Here we go again.

Many of you will recall the infestation of mice that we had last year. It seems that living across the street from a park and an open field might have its rodential drawbacks. This weekend, I found evidence of a mouse in the pantry. I freaked out and scrubbed things from top to bottom and then tried my hardest to put it out of my mind. Finding a half eaten biscotti in your pantry and a small pile of poo in the vicinity makes you feel yucky for countless reasons.

So tonight we were eating a pleasant dinner together as a family when Mike jumped up and started beating the floor with the rug. I promptly realized that he had a visual on the mouse. Carter started excitedly saying "Daddy is killing a bug" over and over and over while I tried to determine the safest place for me and Evyn to be. Then Mike went after the fireplace tools. The fun was only beginning. Picture the kitchen with rugs strewn here and there, the fridge pulled out from the wall, all chairs displaced and my sweet husband in dress socks and pajama pants laying spread Eagle on the floor. Suffice it to say that I was done eating. Here is Mike in action.


Carter had to get in on the action too. Here he is yielding the most dangerous of the fireplace tools yelling excitedly about helping daddy kill the "bug."

About 15 minutes later, Mike was victorious. The baseboard, not so much. I spared you the close up of our most recent victim of violence. Carter was completely fascinated with the whole event. After Mike showed him the corpse, he looked Mike in the eye and said "Templeton (the rat from Charlotte's web) is so creepy." True that.

I am now really disturbed on many levels and for many reasons.

1. Look at how filthy my kitchen floor is.

2. How and why did this mouse get in my kitchen? There is not a door anywhere close to the kitchen. Has he been living here? If so, where?

3. What kind of balls must a mouse have to run across the kitchen floor in broad daylight when four humans are in the room?

4. Aren't there normally entire colonies of mice when you find one?

5. Can I ever go barefoot in the kitchen again?

6. How did that mouse open the biscotti without an opposable thumb?

7. Where else has that mouse been?

I could go on. It looks like it might be time to start setting traps again. I will keep you posted. Just keeping it real here, folks!

Why every mommy needs a little girl.

Because wings, tutus and ruffly bottoms are nowhere near as much fun on a little boy!

TAG, and more.

My sweet buddy at Bonkland tagged me, so here you go!

This picture was taken on the 4th of July. We were headed to the 4th on Broadway parade with the Henson girls. Sherril just had a baby so we kidnapped the older three for a sleepover. I absolutely adore these girls and their mommy.

1. Choose the 4th folder where you store your pictures on the computer.
2. Select the 4th picture in the folder.
3. Explain the picture.
4. Tag 4 people to do the same
5. No cheating. (cropping, editing, etc)

I tag Monica, Kelsey, Mika, and Denae!

And I have a few pictures from the week that are completely worth sharing!

This is Carter with his "sad frog." He told me that the frog was sad because his mother left him to go to work. Ouch.

Uncle Mark came over to play on Saturday morning. Carter tells me that Uncle Mark is his best friend. Here he is loving on little miss.

This is Carter in his footie pajamas, daddy's boots and hat, riding "summowitz" the stick horse. I believe that he has stopped to feed the horse in this picture.

The cutest member of La Leche League. I love that baby Max is only wearing socks and a bib in this picture. For the record, Evyn is normally fully clothed when I nurse her.

Our precious friend, Andrea, gave us this insanely cute hat at church this morning. Little girls are so much fun!!!

Hobo.

Carter told Mike tonight that he looked like a hobo because he had "sparkles" (whiskers) on his cheeks. Then he told him that he should go jump on a train. What? Who is this kid and where did he come from?

my new passion

Gymboree. Seriously, the mouse in her pocket matches the mouse on her socks, which all matches the precious pink bloomers. I am going to have to set some limits or I might be in trouble!

Look at this smile. My heart is so full.

Just another day at "ahonks."

There are days that I have really deep thoughts or perhaps something inspirational to blog about. And then there are days like today.

Mark came over for dinner tonight, which to Carter is the next best thing to a visit from Santa. After dinner, we laughed until we were sick watching these two play. What you see here is Mark sitting in the backseat of Carter's car while Carter drives to work in the front seat. He told Mark that Mark would be the son and Carter would be the dad and then proceeded to buckle Mark in to a 5 point harness carseat. Safety first in our house! Then when we asked where he worked, Carter promptly replied "ahonks." Great stuff. Please notice Carter's work apron stuffed full of plastic tools, which he apparently needed for whatever it is that he did at ahonks.


Then we had to jump over Carter's "jumping bee" which resulted in more hysterical laughter. Who knew that one toy could be so much fun? Our other favorite Carter story from this week was hearing him count independently the other day. This is what we heard ". . . thirteen, next-teen, fifteen. . . "

Carter has rediscovered his recliner. Here he is sitting with his pretend pig "Wilber" from the movie "Starla's Web"- he carries his imaginary pig with him everywhere! I would say that he has discovered the realm of imaginative play!

My precious, precious Evyn. I want to eat her with a spoon!

And I leave you with a picture of Mike taking what he calls a "floor nap." It is his favorite way to nap, and it is just so weird that I finally took a picture of it! I do love that boy- floor naps, toenails and all.

Two days down, 18 weeks and 3 days to go

I can't tell you how touched I was by all of the blog love that I received yesterday as I started back to work. Thank you to everyone that prayed for me or left a comment to encourage me. I definitely knew that I was being prayed for and it made a difference!

My mom always tells me that being a mommy means learning to live with your heart on the outside and that is so true. I honestly miss my kids so much that it almost physically hurts, but I cannot help but think that I am the luckiest girl on the earth to even be able to experience that kind of love at all. So instead of pouting about having to leave them, I am trying to make myself focus on getting to come home to them.

Some blessings from the day included flowers from my sweet Mike, leaving my precious babies with my precious mom, phone call updates throughout the day, countless emails and phone calls to check on me, an amazing basket o' love from my sweet Evans girls, a hug from Purk, and dinner from Sherril! I am blessed beyond measure. I missed the kids like crazy, am not enjoying my familiarity with my breast pump (and someone practically knocked my door down the very first time that I needed to pump), my computer at work has completely crashed, and I had a full blown ugly cry at the end of the day, but all in all, things are going well. Evyn is doing well with the bottle and Carter is enjoying being back in the swing of things and is doing smashingly well (comparatively) in underwear! I forgot how hard it is to wash and sterilize things every night, pack lunches, cook dinner, do laundry, etc. I know that it will get easier, but we are still definitely finding our groove right now.

The other thing that I forgot about is that the second day is harder than the first. I think that I was all mentally prepared for day one but then had the sudden realization that I had four more days to go before I made it to the weekend. Tomorrow marks the halfway point. Overall, I am amazingly blessed to have a job to go back to that I really do enjoy, and just look at what I get to come home to at the end of the day!

This was Sunday morning. Super sweet.

This is Carter's maiden voyage on his big boy bike that he inherited from Aunt Starla. He loves it! He goes about 1 mile an hour and insists on wearing his helmet! It is super cute to see.

Please notice that Carter is wearing a hat and a visor and holding a spiderman figurine. Crazy kid.

This was Evyn tonight! She was almost giggling and it was so stinking sweet!

And on a completely unrelated side note, look at what Mike did to our sheets with his toenails. Disgusting, no? He might actually have hooves. I think that I might make him start sleeping in socks for my own safety.

Thank you again for your prayers and support. I'm gonna make it!

Tomorrow

I go back to work tomorrow. I have known that this day was coming for a long time and I have been praying that the Lord would prepare my heart. I know that tomorrow will be hard, but I feel calm. Part of me is excited to see my big kids at school again and I am blessed to have friends that I am looking forward to seeing. But to be completely honest, my heart is breaking right now. How can I leave that sweet smiling little girl? It is so stinking hard.

I sometimes feel like being a working mom is the most intricate balancing act on earth- balancing being your best at work with being even better at home. Balancing loving your profession with adoring your family. Balancing feeling that amazing sense of accomplishment with feeling guilty. I could go on. It is really hard for me. I love my job. I really do. But I wrestle with these emotions and more.

I have savored the time that God has given me to be a mommy this fall. I have watched Carter grow up so much in such a short time. I have gotten to hold Evyn by the hour and I think that she has actually grown while in my arms. I feel like I know my kids better than anyone else and I love that. What a precious gift the Father has given me in these two precious children. Maybe the best part of being a working mom for me is that it makes me become very intentional about cherishing the time that I get to be a mommy, and I do cherish it. In some ways, I am a much better mother because I feel like I have to make every minute count.

I am also richly blessed that my children will go straight from my arms to other arms that will love and cherish them. They will spend two days a week at PDO with amazing and loving teachers (shout out to Bolton- I love you!), two days a week with Grammy (you know how much you mean to me) and one day a week with the best daddy on the planet. I could not ask for better care for them. And as good as all that sounds, it is still not me. I am thankful for the precious love that they will receive and almost jealous of the people who will get to be with them while I am working all at the same time.

It is my tendency to be a somewhat irrationally emotional person. My nature right now is to grieve the time that has passed- grieve the fact that Evyn is almost three months old and my maternity leave is over. God is slowly teaching me to live in the present. Each day is so full of joy and I don't want to miss a minute of it because I was too busy crying that yesterday is over. I want to love a life of "todays". And I guess that means that I need to let go of my anxiety about tomorrow. I know that God is big enough to hold me through it. I know that my Heavenly Father delights in me even more than I delight in my own children and that makes me feel richly loved. So pray that as I drop off my babies in the morning my heart will be full of the love of Christ and that I will be able to focus on that throughout the day. Pray that tomorrow will not be a day of sadness but the start of a new chapter for us. Thank you all for your love and support. I am so blessed to have the friends that I have. And thank you giving me the freedom to be transparent here. I promise to get back to posting about mousetraps and skin tags soon!

(Oh yeah, if you want to make me feel a little bit better, you could always go vote for me (#13) again here: http://denaehutsonphotography.blogspot.com/)

I really like to win!

I wish that I were one of those people who simply enjoyed playing games, but I am not. I love to win. I have this fiercely competitive streak in me that sometimes surprises even myself! So, here is where I need your help. Evyn's picture is in a contest and I really want to win! If it wins, I get to choose a free print, which I would LOVE to have. There can only be one vote per household per day. The contest will end at noon next Saturday, January 10th. To vote for Evyn, (#13), click on the following link: http://www.denaehutsonphotography.blogspot.com/ and know that I will be ever so appreciative. I know that this is completely shameless, and I am sorry to all of my buddies that also have babies in this contest, but a girl has to do what a girl has to do! Now go vote! And then do it again tomorrow!!! And the next day. . .

Resolutions

I hate New Years resolutions. I guess everyone does. But I decided to make some anyway, and in the spirit of accountability, I am posting them here. Judge me in March if you must, but here they are (in no particular order) anyway.

Drink more water.
Spend more time in the Word.
Read more.
Be intentional about exercise.
Turn off the computer when the kids are awake.
Hold hands more.
Take time to appreciate little things like good coffee or a sunrise.
Make time to call friends that I don't get to see very often.

That is about it. Nothing life changing. Check back with me in a few months and we will see how I do!