Maverick is 5 years old!

This is a post for you, Marissa ;)

Maverick is 5 years old today!

Maverick likes to eat any people food he's not allowed, be chased by sister Goose and cousin Murphy at the ranch, and be permitted to doze on the chair curled next to mommy. It's a simple but happy life. If he could get a few more ways a day out of us I'm sure that would be the icing on the cake - pun intended :)

Happy Birthday, Maverick!

Oh, and he still runs around with a shoe in his mouth whenever he hasn't seen me in more than 30 seconds. I suppose that's not going to be outgrown after all, haha. 

Tuesday Happenings

For some reason our sweet girl is a crazy child starting around 8pm and lasting until 11pm or so. It started this past week and it's really frustrating to know she's unhappy and there's really nothing we can do to comfort her. There's a lot of tag teaming involved, because it's hard to pace around, hold a baby, and NOT get irritated that nothing's helping the poor girl. This happened with Clara too - it's brutal, people.

In other words Bryan is currently taking a turn trying to calm her down so I'm going to quickly blog about today!

While I was showering and getting ready this morning, Emma had her "no no, Mom, keep it down in there" hand up :) Mayyyyybe she needs an earlier bedtime (see above). Doh.

These dogs crack me up sometimes. Oh Goose.

Despite Emma be colicky and grumpy lately, I HAVE to get some school stuff done. Today we alternating nursing, rocking and bouncing while I tried to grade research papers in the recliner. Not the easiest thing in the world to do, but I did manage to get several more done.

She looks so peaceful - such a contrast from the racket in the other room, bless her heart.

A moment for me to pee! hooray! annnnd she's cute

Clara's class picture was posted today. She's on the bottom row, 2nd from the left. Cracks me up. Also: how the heck did they get all these kids to stand/sit still long enough for a photo!? amazing.

Then I had the brilliant idea to walk in the heat from our house to Primrose to go pick Clara up. Oh my gosh. EXCELLENT workout people. 2 1/2 miles there:

Not a horrible time for pushing a very heavy stroller and walking 2 dogs up and down the hilly sidewalk in the heat. Not great time, but not bad.

Then we started walking back and Clara had a bit of a poopy explosion. Then Emma had a HUGE explosion - we are talking poop up to her ears, people. No wonder she was cranky earlier.

Clara kept pointing and saying "my wah wah!" at the river

On the way back you'll notice the time is shorter, that's not because I picked up speed, but because after cleaning up two poopy children with 2 dogs and a couple of wipes I was just about done in. Plus my feet were killing me, so Bryan picked us up with a mile to go on his way home. Phew.
(Do you think less of me? I was relieved!)

When we got home Clara decided that Emma (I almost wrote Molly!) needed a hat and a paci.

Such a good, confused sport

Teeny tiny toes

Then I got back to grading with company while Bryan put Clara to bed!

It's not a glamorous life, but maybe it makes for some mildly interesting reading? :)

Okay, my turn to get get the sad little one. Pray she falls asleep ASAP so we can too!

A puppy life

And they think they have it so hard. 

Silly puppies. 

2 dogs & a baby

A little attitude & rain

 Clara has starting developing rather specific and decided opinions lately. For instance, notice the shoes on her feet. They are a size too big and they are "church" shoes, yet these are the ones she wants to wear all.the.time. not in the slightest phased by how often they cause her to trip.

She is also pretty stubborn about bedtime these days. Yesterday she was not interested, so she tried to close us AWAY from the stairs so we wouldn't carry her up.

You can tell by the cheeky smile on her face that she thought this would work nicely.

Just being silly

Video:

But then a storm came quick and hard! Our rather fearless youngster was terrified of all the lightening and thunder at first.

A few cuddles and selfies with Mommy almost made it better ...

But then it started hailing too and it was all over :( 

So sad :(

Maverick & Goose were either scared too or just glad to have a chance to cuddle with Mommy and Tiny.

I do love all these sweet critters - even when they drive me nuts :)

Oh, pups

Just another regular evening in this household. 

Everyone needs to be close to Mommy.

Supportive puppies

When Mommy starts laughing so hard she cries, the puppies are right there. 

When she goes to bed they are there too, taking turns staring at her to make sure she's not still crazy. 

It must be stressful taking care of a human, but they sure are good at it :)

Double guard duty

Ever wonder what it would be like to have 2 dogs wanting to be all up in your space at all times?

Even nap time they are right there, ready to be alert the moment someone drives by or a child laughs. 

I love the pups, even when they drive me insane. 

Feel free to ignore the current messy state of our bedroom :)

Don't worry, Mom. We got this. 

Maverick turns 3!

Even when he is annoying, barks or makes a bad puppy choice, he's still my side kick.

So glad you are a part of our family!

Love you Maverick!!

Some puppy love

First a photo of the 3 amigos (canine cousins) because it's far too cute to not share:

Then here's a photo of a very patient Maverick allowing Clara to follow him around tossing her blankets on him telling him, "puppy go night night! Night night puppy!" When she was sleepy and ready for bed. 

It can be a rough job being the furry older brother of an energetic toddler, but I think it may be evened out with dropped goldfish :)

I spy with my little eye

A puppy dog enjoying the weather.

Can you find him?

Exhausting

Watching Mom grade really wore us out. 

Playtime

I knew as I drove a grumpy toddler home from school today that we have to do something fun and distracting to get us through until Daddy made it home. I decided to take the dogs and Clara for a walk and then stop at the park on the way home. Not only did we meet 2 sweet families (one with a 17month old! We swapped numbers and are planning on a playdate soon - her son is at a similar activity level which is wonderful), but we also had a great time swinging, climbing and sliding. Tiny daredevil. Everything was amazing until it was time to go home

(Oh no no no no no!!!) And since she realllly did not want to get back in her stroller, I started to guide her while she pushed it until some kids waved at her across a street (!!!) and yelled at her to run run run - I was livid. She darted across our neighborhood's main road to see them. Ohhhh no, you don't missy. I could have spanked their butts - they were all pre-teens and should have known better. Anyway, after that I strapped Missy AngryPants into her stroller and walked her screaming all the home. Phew. 

New friend, Alex!

And then I caught one of her streaming blankie moments and one of the few minutes she sat still :) 

We have a new word! She went to the fridge, pointed at it and said, "cheeeeeeese!" Well, that's easy! I love communication that doesn't involve a lengthy guessing game.