Disclaimer: I wrote this at 2:19 AM on Wed. morning. John says it’s hard to read. That’s embarressing, but hey I write weird late at night. So enjoy my weirdness for as much of it as you can.

Today we met up with some friends of the family and we purchased their Thomas the Tank train set. Usually families just use Thomas stuff as a default gift for birthdays and Christmases for years, but instead we pretty much got the whole set in one huge swoop. We weren’t really planning on dropping this kind of cash on a toy for Miles, but considering how gosh darn expensive the Thomas sets are, we went for it and saved quite a bit for the whole set. Plus, it’s good to recycle and this set was loved by a very sweet, good and verrry smart little boy named Jammer. (So it’s got lots of happy energy tied to it.) So yippee! Now, if only I had the room in our house to set the thing up. That’s ok, we’ll only get out a couple of pieces at a time, so it will grow on me and I’m sure over time I won’t even notice a train set has taken over our living room.

The train set came with a bonus ride-on toy that our friend’s kids had outgrown. What a fun surprise! Isn’t this the cutest scooter?! Love it! In the “mommy world” you are cool if your kid has funky wooden toys. I haven’t belonged to that club though doing cloth diapers saves me a little bit from the un-coolness of Miles’ un-hip plastic toys. So Miles finally has a funky wooden toy. Perhaps he’ll stop getting his lunch money stolen at play dates. But I digress. Back to the scooter! Miles spent the ENTIRE afternoon playing with this thing. I was in the midst of changing his clothes so he could play outside with it and get some photos, but he wasn’t interested in getting dressed. Typically he would have had his diaper off in two swift moves of his hands, but he was so smitten with his scooter, that he forgot how easily he could have been enjoying his toy naked.

and here’s our little guy after he ate an orange. Hence the orange peices on his face. This kid can SLAM an orange like it’s nobody’s business. He gets his appetite from me and Stamp.

So we had a VERY close call with Whisper today. I left at noon to meet our friends for lunch and I remember hearing the dogs howling inside. I shrugged it off because sometimes they don’t want us to leave and they howl. So I was gone for a few hours and John returned around 2 PM. When he walked in he saw Stamp whining at our back glass door. He looked out and saw Whisper OUTSIDE in our back yard. She had been outside on her own for two hours without a collar on. Ok, this is a HUGE deal because we don’t have a fenced in yard and we live on a street where people drive like idiot speed demons. Poor Stamp had been trying to tell us! : ( We are SOOOOO lucky she didn’t end up in the street, picked up by someone thinking she was lost (Though, let’s face it, we walk the dogs three times a day, you would have to be blind to have never seen them with us before) or who knows what!

So here’s John, thankful to have his pup back. I can’t tell you how much of a close call this was. When ever I see a dog loose on our street I always pick them up and return them to their owner. It kind of stinks that nobody noticed Whisper was on the loose today. Oh well, it’s not like everybody is home during the day like we are. Plus maybe Whisper just hung out in the back yard taunting Stamp with her freedom for two hours.

We just love our little pugs so much and John does so much to care for them that they sure have a hold on our heart. I remember doing the math when I got the pugs that if they live as long as pugs are supposed to live we’ll be in our 40’s when we have to say goodbye. That felt a lot further away 6 years ago when I got them! Oh, I can’t think about losing them, I’ll just enjoy the time we have and next time I leave, I’ll make sure a little pug doesn’t sneak out while I’m putting Miles in the carseat!