Birthday Perfection

What??? It's Mommy's birthday? She's how old?

Poor Sunny Mouse must have been too hungry to wait for the cake; she had to start on the lilac bush.

The best birthday picture I could take of myself....this is getting to be tricky, finding a creative way to take a picture of myself each month. This month was especially tricky because I just barely could open my mouth wide enough to eat cake by yesterday after having my wisdom teeth out on the 28th of October. That's not why my lower face is hidden, though. I just wanted to focus on the eyes, although I think the focus ended up being on the screw holding the girls' slide on rather than on my eyes anyway! Either way, I got a picture of myself turning 31, and the earrings you can see (one of them, anyway) were the ones picked out by Miss Mouse specifically for my birthday present.

The anticipation builds......

until they are all on fire. Notice the cake is half purple (Sunny Mouse) and half green (Miss Mouse). The cake, which is a heavenly "angel cake", according to Miss Mouse, was an unexpected treat from Grandma Kathy and apparently had been snuck into my freezer when I was in outer space on pain meds after the aforementioned wisdom teeth adventure. Tricky, tricky! And yummy, yummy!

The best thing about my birthday this year - well, there were several! First, the coloring in the picture of myself - that really is the color that everything appeared both last night and tonight. The photo is heavily edited, obviously, but that golden/pinkish/red color is what has saturated the world the last two nights. How awesome for a November birthday girl to play in that light. Most of my birthdays have involved a much, hm, "whiter" and colder color.

Next, Miss Mouse was nearly out of her mind with excitement about my birthday this year. She and Mr T went shopping on Friday to find a gift. She was so pleased to have to keep the gifts secret from me, but late in the afternoon on Saturday, as she told me for the fifteenth time about the gift bag she had picked for my present, she exclaimed, "Yes, and we got you a fancy, fancy gift! And the earrings aren't the fancy gift; the fancy gift is something else." Oops! The really fancy gift turned out to be a truly fancy bird feeder which has already provided much entertainment and bird education for us. It was just so incredibly fun to watch her be excited.

And last, even though Mr T had to put in a 12-hour day, he was able to be home for 2 hours in the afternoon to have cake and visit with us, and I was able to go out and celebrate my free birthday meal with two of my good friends, one of whom brought her own little girl along. So, the, hm, six of us "women" enjoyed our Italian dinners and some conversation. What a treat!

Check out others' brave self-portraits by clicking here

The Farming Life for Me!

Even before our trip to the farm a couple weeks ago, Miss Mouse had been announcing that she wants to be a farmer when she grows up. Yes, indeed, she is certain of it, and while visiting the farm, she definitely showed her love of the land, of the outdoors, of all things "farm"!

Sunny Baby Mouse wasn't feeling so terribly well at the farm (her unfortunate fall left her fairly sore for a couple weeks...thankfully, she's back to normal now, but she had a couple tough weeks which unfortunately included the week we were visiting my family), but she was obviously able to enjoy herself!

It doesn't seem like that long ago there were two other little girls hanging on the same red gate.
How time flies. How precious this time we have with them is.

Miss Mouse was impressed with the new truck (so was her Mommy!). It has quite the air horn, too!

Though Miss Mouse is often my more timid girlie, she has no fear of the farm animals. Number 71 was quite the favorite that week. Miss Mouse was pleased that by the end of the week Number 72 also came to take oats out of her hand.

Usually Sunny Baby leads the way into the unknown, but when it came to this week, Miss Mouse was in charge.

Miss Mouse and Auntie Laura had a birthday party for McFlufferton. This is the cat that was dropper-fed by my sister last October. He's fairly, um, docile. Miss Mouse carried him around and loved on him all week. He kindly acquiesced. Auntie Laura got him a catnip ball for his birthday (say it fast: "catnipball"). Miss Mouse ran up to Grammy to announce that McFlufferton was going to get a catnipple for his birthday.

Like I said, all things "farm" are loved by Miss Mouse. She and Grammy were laying newspaper to compost the flower beds for the winter.

We had a wonderful trip to my Grandma's and Aunt's and Uncle's place. Sunny Baby is calling the "Kiiiitttteeee". She seems to assume that if they don't come to her, she just needs to call them louder. They must not have heard her, right?!

My Mice do look alike. And that is so fun!

Auntie Laura and Uncle Jon have an amazing house of light. They have windows on three sides of their living room. I went picture-crazy in that warm, late afternoon sunlight!

I am fairly sure we have a picture of another little girl in the same spot, at about the same age, also looking for a kitty.

Peeking through Great Grandma's windmill.

Miss Mouse had the privilege of riding out to the "grain pile" with Grandpa Bob and Mommy. She wasn't quite sure why I thought it was so cool, but it seemed like a pretty great sandbox to her. To me, it was amazing; we have no pictures of me holding excess grain from a pile at age three. A child of the 80s drought, I remember harvests that would not ever, not in one's wildest imagination, have yielded enough to need to pile grain on the ground. Abundance, in the hands of people like my parents, is an amazing thing.

Miss Mouse loved the sandhill crane. We talked about the different shades of gray in its feathers and how it almost had brown tints in certain areas. To me, this is incredible. She is appreciating the gifts of nature, the gifts of God's Creation more now at three than some of us do in a lifetime. Really? How many people would have thought offhand that a crane was a beautiful bird? Yet, it is. If we only take time to notice the beauty. That time, time to notice, time to appreciate, time to drink experiences in - - that time is one of the most important gifts I'm striving to give our family. We are so blessed to have time to give time to them.

The most upsetting part of this picture to me was that I wasn't entirely sure Miss Mouse knew the duck was deceased. Mr T. assured me she did, but she carried that thing around and loved it nearly to pieces.

Yes, Sunny Baby did, indeed, have a great time.

More Glorious Autumn

Sunny Baby is so incredibly excited about having just eaten a second-crop chokecherry!

An egg! Look, Mom, an egg!

Miss Mouse was so proud of that egg....and then Sunny Baby got injured. In our haste to get her checked out, we forgot to take the egg home. She's so sweet, though; she just said, "Oh, well, we can get another one sometime."

They're drumming.

For anyone who thinks that Miss Mouse is always quiet and demure.....The girl can roar! *Sidenote: It's a happy roar.

Enjoying the near-peak leaves out at Grandma and Grandpa's. We were lucky enough to spend several weekends (well, what we call weekends, anyway) with them as the leaves changed and dropped.

The apples also ripened while we were out there. Sunny Baby Mouse shoved her little face right in. Yum!

Where Everybody Knows Your Name

Everyone needs their Cheers bar.

I wasn't even old enough to be allowed to watch the show when it was on, but I remember the song and can probably sing it word for word. As I've gotten older, I've realized more and more how true are the words that we all need a place "where everybody knows your name" ...

The girls and I traveled to a place like that on Sunday, a place where Miss Mouse was welcomed as a "kitchen helper" with the other two children her age, a place of community, deep roots, and deep faith. Mr. T and I were blessed enough to be part of that community for some years, and it was so special to take the little Mice to see what it is like, to have a taste of that place where everybody knows your name.

From the inside on a warm, humid summer morning, these orange-glass windows cast a glow that makes the high-ceiling-cool of the church a little warmer. In the winter, they send warm fingers into cold tummies and feet as the strains of hymns sung for generations melt the frozen tundra outside.

Melodramatic? No, not so. Mr. T's summation of this congregation is that to be their pastor, one must be okay with the fact that until you've been there several (several) years, you are not the spiritual head of the congregation - Mr. F is, and rightly so.

Hard work, devotion, leadership, and faith have been passed on here through generations, not only to those in the "founding families" but to all those blessed enough to live on the prairie near this place. All are welcome here, as long as you're willing to pitch in, perhaps clear a table, teach some Sunday School kids, take the offering, or participate in the Christmas program, which seems to have sprung entirely out of a Little House on the Prairie book (complete with, as of my last knowledge, real candles with real flames).

I never did any of those things there, but I did make some fairly cute duck cookies for the bazaar every fall. The same woman bought them every year, put them in the freezer, and gave them to her son who liked to duck hunt for Christmas. Every year. Rose is gone now, has been for several years, and I very nearly cried for how much I missed her when we were out there last Sunday. This is a good place with good people. Most places are, to be truthful. But this one is especially special because here

everybody knows your name.

"Running free" in a parking lot. Miss Mouse loved that idea and has since mentioned several times that that is the only parking lot where she can run free (it was significantly after everyone but the ladies in the kitchen had left).

We had a perfect autumn day. Crisp, cool, windy but warm. A perfect day for a bobble hat. If you ask, I'll tell you where to get one ;)

Autumn

So, I'm getting braver...yikes! For the past few months, I've had trouble looking at or taking pictures of myself from the front, showing a smile.

It stems from an evaluative appointment with a really kind orthodontist last February. He's a member of our church, and Mr. T knows him well from council. Really, he's a great guy.

Unfortunately, my evaluation, which I was hoping would land me with a simple, "yes, you should have a retainer to stop anymore trouble with your bottom teeth" or "nope, you're fine", ended with a choice of the said retainer OR major orthodontic work....when I asked why I would want to go through having two permanent teeth removed, screws put in my mouth in two areas, and two-three years of braces, "aesthetics" was my answer. I appreciated the honest answer. Yet I had never had an aesthetic problem with my smile....until then.

Since then I've had trouble looking at any pictures like this. I guess this is some kind of immersion therapy then, posting this picture.

I decided to go with the retainer - eventually. Sure, a perfect smile would be great. Maybe 15 years ago I would have chosen differently. But for the main reason that I don't want my little Miss Mouse, who would be vastly old enough in the next couple of years to take all the orthodontic work in and process it in her pretty little head, to think that to be beautiful, to be feminine, to be perfect, requires that amount of pain and sacrifice, I am living with my imperfections.....and continuing to smile each time one of my Mice gives me a flower to tuck behind my ear.

If you have a moment, check out some of the other brave people at:

A Few of My Favorite Things....Minus One

I've always loved Radio Flyers. I love them even more when I can take a half-way decent picture of them. I realize the quality of these photos is not "quite there yet", but they're so much better than anything I have ever been able to take that I'm running around like a maniac snapping pictures of everything I love....and then turning sort of mushy inside when they actually turn out!

My autumn flowers are some of my favorite things. I wait as expectantly for them as I do for the crocuses, tulips, irises, hostas, and bleeding hearts to poke their brave little heads through in the spring. These hold-outs that are hardy enough to weather the brisk fall temps are near and dear to my heart, as well.

Guesses as to what is pictured here? Hint: I did not take this one, nor have I been anywhere near anything like this in about 10 years. The last time I was, I was left on the ground by a pile of food, in the middle of a bright orange/yellow maple grove. But this is definitely one of Mr. T's favorite things.

My little exuberant one. The lighting is off, but the photo captured her love of freedom so well that I couldn't help but include it.

So I may have gone a little hay-wire editing this one....the purple isn't actually that bright, and Miss Mouse does not wear lipstick, but when I look at her, this is what I see....all brightness, candy-colored-sweetness, and blue eyes.

Mr. T is missing from my short list of favorite things, not because he doesn't make it onto my list, but because I haven't had time to download and edit the cool pictures I took of him last weekend. More autumn pictures to come! Oh, and more wedding pictures, as well.....I'll have them posted by Auntie Laura and Uncle Jon's first anniversary, no doubt about that!

Short Stories

The girls have been hilariously creative this week.

Monday - Miss Mouse organized a vet clinic (quickly - I just ran downstairs to transfer laundry to the dryer). I came upstairs to see both girls in Sunny Baby's room with a plethora of stuffed animals on the floor. Miss Mouse explained, "I am the big doctor, and she is the little doctor. The animals ate chemicals, so now we have to fix them. They need to wear a bib while they are at the doctor so in case they spit or anything." For a full half hour, Sunny Baby Mouse and I carried animals, hand-in-hand, from Miss Mouse's room to the makeshift clinic. Miss Mouse would toss out an animal when it was "done", so Sunny would run as fast as her little short legs could go to retrieve the "fixed" animal and replace it with another that needed to be treated.

Quiet time - The other day during quiet time Miss Mouse came out to get me to show me the garden she had created. Under her desk she had arranged super-size legos into a square (she pointed out that it was not a pentagon; it was a square). Those were the flowers, but they were flowers that would turn into vegetables (I've created a real producing farmer). She then pointed to the back, near the wall, where she had arranged parts of a wooden clown toy, and explained that those parts held water which then made its way through the bottom of the desk toward her flowers.....so, I guess, she effectively set up an irrigated garden during her quiet time.

They provide more entertainment for me than daytime television could ever dream of providing!!!