farewell dear friend

this past weekend we lost katelyn's beloved elephant. anyone who has ever been around katelyn knows that she rarely goes anywhere without her elephant. he is truly her best friend. here's how it happened (by the way this is loooong) :

katelyn and i had gone shopping with some friends at a couple of different stores. it was a rainy afternoon, so i decided not to argue with katelyn when she wanted to bring elephant inside with her. i just wanted to get inside quickly.

we went to our first store without any hitches. it was the second store where we lost elephant. i was the one holding and keeping track of elephant while katelyn ran around the store with friends playing with toys. i was also the one who set elephant down and forgot about him. it wasn't until it was time to go that i realized i no longer had elephant in my arms. i quickly ran back to the place i had him last, fully expecting to find him, but he wasn't there. at first i didn't think anything of it. i thought i must have moved him or dropped him somewhere else. so i started searching the whole store. it didn't take long to search because it was a very small store, but elephant was no where to be found. i really was baffled. i searched and searched that store for another 30 minutes. i asked the employees if they had seen anything, but they hadn't. by the end of my search i was completely confused and frustrated. katelyn didn't realize at the time what was wrong, but i knew she would when bedtime rolled around.

i left the store crying, mainly out of frustration and guilt for losing katelyn's favorite toy. i got in my car and prayed that we could find this elephant.

katelyn did great that night playing and having fun...until it was time to go to bed. we put her in bed and she immedietely started looking around for elephant. she started patting her bed and asking, "where is it?" over and over again. we tried to explain that elephant was gone, but she didn't understand. she wanted to get out of her crib to search, but of course he wasn't anywhere around the house. after trying to help her understand again, we finally put her back in her crib and closed the door. she cried for 10-15 minutes, then finally fell asleep. after she went to sleep i decided to check the internet to see if i could find the same elephant. i had no idea there were so many stuffed animal elephants out there, and not one was the same.

that night i couldn't stop feeling guilty about her elephant. i felt so bad that i had made katelyn cry when she hadn't done anything wrong. sure, i make her cry all of the time when i say no or make her share her favorite toy, but this was different. i sat on the couch for a long time thinking about that elephant. i couldn't stop thinking about the stories i grew up hearing from gene r. cook about prayer and finding things you have lost. i finally decided to pull out my book, receiving answers to prayer, by gene r. cook. i read of the personal examples he shared and the ways he talked about preparing yourself for prayer and receiving answers to prayer. i applied these principals he talked of to the best of my ability. i can honestly say i felt much better after i took that time to ponder. i really felt like everything was going to be okay. tyler and i then decided to go back to the store the next day to take one more look for the elephant.

before searching the store a second time, tyler and i prayed once more to find the elephant. i just remember telling the Lord that we knew that He knew where the elephant was. but if it wasn't meant to be found, then we would accept that answer. we went into the store and searched once more, but to no avail. i admit i went home a little disappointed. i truly thought we were going to find him.

that evening, as i was yet again thinking about elephant, i decided to check the internet one more time. i typed in the exact same thing i had typed the day before. one of the searches came up from ebay. i clicked on it, and amazingly, it was the exact same elephant. i was elated. i made tyler come and take a look and we hurried and bought the elephant.

i know that this was a direct answer to my prayers. i'm grateful that we have this wonderful principle where we can talk to a loving Father in Heaven who cares about the same things we do. i know it was just a dumb, dirty elephant, but he meant so much to our little katelyn, and after losing him, to me. i'm grateful also that we didn't find him right away so that my faith could be strenghthed and i could take the time to really prepare my mind and heart for prayer.
i'm pretty sure that elephant will be a constant reminder of this principle, and i'm grateful for that too.

we haven't yet received elephant in the mail, but we will surely video record katelyn's reaction with her beloved elephant.