Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Adventures in Motherhood

Yesterday started out painfully early. Hunter woke me at 4:37 am demanding some ice to freshen up his water from the night before. I was extremely irritated for two reasons: 1) I knew rationalizing was not going to work and 2) I had my alarm set for 5:00 to meet Heather at the park for a run at 5:30. Why is it that 30 minutes in the morning can seem to make or break a day? With a "fresh" water on the rocks I convinced Hunter to go back to bed just in time to throw on my clothes and meet Heather at the park. In fact, we pulled into the parking lot of Smucker Park at exactly the same time :)

But after my run and such an early morning I was tired. Really tired. And in case you didn't know, tired mom + tired kids = long day. We plugged along until we hit the brutal hour of 4:00 pm.


Emma was getting ready for a "tea party". She invited her friends from across the street to come over and decided they should all be "fancy". She came out in this outfit and I thought she looked just darling and had her pose by the front door.





Hunter was in the middle of a temper tantrum about (you guessed it) wanting some ice in his drink. But now we were out of ice. We used the last of it to shut him up earlier. I was pretending to ignore his screams and busy myself with cleaning up the mess we made in the dining room at lunch: edamame and quesadillas.

As I reached down to pick up a handful of fallen edamame shells I almost stepped on a small creature. For a spit second I thought, "Oh my gosh that is the biggest cockroach I've ever seen in my life!" But then I saw it's face and it's tail. It was a mouse. A teeny, teeny, tiny mouse, well, about the size of a large cockroach.

I screamed at the top of my lungs. Ran into the kitchen, then started hysterically laughing at myself for the way I reacted. Now Hunter was curious and confused and quiet (yes!). I decided I wanted to find the mouse. Where did it go? Were there others?

I climbed on top of our dining room table to survey the ground below. Hunter followed me to the king's chair (that's what we call the head of the table). I looked and looked for a couple of minutes with no luck. Then, all of a sudden Hunter calmly said, "He likes it." I followed his gaze to find that little teeny, tiny mouse right in my blind spot, not far from where I almost stepped on him. He was eating one of the fallen edamame shells. And Hunter was right. He liked it.

When I got a closer look, I saw that this little guy was actually kind of cute just munching away on that salty, green shell. The Rescuers and Stuart Little flashed through my mind. I called in Emma and we all got down to get a closer look. The mouse nibbled away and we decided that this little baby mouse was so new that he didn't know to be afraid of humans and run away. I decided that he was so tame I could probably catch him...the last thing I wanted was to leave him there and and by the looks of it, he wasn't going anywhere on his own.

I ran to my closet, grabbed an empty shoebox and ran back to the dining room. That little guy was still in the same spot! I warned the kids to get out of my way and threw the box on top of the mouse and scooped him up with the lid.

I CAUGHT A MOUSE! Here he is:



The kids were entertained for the last stretch before Tommy came home. Just watching, NOT TOUCHING the mouse.





Emma thought the mouse might like some cheese.




He did.


Right here's when they asked,

"Can we keep it, Mom?"
No. I told them Tommy would take the mouse to work tomorrow so he could find his mother in the desert. I was pretty sure it was a desert mouse. Luckily, Emma agreed with me and convinced her brother that the mouse should not be separated from it's mother.
Until the next adventure...




Sunday, April 26, 2009

Happy Birthday Hunter :)


Three years old.


At this moment in time here are a few of Hunter's favorite things:



bear hugs

cowboy boots

cowboy shirts

cowboy hats

bullriders/broc riders/steer wrestlers

popsicles

gum

riding bikes

being able to stand up in the jacuzzi

peeing outside whenever given the opportunity

Olivia (the cartoon)

his role as "the brother" when playing house










I love you, Hunter.









Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Must. Get. Egg.










We hunted eggs at my mom's house this year...Zach and Jake helped her hide eggs for my kids. Big surprise, Emma "won" with 18 eggs found.
















This was as good as it was going to get for a family Easter photo. We'll take what we can get :)




















Wednesday, April 8, 2009

My sheep

Hunter & Emma

Hunter & Emma
(Bubba & Roo)

Love TAMN!