Watch where you step

or you may crunch on a mouse! Yep, that's right, I experienced the most disgusting thing ever to happen to me in recent memory, perhaps even my life, today....I stepped on a mouse! In a way it is incredible. I couldn't have stepped on a mouse if I was trying (not that I would ever try), but I happen to step at just the right time to hear a "crunch", look down, and see the little thing twitching. Here's the story. This morning I was loading my girls into the car which was in the garage (garage door open). I buckled Addi and as I was walking around the back side, I heard (and felt) something crunch under my foot. I took a couple more steps and kind of thought to look back because it was certainly something more substantial than a leaf. There was a little mouse laying on its back and twitching a leg. I screamed. I jumped. I almost had a heart attack. All I could think of was that it was still alive and I didn't want the thing making it all the way into our garage and then into our house. The thought that I weigh probably a million times more than what it weighs and the crunching was all of its little bones breaking didn't cross my mind. I was in survival mode. It was my mortal enemy! So, I worked up my courage to step out of the car and peek around...still twitching. I ran inside to get the broom, decided I didn't want our dirty broom touching a mouse (it made sense to me at that moment), ran back to the garage to get something else that could be used to scoop it up and away. There were shovels of all weights and sizes, however, I felt a rake would be more appropriate for this job (again, it made sense to me at that moment). It is one of the rakes with long, curved, flimsy spikes on it. When I tried to scoop the mouse out of the garage (keep in mind it was laying about 2 inches inside the doorway) and into the yard, it fell into the ridge where the driveway concrete meets the foundation of the garage. There it still lays because I am not nearly as brave as Kat! Kat, how did you work up your nerve?! You are my hero :) Unfortunately for my viewers, I am not about to walk out there and take a picture to add to this post. I did call Bryan. His reaction was a little different than mine. He thought it was one of the coolest things I've ever done...glad I could impress you, Babe :) But, he clearly understood that he will spending hours of time laying traps in the garage and Decon under the crawlspace. I keep envisioning armys of mice making strategic battleplans to invade my house. Apparently my feet are the only defense we need, but since I am a wimp, we will be using other means to defend our domain. As I said before, watch where you step! Maybe I should go buy a lottery ticket and be thankful the weather is nice with no thunderstorms in the forecast :)

Happy Birthday to Cousin Ethan!

Ethan turned 2 today! We wish so much that we could be with him and his family to celebrate the big day. Since we can't, Addi and Libby are sending a special message his way...

Walking and Marriage

I finally got some video of Miss Libby Lu's wobbly steps. She is showing great improvement with each passing day. Of course now she believes she's too big to crawl down the stairs and will "uhh, uhh, uhh" at the top of the stairs until I come help her "walk" down. All the teachers at preschool comment that she looks too small to be walking :), but here she is...
*warning - you may want to turn down the volume on your computer to avoid blasting your eardrums with shrieking "Momma-encouragement" :)



Yesterday Addi announced to Bryan and me that Joshua is her favorite friend and she is going to marry him! She has been talking about this Josh kid for a while now and couldn't wait to introduce me to him at preschool today. Apparently he's the little Ladies' Man of the class and seemed to enjoy all the attention he was getting. I don't think Bryan is enjoying any of this and it hasn't even really started yet:)

We've been...

very busy this past month. I started teaching preschool 5 mornings a week (which means the girls both go to their classes 5 times a week) and will continue with that through October. It has been great and I will miss this group of 4 year-olds when their teacher returns from maternity leave. Bryan's parents flew in on the 22nd of September. We had a great visit and they were wonderful houseguests. They cooked every night and kept my house neater than I usually do :) Nana and Poppa, you are welcome here anytime! (Even if you don't cook or clean!) Aunt Lisa, Uncle Clay and Ethan flew in on the 28th and we all loaded up and set out for the beach that same day. We spent 4 days on our most favorite NC beach, Sunset. It is peaceful, relaxing, and beautiful. We hung out in the beach house, hunted for sand dollars, shells and starfish (by the way Parkers/Starrs, Starry the starfish was apparently eaten by something while drying out on our deck...shhh, Addi hasn't noticed!), rode bikes on the beach, tried (some more successfully than others) some boogey-boarding, played games, took walks, and had a great time. Lisa has posted more pictures of our beach trip on her blog. We returned to Raleigh in time for Bryan's parents to adjust their packing and head to the airport. The Starrs stayed with us until the afternoon of October 3. Addi was so excited to have Ethan sleep in her room! They both slept on her trundle until Ethan kicked her off of it in the middle of the night :) I'm sure the next time they're here we will have to let Libby sleep somewhere in that room so the "new girl baby cousin" (as Addi calls her) will have a room to sleep in. Now I need to start planning for Halloween and Addison's birthday party. She already got a big present from Nana and Poppa when they visited - a new bike! Oh, one last update...Libby has joined the walking world! She took a few steps about a week ago. Since then she has taken 3 or 4 steps at a time a few times a day. Today, though she was walking like crazy at preschool. Her teachers said she was even turning around without losing her balance! I've tried to get some video footage of it. When I'm successful, I'll post some of her first wobbly steps.

VIP

Our Very Important Person of the day is my grandmother, Rea Miller...better known (at our house) as Ma. Her birthday was several days ago and I completely forgot. Sorry, Ma and Happy Birthday. She is a loving and kind woman and we love her very much. She was with us the day that Libby was born. (In fact, Libby's real name, Reagan Elizabeth, is partly after her.) We miss you, Ma and hope we get to see you again real soon.

God is So Good

"God is so good.
God is so good.
God is so good.
He's so good to me."

You know the song...the next verses are "He answers prayer" and "I love Him so". Addi knows this song also. She was sitting on my lap last night during our small group singing her heart out to this song. I didn't really know she knew "God is So Good", but it almost moved me to tears hearing her sweet, young voice singing those simple words. It made me reflect on how easily I get caught up in things that don't really matter. The next time I start getting overwhelmed or feeling sorry for myself, I hope I will remember listening to my sweet girl sing that song.