A Day Off, SAHM Style

Everybody deserves a day off from time to time. Even a stay-at-home mom deserves one. The bad thing about it is, you can't just call off or play hooky. The kids are ALWAYS there. There's no such thing as weekends or sleeping in as a parent, stay-at-home or not. Am I right? But yesterday I got a half day off and I can tell you I needed it! I am rejuvenated, and re-energized this morning! Hallelujah!

It all came about in the daily morning email my husband sent me. He mentioned that he was not feeling like being at work. My husband works hard, let me tell you. He works 7 days a week, 10 hours through the week, and 6 hours on weekends. Rarely does he take a Sunday off, and I can't quite remember the last time he took both a Saturday AND a Sunday off. It had been about a month and a half since he had even taken off a Sunday. So I knew that he must really be burnt out to mention that he didn't feel like being at work at all. I emailed him back and suggested that he just take the day off after lunch. Being in a union he can miss 2 days every month with out any repercussions, so going into his boss's office and saying "Hey I'm not coming back after lunch." is perfectly acceptable, no questions asked. He did exactly that.

He got home, and stretched out on his recliner. Ducky was napping, Punk and Twinkletoes were each on separate computers playing computer games, a rare treat for them. I spent about 2 minutes talking with SB, and then said "I'm going to sit in the sun!" I took a book with me and didn't move for over 3 hours except to refill my ice water. It was heavenly! SB got to doze, I refreshed my tan, the kids felt spoiled, and all was calm!

Then Ducky woke up and our world turned upside down again, as she is officially into her "terrible two's", but for those few hours, SB and I were able to recharge and hit the ground running this morning. Again, Hallelujah!!

Our Family Has Grown

I had a wonderful birthday, despite my frustrations the days leading up to it. Everything worked out and I thoroughly enjoyed myself. My husband installed a cd player into my van, and got me both of the Taylor Swift cd's that Twinkletoes and I had been dying to have. We've been singing non-stop since then!! My mom got me new phones for my house, since the ones I had were crap and always went dead without warning after 15 minutes of conversation. And she also got me, The Sims 3 game..which totally explains my absence from this blog..I'm totally addicted!

We spent the 25th (the day after my bday) at my mom's to celebrate. We had good food, games, conversation, and family bonding. It was wonderful. The kids were getting tired, and I was itching to play my new game, so we headed home around 8pm. The kids wanted to go see if the neighbor girl was still outside, so as we were unloading everything from the van they ran to the backyard to check. Next thing we knew, Twinkletoes comes screaming and crying around the corning, shouting, "TAG GOT LOOSE!!!" (Tag is our shed-crazy, totally wild dog, who likes to run away any chance he gets, and kill small wildlife.")

*crap*

SB got the kids calmed down and took off on foot to look for him. First stop, the church camp across the yards. About 25 minutes later he came back and got his truck. About 45 minutes later he came back home because it was too dark. The dog never came back. He isn't at the pound. My theory is that he managed to make his way 3 miles up the road to the country and is living his dream life stalking and killing animals in the woods..but who knows. Probably some poor family found him and was suckered in by his sweet face and kept him, not realizing what they are getting into like we did when we adopted him from the pound.

The kids were surprising not upset at all after the initial shock. Twinkletoes proudly announced that "Now I can get my kitty since Tag won't kill it." And Punk just immediately started asking for a new dog. Ducky was not as understanding and for 3 days afterward kept taking his collar and pointing to his dog run asking "Where Tag?"

We really didn't waste any time replacing him. We knew for sure that Twinkletoes would be getting the kitten we promised her before we adopted Tag and then found out that he didn't like small animals. So I checked the paper and found inside litter-trained older kittens. Perfect!! The kids and I hit Big Lots for all the supplies we needed for our new addition and then picked up our new orange & white long-haired baby boy, Harry. (Punk and Twinkletoes named him..)

SB and I talked about the dog situation. "Ducky really needs a dog." we agreed, "she's such an animal lover, but because she is so young, she can't love on the cat, because she runs and screams after him like a little troll, and the poor thing runs scared every time! "

We decided not to do the pound rescue this time. Last time we thought it was the right fit for us, getting a 1 year old dog, and skipping the puppy training, but we ended up with a dog that was impossible to retrain to stay with us in the yard, and we were never able to enjoy when outside because he had to be tied at all times.

So we found black Lab/Walker (a hound) mix pups and scooped up our new 6 week old baby boy, Hunter. Named appropriate because the Walker breed dogs are used for hunting, but don't HAVE to be. My mom's beloved dog, Cosmo, who died last year was half Walker. She fell in love with Hunter and we took her out yesterday and she adopted his sister, Bella. (Named after Bella from Twilight!)

Here's some pics of Hunter the day we brought him home..