Recent Goings-On

Daddy and Miss Mouse picking out the perfect pumpkins - Oct. 19

Miss Mouse and Mommy ready for the hayride to the pumpkin patch

Miss Mouse - "Mommy has me in a dress on a hayride! I'm really not so sure about this....."

Happy "meat" harvesters!

Really, truly, she chose to lug those around!

She thinks it is so cool Daddy comes home with "meat"!

Grammy and the Mouse playing with friend Andrea's new puppy - super, super cute! Oct. 21

This was Auntie Laura's work with a bit of cajoling on Grammy's part for Miss Mouse to sit still on the bathroom counter long enough! It made an adorable look for our outing to the mall and then to an Indian restaurant later in the evening - Oct.22

Miss Mouse "dressed" as Rebekah for Halloween. Okay, perhaps not, but last night was a bit of a struggle (think 30 minute scream-fest) around snack-time (not sure why). Once Daddy got home (20 minutes into the scream-fest), we were together able to get the poor Mouse settled enough (she had just been sitting on my lap sobbing - we're so lucky - even her 'fits' are usually fairly sweet!) to listen to him tell her the story of Rebekah and Isaac meeting at the well and Isaac giving her the nose ring. Daddy explained the idea to Miss Mouse, so she thought she should play "dress up" apparently. It worked; she had a good time with Daddy's ring and agreed to take bites of her snack in between play-time with the ring! This is, perhaps, the very definition of the phrase "whatever works"! - Oct. 29

Happy Birthday to You

This past weekend was crazy! We spent Saturday and Sunday attending numerous functions to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the church Daddy serves. Last Wednesday, Auntie Laura and Grammy arrived (it was teachers' convention weekend for Auntie Laura). We got lots of work done around the house, projects that are difficult for a Mommy to do while chasing a toddler at the same time. Thursday afternoon we treated ourselves to some time shopping downtown. Very cool. Miss Mouse enjoyed it, as well, other than one of the stores where she sort of "freaked out" and wanted to leave right away. She just pulled back really hard and wouldn't move unless I carried her; a friend suggested the place must have been haunted. Hmmm...perhaps. It would be the appropriate time of year for such things anyway! She enjoyed the other stores much more. We finished the evening at Red Lobster. Yum! The next day (Friday) there were lots more projects to tackle, but, again, we treated ourselves to some shopping in the evening, hitting the mall and then meeting Daddy for dinner at an Indian restaurant. Yes, Indian. As in, from India. It was extremely cool. Miss Mouse thought so, too. It was quite a fancy place - cloth napkins and the works - but they seemed okay with the Mouse being there. We grabbed a takeout menu on the way out so that we can remember what we had - mine was cottage cheese chunks (think huge chunks of mozzerella-type cheese) in a spinach sauce; Laura's was chicken in a tomato sauce; Grammy had Indian vegetable fried rice; and Daddy had lamb in a dark gravy. Everyone's was excellent, though most of us chose Laura's as our favorite. As I said, Saturday was hectic. We started the day with Grandma and Grandpa Toomey at Barnes and Noble for their story hour. I'm not sure how much fun Grandpa and Daddy had, but Grandma and Miss Mouse had much fun looking at other babies (there were plenty for the Mouse to observe) and books. Then Daddy, Miss Mouse, and I went to a luncheon for current and former staff at the church. The food was great; the Mouse ate an entire pulled pork sandwich (not the bun, just the meat!). I returned home with Miss Mouse long before the luncheon was "officially" over so that she could stay on nap schedule. Saturday night, Grandma and Grandpa, Daddy, and I went to a banquet celebration. It was fun to visit with friends there and to listen to the speakers. It's always fun, though, too, to return home to our Mouse. Sunday we woke up to snow! Ugh! Snow and strong wind. We braved the weather and made it to church just in time to get a seat in the nosebleed section (the service was held at a local auditorium in order to accommodate everyone at one service, rather than the six that are usually held each Sunday). This seating arrangement was really hard on me and Grammy. I was able to adjust, but Grammy had a tough time the whole service. After Grandpa (from the other side of the family!) graciously helped her get down the stairs for Communion, she refused to return up and just met us after the service was over. I can't say I blame her too much. It is really dizzying to be that far up, just about eyeball-level with the ceiling lights! Lunch after church was great, though we returned outside to snow and wind greeting us for the drive home. Bummer. Auntie Laura and Grammy took off right away after lunch to make the long drive home; Grandma and Grandpa stuck around for a few hours to play after Miss Mouse's nap. So.....that was our weekend! Busy, busy, but fun and exciting at the same time.

Wild, Wild West and More Recent Activities....

It's obviously been awhile since my last post. I'll try to catch the blog up to speed. The first weekend in October was spent out West. Daddy Mouse went antelope hunting (successfully - one with a bow, one with a rifle), and Miss Mouse and I spent the weekend with Auntie Laura and then Grammy, Grandpa, Great Grammy, Great Auntie Linda, Great Auntie Karen, and Great Uncle Bill. We had a great time! We got to meet Auntie Laura's horse, Jewel, who is an absolute sweetheart. Unfortunately, it was too windy for Miss Mouse to spend much time with her. Still, it was great to meet the newest pet addition to the family in person, and to spend time at Laura's and Great Grammy's. I think, however, we're going to need to get ourselves a school bus to pack everything in the future. Ugh! With a kenneled dog in the back, several weapons, two adults, and a toddler that requires carrying a toilet chair, toys for the trip, a suitcase, blankets (in case the motel we stayed at the first night was disgusting, I put in blankets for Miss Mouse to sleep on), etc., we had little room for anything else - like another car seat and baby!! I think in the future, we will learn to pack more intelligently. When we got back, I went to work finishing another towel order. Now that that's done, there is a bit of breathing room for blogging! Other things going on include the inevitable "leaf sweep" which seemed to hold off this year until quite late. Last year, we jumped in leaf piles when Auntie Steph visited the last weekend in September. This year, it is mid-October with the leaf piles just now popping up. Miss Mouse had loads of fun last night playing in our neighbors' pile with their grandkids. I got it on video. She would sit down hard into the soft pile and then throw herself backwards. Pretty funny. They (Jada and Esmae - the neighbors' granddaughters) even got me to jump in the pile once. I think it earned me the title of "silly".

We also enjoyed a visit the other night from a, hm, how to describe her, long-term friend of mine (i.e., friends since age 3!) and her husband and baby daughter. Adorable baby daughter, that is! Miss Mouse was pretty unhappy when the baby left. She now can say the entire word, "baby", and makes sure to use it a lot! Daddy asked her if a baby should come to live at our house. She said, emphatically, "Yes!" (or "Yesh!" as it comes out). And just to clarify, Miss Mouse is patting Baby Addison; Miss Mouse enjoyed giving her toys to Baby Addison because when she would offer a toy, Addison would just dissolve in giggles! Such a sweet baby girl, she is (Addison)! At one point, when Addison began crying, Miss Mouse ran to give her a toy. It actually helped for a moment! It was a really fun visit from friends and their sweet baby!

On the talking front, we now hear the entire words "baby" and "boom". There is also a word for "leaf", though it comes out "weese". She will try to say "red", also. On the color front, I'm fairly positive that she knows, when able to concentrate, the colors red, green, blue, and possibly purple. She will point to the appropriate color in books with me and hand me the appropriate color toys when asked. It seems that she gets it correct way more often than simple chance would allow. Moving to the potty training front, we're making good progress (in my novice opinion, anyway) there, too. She now appears to relish the "big toilet" because it makes noise when she 'goes' in it. We've had several 'poops' and several 'potties' on it. She loves the idea of getting to use toilet paper, and just is really enthralled with the noise on the 'big toilet'. I'm hoping these are steps in a good direction! This is totally child-led so far, but she really does seem to enjoy it, even though she is starting much earlier than I had thought she would (or than anything I read says she even can). I think those are most of the updates on what has been going on in our lives lately. Miss Mouse is ever-helpful, insisting that her jacket be put away immediately when we come in; wanting to shake the rugs every time (every time) we vacuum the kitchen (which is several times a day); making sure toys are put back in places that she wants them, etc. I'm sort of hoping this trend, for one, lasts! I'll end with another picture I took a bit earlier this fall. I think this one was from September.

Tough week for Daddy, Part II!

Poor Daddy Mouse continued his tough week last Friday in an even tougher and more serious way. Miss Mouse and I were all packed up to go to the lake to visit Grandma and Grandpa and get some fall leaf pictures. Daddy Mouse was going on a bike ride, and then we would leave. I thought it was getting a bit late for his ride (i.e., that he should have been back about 10 minutes sooner), but as sometimes he stops to talk to people he knows, I wasn't too worried. He walked in and headed downstairs. Nothing unusual. I asked how the ride was and if he was just going to shower before we went. My heart skipped beats when I heard "I had an accident". Of course, Miss Mouse and I followed him downstairs and then were able to see how he was favoring one shoulder and was bleeding from his eyebrow. Thankfully (notice how often I'm using that word in these posts?) our neighbors (yeah, the same ones as with the sheetrock - boy are they going to wish we hadn't moved in!!!) were home and came and got Miss Mouse. She ran off with Ken as soon as he asked if she wanted to swing in the backyard. I didn't even get a backwards glance from her! After a quick phone call to the lake to change our plans (and hear that, again, thankfully, Grandma and Grandpa would head into our place for the evening), Dadddy Mouse and I headed to the ER. He was in a lot of pain, and his eyebrow looked really awful. He also had cement burns on the inside of his arm, his hip, his ankle, and his knee. We waited an hour, but at least we were able to get some ice packs for his shoulder. He also was able to cheer up two children in the ER. The one, who was apparently cheerfully waiting for stitches on the back of his head, exclaimed to his grandparents, "Look at his owie!!". We got a good chuckle. Though that probably hurt Daddy Mouse's shoulder. Another girl coming out of the ER with a bandaged hand was sniffling until she saw him and exclaimed, "Whoa! Look at his blood!!" Although in each case the parent/grandparent was embarrassed, I think Daddy Mouse was mainly amused, as I know I was. Thankfully we were reassured that nothing was broken and were sent home, after one heck of a stitching process for the eyebrow, with pain medication prescriptions. Miss Mouse has been kissing Daddy's "uh-oh"s all week; he's been terribly sore and still can't lift his arm above his head, but he is very much-improved from last Friday already. We are just really thankful the accident wasn't worse and are hopeful that he will continue to improve (he's getting a little nervous about the bow season ticking away).

Tough week for Daddy!

The past week was a tough one for Daddy Mouse. I'm not sure he'll appreciate me posting this, but, as I stated in the last post, part of my goal is to preserve our life events for Miss Mouse. And this definitely needs preserving! Daddy Mouse was up in the attic (access through our bedroom closet) attempting to install the antenna we will need come February when the brilliant (hear the sarcasm?) idea of going to purely digital signal will take effect. All was going well. Grammy was holding Miss Mouse while we all watched Daddy Mouse and handed him whatever he needed. At one point, we were trying to figure out which end of a coaxial cable to hand up when there was a terrible crash. Dust flew everywhere, and we were suddenly able to see Daddy Mouse....through the hole in the ceiling. Ugh. I was smart enough not to say anything. Grammy, however, couldn't keep her exclamation to herself! She looked up and said, "You came through the ceiling!!". Daddy Mouse responded with a very dry, "I know." What Grammy claims to have actually meant to say was "Oh look, he came through the ceiling" rather than having addressed it to Daddy Mouse. We had quite a lot of good chuckles about it the next days, but that was a rough night. Thankfully Daddy Mouse was not seriously injured, escaping with just two sore legs from where he caught himself on the supports. Now, if you are like Daddy Mouse and can't figure out how anyone could do something such as fall through a ceiling, I should point out that it has happened twice in my family's history that we know of. My grandpa, Papa, fell through when my Dad was younger, and a young man doing some attic work also fell through that same ceiling (different spot, I assume) a few years ago. So, to my family, this was not an unheard of disaster! Daddy Mouse was horrified, though, of course. Thankfully, again, we were able to get sheetrock from our wonderful neighbors (it was a Sunday night near 8:00 that this event took place) to patch the hole. Then Grammy and I went to work getting the clothes cleaned. All of my clothes had been laying on our bed so that there was access to the attic. Hence, all of my clothes were covered in insulation. As was the floor, and the chest of drawers, and everything on the chest of drawers. I'm still not quite done airing out clothing in the dryer. It's an ongoing project. Anyway, we will be figuring out a different way to pick up digital signal as Daddy Mouse has sworn off attic work!!! Understandably!

I resigned!

I've been meaning to post this for some time now, and as readers will see from the post following this one, life has just been too hectic to get it done. My main goal in posting this is to preserve my thought process and reactions for Miss Mouse, should she become a parent herself someday. The whole blog will be going into some sort of book at some point, sort of a "baby book extension".

Anyway, about a month ago, I noticed a dramatic change in my sweet, even-tempered, easy-going little gal. All of a sudden, she seemed to need holding constantly, demand complete and total attention at all times, and scream a lot. Meanwhile I was in the midst of my "fall work" which I had planned to consist of canning our own spaghetti sauce for the entire winter (at one jar per week, I figured I needed 36 jars to make it from Sept-May; each batch makes four jars, so I needed to make nine batches), freeze our own pizza sauce, again for the entire winter (again, each batch makes four servings, so I figured on nine batches), freeze veggies from the farmers' market to last us through the winter (corn, peppers, peas, beans, beets), and find apples to make our own applesauce (don't even ask how many batches I planned on for that). I planned to get this list done before the pumpkins were ready for me to roast the flesh and seeds. My goal was to have us sustain ourselves completely and totally on farmers' market produce (since my garden was an utter flop, yielding all of two meals of beans). I foresaw myself as the perfect homemaker for my family - certainly we would not be buying any canned or frozen vegetables this year. We would not pay out the nose for high fuel costs, nor would we have any worries about fresh veggies imported from who-knows-where and contaminated with who-knows-what. Afterall, I figured that having the privilege of staying home with my baby obligated me to be the best possible food-preparer, housekeeper, mommy, and wife possible (there's a fair amount of guilt that goes along with having a job that you like as much as I like mine right now!). And in my mind that translated to the best - period.

So, Miss Mouse continued her transition to toddlerhood, and I became more and more frazzled. How was I going to get all this work done with this needy, active little toddler under foot? I had towel orders from my business to fill in addition to all my "fall work". Things were getting crazy, and Mommy was getting crabby, crabby.

Finally one day things clicked. Perhaps just doing the best I can do while still enjoying my little toddler is enough. Perhaps the best thing for her is not to have a frazzled mommy and farmers'-market-fresh veggies. Perhaps she needs a happy, calm, stable mommy and decently-healthy food instead. Yeah, I know. Duh. The thing is, I know there are women who are able to do everything - keep the baby happy; cook salsa, spaghetti sauce, apples, canned veggies, frozen veggies, dried fruit, etc., etc.....But once I finally gave up the ship and realized I'm not one of them, things have gotten a lot happier around here. For everyone. The minute - literally, the day - that I gave up the demands I had put on myself (because thankfully they were not there from Miss Mouse's Daddy or Miss Mouse herself, of course!), Miss Mouse got extraordinarily less clingy and needy. Hmmm...coincidence???? She still loves to be held, a demand which I love to oblige. And we're struggling with "Mommy phone time". But overall, I am a hundred times less exhausted, feel like much less of a failure (could it be that I don't have empty jars staring at me constantly?), and am enjoying the rambunctious, adorable little toddler that is blooming at our house.

Of course I still do my best to keep up the house; we have laundry days, bathroom cleaning days, vacuuming days, and straightening days, and I am freezing some peppers; I'm hosting a Bible study one day a week this fall, and I work out everyday because I think it's important for Miss Mouse to see that. Miss Mouse does her best to help me keep things clean and busy and to mess the house back up again, as well!! At least now I'm free to enjoy this new stage! I should have resigned much sooner!

Toilet Time!

Perhaps I will 'jinx' our toilet training process by posting this so early, but I had to announce that Miss Mouse actually used her toilet chair today for the first time! She's been sitting on it quite often, looking very proud, but nothing ever comes out. We weren't worried, just happy that she seemed to like the chair very well. Well, today, while Grammy was with her, of course, (it wouldn't certainly be for me - same way as she never told me she knew what all the animals said, but she told my mom at 14 months...) while I chatted with Auntie Laura over the phone (she's left out of our family gathering for the weekend but will be visiting in October). Suddenly I heard great commotion from the bathroom. I heard the words "potty" and "on the chair", so I told Auntie Laura we had a bathroom emergency and basically hung up on the poor unsuspecting aunt. I ran to the bathroom, and what do I see but a tiny little girl with a nice yellow substance in her toilet! Thankfully I had planned to use some stickers as a reward, and they were laying right on the counter. So, she got to pick out a duck sticker to put on the cover of her chair, and she got to use hand lotion. She was so excited. I think that perhaps contributed to the fact she could hardly settle for a nap and when she did, only slept for 30 minutes. Regardless, I was nearly bursting with motherly pride of my little girl, using the toilet all of her own volition! Let's hope this continues.....