I smiled when I saw one of the last WordPress Photo101 assignments.

Triumph.

It motivated me to get out of my car, in the parking lot at work, and snap a photo of my snow tires.

Because they are ON MY CAR.

How this is viewed as triumph in my life – and indeed symbolic of other victories in the week just had – will maybe become clear as I tell you a the story of my week.

In keeping with both weekend and season, I will weave in my thankful for Lizzi and her Ten Things of Thankful Weekend Hop as I go.

I finally called to book the appointment for the tires two weeks ago and took the first available appointment – which was this Thursday.

I began this week in a churn of wonderful organization. Got a parenting post out Monday for the first time in a while, where I reflected on a lovely weekend just had with my daughters (Thankful #1).

Mid-afternoon Tuesday at work we got hit with an urgent high volume of time sensitive work. No problem. Meeting of key players, figured out approach, agreement re: who was doing what, coordinated deadlines for materials, tasking sent by colleague and day two of making it to daycare pickup on time.

Tuesday I even managed to hit the gym after work, WITH KIDS, and made it 40 minutes on an elliptical machine while watching news with kids happy in playcare (Thankful #2).

Kids with me, you ask? Well, my husband was on late shift, and working extra late this week as he’s a photographer, it’s holiday party season, and so it was just me and the kids after-work this week.

Wednesday late-day became clear some items weren’t going to meet deadline. Left to pick up kids, managed to cook pasta while girls were kept busy by Netflix and coordinated my mother to take the girls to swim lessons so I could get back to work while they were swimming and we could collectively meet deadline for above mentioned project. So here? Thankful for blackberries, ability to work from home, and for my mother who took both girls for a lovely evening at the pool (even though I missed it). So that’s thankfuls #3 and #4.

Added bonus here? My mom reported back that the teacher told her my eldest is the best swimmer in the class. We’ve been pretty pumped about that all week. She struggles with other stuff in school, so it’s good to know – and for her to know – she’s excelling at something.

Worked until about 7:45 and then even managed to get another blog post out – I guess when the adrenaline is going, it’s going.

Then I remembered Thursday was snow tire day – requiring the lovely coordination of dropping car off, busing to work, then after work busing to autoshop, getting car and getting to daycare on time. All sandwiched around that thing I do all day at the office.

So I had a couple of glasses of wine and was thankful when my husband got back at 9:00 and even volunteered to load the snow tires into the car. So that would be thankfuls #5 (wine) and #6 (husband).

Managed to leave work the following day with what I thought was ample time to get to dealership then daycare.

Not so much. Ended up missing a transfer that required me getting off at the mall about a 3/4 kilometre from the auto shop and running – in heel boots – to get there about 10 minutes after they closed (I’d called and they were fine staying to wait for me – this would be a thankful, but it gets better).

Not super composed, but I’m thankful I work out because otherwise it would have been WAY LESS composed (thankful #7).

Discovered two tires over car seats, which was a problem until the nice man at the autoshop rearranged them so they were instead in the front seat and I could legally bring my kids home (this is almost thankful #8, but they are actually about to get even more awesome).

So then made it to daycare pick-up sort of on time (I’d also messaged to let her know and she was okay). Forever thankful for my wonderful daycare provider (thankful #8).

Then realized I’d forgotten my bag at the autoshop in my rush to make pick-up. Tried calling and they weren’t picking up. So rush the girls back to see if they are still there and turns out not only were they, but they had tried to call me (thankful #9).

After making it home in one piece, I managed to have enough energy to cook dinner, do some much-needed cleaning while the girls watched Netflix (again, I KNOW) and even managed to get the tires downstairs by myself. I figured this monumental achievement deserved another photo, so I took one and dressed it up all pretty for you:

Suffice to say?

After all this?

I was thankful for the weekend (thankful #10). We went for sushi dinner Friday as a family; I made it to the gym again Saturday morning (yippy! – that’s twice this week); the girls and I hit a craft show Saturday afternoon to visit granny (she knits sweaters) and got two lovely Raggedy-Ann style dolls, and this morning? I slept in, had some blog time, and now? We’re about to put up the Christmas tree.

How was your week?