been thrown so many big trials that sometimes felt like they would swallow us whole, or maybe chew us to death first - I'm not sure which. But my goodness, it is so easier now to feel the joy that family brings!

Anyway, back to the title. Knights in Shining Armor. I'm not exactly sure how it came about. I think it was a combination of getting these awesome knight helmets from Pops, library books, getting some miniature knights for Christmas, and the way Pmc always talks about being my knight. But, my kids kind of have an obsession with being "Knights in Shining Armor." They wear these helmets around much of the day, and Cpc is often in charge of rescuing a princess. I'm not sure what else he comes up with, but Cdc just imitates the whole thing. Cpc also uses his "grabber" to rescue things for me (when I drop clothes between the washer and dryer, etc.) and I guess it's kind of a sword, maybe because he doesn't have one of those! We love our little knights though!

But I also bring up the Knight in Shining Armor thing because of my real knight - Pmc. Last week I made a failure of a dinner. I tried to make my own Cream of Chicken soup to go with our Chicken Haystacks, and it was awful stuff. Usually if it's not good I do a pretty good job of just mustering through it, and Pmc pulls out some cereal. This time, Pmc was the one to gag it down and I couldn't even look at it without gagging. That's how bad it was. Now, mind you, this happens at least once a week. I just can't seem to withhold myself from trying to learn how to do new things. It's so common for me to figure "I could probably just make that," especially if it means one fewer thing I have to buy because we have all the ingredients on hand. Pmc is VERY patient with this, and I guess this is where I do have some patience - because no matter how many times I fail, I just keep doing it. Well, what do you do with a family when you sit down to eat dinner and mom wrecked it? You've got to come up with something to eat right? And how often can you really have cereal for dinner? Remember, this is something I do on a regular basis - once or twice a week, sometimes more! Well, Pmc is in charge of our "eating out" money, and so he usually swoops in and saves the day by saying "I'll go pick up a five dollar pizza" or something of that sort. So anyway, last week, when I realized even I couldn't eat this stuff I nearly broke down crying, feeling bad that I was once again making him dig into money that would go a lot farther on a nice date that he'd love to take me on if I didn't make him buy us cheap dinners every few days. I recognize that was a run-on sentence. I'm good at those! I'm also good at realizing "I did it again" just a little too late and trying to apologize, even though I know it's going to happen again. Why can't I change this silly bad habit? Pmc usually tells me in these instances "It's ok - I love doing this," and I never understood why. But this time he explained himself. I just love him. He said "how can I be a knight in shining armor if my princess never needs rescuing?"

Yes everybody, go ahead and gag at the cheesiness if you must - but it totally made my day and I'm so grateful for Pmc. I feel so lucky to have him, and lucky that we can learn and grow together. And maybe somehow I'll find a balance of giving him things to rescue me from without thinking I have to learn how to make everything from complete scratch every time! Until then, I'll be calling on my knight every few days!