We must have just had a little TOO much to be grateful for...

Yesterday was a pretty fantastic Thanksgiving, until things later that evening took an ironic twist. So the start of our day was pretty average. I woke up at the crack of dawn (okay, more like at 8, but it felt like it), and Todd slept till I got too bored and woke him up. Then we took a quick little trip to the store to get some last minute ingredients for our meal. We shoved the ham in the oven, and since it was so warm out, we decided to get outdoors a little bit! We went and played a little tennis, and then we got to play some disc golf after that. It was really nice to get out; we haven't been able to since it has been so cold lately.

Since Summer and Chris are in Nebraska for Thanksgiving with Chris's sister and her family, they left us a key so we could come over and enjoy their TV while they were away :). We decided to take our Thanksgiving feast over there, since we don't really have anywhere to sit in our apartment (nor do we have furniture of any kind here). So we got there about 3:30 and started cooking away. By about 5, everything was ready, and we were trying to hurry because Walmart's "Black Friday" sales started at 6.

 Right as we were sitting down to eat, there was a knock on the door. I answered the door and saw a man, and the first thing out of his mouth was, "Uh.... whose motorcycle is that?" I looked over, and the motorcycle had been tipped over.  My heart sank when I saw it. It had fallen right on the curb, and it didn't look like it was going to be pretty. There were two sets of parents (one mom, and one couple) who had come over to tell us about it. They said that both of their kids had been playing outside, and different neighbors saw them playing near the motorcycle. No one actually saw the kids do it, but as soon as it happened the kids were standing right by it with shocked looks on their faces. But since no one actually saw it, both of the parents were kind of trying to pin the blame on each other, while we're sitting there thinking that we sure as heck aren't going to pay the damages. When we picked up the bike, there were significant scratches, and the whole double exhaust pipe had been bent out of place.

So now, 6 days before we leave, we have to sort out a way to get the bike fixed. We called our insurance, and they started the claim, but we won't hear back from a representative until sometime today. To make matters more difficult, we're probably going to need to file a police report so we can prove to our insurance that we were not the ones who damaged the bike. Since we didn't want the police contacting these parents before they were aware, we called them just to let them know that we were going to file a police report just as proof for our insurance, not to get them in trouble or to press any charges or anything like that. The couple didn't answer, but when we called them mom, she started freaking out. Then her husband/boyfriend started yelling things like how we were trying to use them to pay for damages that were already there.

It's really stressful because we are going to have a deductible to pay, and we don't feel like we should have to pay it. Since neither of the parents will take responsibility,  if we're going to have these parents pay it, we're going to have to go through the court system... which could take a really really long time.

What most frustrating about this whole ordeal, is that these parents are not willing to take responsibility for their own children. If Todd and I had kids who did that, we would 100% pay the consequences, and then have our kids work to repay us for what they did. As a parent, my kids are my responsibility, and if they did something while I wasn't supervising them, that's on me. Unfortunately, these parents don't see it that way.

Despite the fact we did absolutely nothing wrong, we're the ones who have to pay for it. That's how life works I guess.

After that, staying grateful for the rest of our Thanksgiving was pretty difficult. We did notice a little miracle though. I didn't mention before that the bike was already over there from when Todd rode over while I was at work, and then it got too cold for him to ride it home. If we hadn't decided to go hang out at Summer and Chris's, we would have never found out about the bike. We would have gone over today, or Saturday and seen it on it's side, with no one there to let us know what happened. So that was a miracle amidst the heartbreak.

More than ever, I'm grateful for Todd. He is so good with talking to people and handling situations like this. I wouldn't be able to cope with or handle all of the things we've had to go through without him.  We'll keep you posted on what happens. Keep us in your prayers that the Lord might work miracles to help us sort this out before we leave.