We're not taping a tv commercial or a movie at our house

It just seems like it because Geico's geckos and Samuel L. Jackson's "snakes on a plane" have started hanging out with us...

 

Inside.

 

Our.

 

House.

 

I could die. I seriously could have a heart attack one of these times and die. If it wasn't for the need to care for a baby 24/7, I might, no I would, be living in a hotel right now. And there would be a giant FOR SALE sign in our yard. Probably covered in lizards and snakes.

 

It all started the Thursday evening before my dad and sister arrived to stay with us and meet Ben for the first time. I was changing Ben for bed, the lights in his room were dim, and I spied a freaking lizard scurrying up the wall behind my beautiful glider. I went running, with this half-scream half-unattractive panic noise into the kitchen and up onto one of our counter stools. I had the eebie jeebies all over my body and couldn't physically shake them off enough. Jeff didn't believe me. He just started cracking up at me and asking what in the hell was going on.

 

He went into Ben's room and 20 seconds later silently came back out into the kitchen, grabbed some tupperware and a magazine, and went back in. I sat in the kitchen with full-body shudders. When he came out, he informed me that it had been "exterminated" and ridiculed me freaking out about such a tiny lizard. For some bizarr-o reason, I then went into even bigger panic mode that he just KILLED a lizard in Ben's room. Jeff didn't understand what he did wrong, and didn't know what the heck I wanted a live lizard for, but went about taking the carcass out to the trash and laughing at my reaction. The whole thing still gives me the shakes.

 

As we were getting ready for bed, I told him in the most serious face that this was NOT to ever be told to or discussed with my sister. She wouldn't have come to visit if she knew the possibility of lizards inside the house. As it turns out, the very next day when she did arrive, she admitted that she had a hard time just walking up to the front of the house knowing that we had seen lizards around.

We're just missing the clever quips in a Cockney accent

The second time it happened I think my heart stopped and I know my bladder broke. It was again late evening and I was in Ben's room getting my breastpump supplies ready for the night (little Ben sleeps so long at night that I have to get up around midnight to pump...lovely). I reached down into my pump bag and saw a DEAD lizard on its back with its legs straight up in full salute.

 

I went running, whisper-screaming and peeing into our bedroom (where Jeff was walking Ben to sleep) and straight into the bathroom. Jeff whisper-shouts back, "What is the matter with you?? What is going on?" I'm dealing with full-on body shakes and the fact that I just peed my pants running through our house (I blame the recent childbirth, obviously) and can only muster out, "dead lizard...oh God....oh God....I think I'm going to die...oh God" from the bathroom. When I'm able to get out more details and put myself back together, Jeff once again grabs some tupperware and a magazine and heads into Ben's room. Disgusting. So freaking disgusting I can hardly stand it.

 

Third time is eerily similar to the second, only the dang lizard wasn't dead yet. I went into Ben's room before bed, sat on my glider, grabbed my pump bag to get it ready for the night, and a stinking lizard goes running up the outside of my pump bag. Total and complete freak out. Again. Shakes from head to toe (me) and more tupperware and magazines (Jeff). This time, Jeff took the thing somewhere outside. Hopefully far away from our house, but I have to wonder when Jeff walked back inside in about 45 seconds. I'm trying really, really hard to not think about it.

 

Fourth time takes the cake and has seriously altered my ability to be home alone.

 

I was feeding Ben at about 3am last Tuesday night, rocking in my glider and minding my own business. I got up to change his diaper and was about to sit back down in the glider when my eye caught something dark on the carpet underneath the window. I only had a small lamp on in the room, so I couldn't tell exactly what it was, but it looked like a 10-inch curved black rope. With Ben in my arms, I went flying out of his room and into ours, and whisper-screamed for Jeff to wake up. All I could really get out was "Jeff! Jeff! Snake! Oh God I think there's a snake!" Jeff pops up saying, "What?! What is going on? Where?" I manage to tell him where and I pace around our bedroom holding Ben. I'm walking like I'm marching in the Rose Bowl Parade kicking my knees up with every step. I can hardly walk because of my body shudders but I refuse to sit down anywhere, either.

 

I peak into the living room as Jeff comes back out and says he needs a flashlight. I asked a zillion times if it really was a snake and he doesn't respond. He looked very serious. Then he comes back out and grabs - you guessed it - tupperware and a magazine. Outside and into the night he goes.

 

After he comes back inside from doing whatever he did out there with whatever it was, he tells me it wasn't as bad as I thought and not to be so freaked out. Yeah right. I told him I don't want to know a single detail and to not tell me anything about it because I will refuse to live here and won't sleep that night if I know anything. I tell him to just let me live in a little bit of oblivion and ignorance. Before I can even ask (aka demand), he says he'll call someone the next day to come out to our house to look around.

"I've had it with these muthaf@#&%in' snakes on this muthaf$#*@in' plane!"

This is where I had the pleasure of meeting Matt (aka my Samuel L. Jackson), our self-proclaimed "wildlife pro." Jeff informed me that all the "pest" companies he called said it's just part of living in Texas and couldn't do anything for us. Matt, on the other hand, deals with all things "legs, fur, scales and tails." He was exactly who I wanted on the job - big black boots, a camo hat and tattoos sneaking out from the arms of his t-shirt. He came to our house the next day and asked me "for my side of the story." I'm pretty sure Jeff gave him clear instructions to not say too much about what was found inside our house the night before. He checked things out inside, talked about why lizards and other "things of that nature" are good for us because they keep all the bugs out, and said his number one priority was to make me feel at ease. He said he gets calls all the time where wives are threatening to move because of what they found in their houses. He made me feel not so crazy.

 

After doing a full inspection outside, he said he would talk with Jeff and determine what we want done. He came back the next day to put wire mesh in our "weep holes" (don't really know what these are, but I guess they're in the brick around our house) and fixed some spots where mortar was missing. Since we've only found these slithering predators in Ben's room, he focused on that side of the house and assured me we won't have any other reptilian visitors inside.

 

He gave me a lesson on Texan wildlife while he was here and told me that every house has these problems. He also said that my fear isn't the reptile itself, but its crazy frantic movements. Whatever you say, wildlife guy, just get them the hell outta my house. It calmed me a little and made me freak a little.  

 

As he was leaving, he mentioned he was glad the skunk in the back of his truck behaved while he was here. Whaaaat??? Nothing should surprise me anymore.

 

I have yet to go into Ben's room at night. One of these days I'll get up the courage, but for now I think I'm doing pretty good by living here. I honestly don't know what I would do if I found something and Jeff wasn't here. Oh dear God let's not think about it.

I can't believe I've shared this when we really want visitors. I think I'm using this as therapy to help me "talk it out" and get past the extreme panic I'm dealing with here all by myself most days. Jesus help me.

M

3 Decades, 2 Swirls and 1 Sher

Can you believe?! My hubs and my Sher pulled off the best surprise ever! On the Friday before my 30th birthday, Sheryl flew to Dallas and showed up on my doorstep (seriously. Jeff dropped her off out front and then told me I had a package at the door) to spend the weekend with me. It was incredible.

Total shock

She not only left her baby girl for 2 nights but also left her hubs on his birthday....unreal. Jeremy is pretty much the coolest for letting Sher spend the weekend with me and for being on full-time daddy duty over his bday weekend.

Our first night was spent at Uncle Julio's for some delicious Mexican food, along with a couple swirl margaritas. De-lish.

We obviously did elbows up in the middle of the restaurant at 6pm

I was so excited Friday night I could hardly sleep. On Saturday, we went out to lunch, to the mall and got our nails done. While my goal was to buy amazing new non-maternity clothes for fall and work, I ended up spending the majority of my time and money in Baby Gap. Go figure.

They bonded very fast and Ben loved talking to Sher

Jeff even surprised me with a fancy pants cake and made my favorite for my bday dinner: cheesy buffalo burgers.

Cake and Captain (in my fancy bday glass thanks to my big sister)

While it was a super quick visit, it was the absolute best to have my Sher in Dallas with me. I haven't seen any of my girlfriends since last April at my baby shower, so I was in serious need of girlfriend time.


our happy fam

It made turning the big 3-0 not so bad.
M

Relativity

We knew that it would be really hard to see family regularly once we moved to Dallas. Thankfully, Jeff's new job provides amazing travel benefits that our families have been able to take advantage of, which makes it relatively easy for our relatives to visit. When Ben was born, Jeff's parents were already in the waiting room at the hospital. It was so nice to have family there and to not feel so far across the country from our friends and family.

Happy new Grandparents!

They stayed with us for those first few days after we went home from the hospital. Grandma Barb made tons of food - when she wasn't cuddling with the little guy. She also wanted to make sure he was learning right from the start.


I had to get a picture of this when I looked over and saw Barb inside the playmat reading to Ben...and I thought I was the only one this obsessed with him.

Let's just say she couldn't keep her hands off of him.

Our next visitors were Grandpa Dave and my sister, Aunt Steph. My dad wasted no time singing to and dancing with Mr. Ben. If you've never had the pleasure, please ask him to sing a few verses of "Roly Poly, Daddy's Little Fatty" the next time you see him. Ben loved it.

Grandpa Dave with a very content baby Ben

My family visited right after I posted about the spiders, lizards and dillos in and around our house. My dad had the pleasure of killing what seemed like upwards of 200 fruit flies during his 48-hour visit. Disgusting and annoying, but we were incredibly grateful for his stealth abilities. I was worried the only thing he would remember from his trip was the number of fruit flies attacking our faces and food. I apologize if you've had to hear about the "damn fruit flies." You'll be happy to know we've cleared our house of them (a new pest has entered our fortress....which may or may not be documented in a future post; I want people to continue to visit, so I have to weigh the risk of divulging).

Aunt Steph came armed with recipes and grocery lists, and stuffed our faces and stomachs full of ribs, meat loaf, chicken, pasta and what seemed like a new dessert for every lunch and dinner. It was amazing, but didn't help with my prego weight loss. Unfortunately for me, my sister opened Jeff's eyes to many of my mom's recipes, and now the pressure is on to start cooking more. Dang.

She also cuddled (and when I say "cuddled," I really mean "attacked") Ben every second she could pry him out of my arms.

Aunt Steph loves her some Benjaroo

She helped us figure out how to take Ben for his first stroller ride (I was nervous pervous) and got me out of the house without the babe to take a trip to Target. I think she OD'd on the Olympics thanks to me, but I hear she got to watch a lot of Bravo shows for the very first time.

Aunt Steph was also Ben's very first babysitter. After twisting her arm, she agreed to watch Ben so Jeff and I could go out to Capital Grille to celebrate our 3rd wedding anniversary. I looked ridic in my attempt to wear a pre-prego dress, but after one Stoli Doli and one large glass of Malbec, I didn't care.

CG for the Anny

Jeff's sister, Aunt Colleen, then visited for a weekend and was able to snuggle with Ben all she wanted.

Aunt Leen loving on Ben 

 She also brought him some of his very first graphic tees. I love this one.

The Novota clan came back for Labor Day weekend, which was also Uncle Paul's first time meeting the little guy.

We ate, we drank and Ben was never left to hang out by himself. He was definitely spoiled with attention that weekend.

Like mother like daughter

My brother, Uncle Matt, is next on the list of relatives to visit. I have no doubt that Matt will take every chance during his quick visit to instill in Ben a love for the Hoosiers and to teach him how to pour a proper Captain.

 Ben is a lucky little guy, with relatively normal relatives.

M

Maternity Leave = Awesomeness

Since about day 3 of my pregnancy, when everything really began to hit me, I've been ueber-excited about my summertime maternity leave. Not just for the whole baby-bonding part and not just to have 12 weeks off from work, but to have 12 weeks of  baby bonding with the SUMMER OLYMPICS on tv! Poor Jeff has heard me talk about my Olympic obsession for months.

Thank goodness this little guy decided to finally come out, because I was getting nervous that I was going to be in labor 3 weeks late and miss the opening ceremonies. Jesus was on my side because Ben came in plenty of time....and even gave me enough time to come up with and create the following:

I know! You love it, don't you?! I got all creative and mom-like and made little B the coolest onesie ever to celebrate 2 weeks of world united-ness and insane athleticism. Things I loved about the Olympics this year: rhythmic gymnastics, synchronized swimming, diving and Carmelita (the runner, duh). Things I ended up hating (I never thought I would hate anything, but it happened): water polo, water polo and water polo. Why was water polo the only sport they showed the entire game of during the afternoon?

Other things I love about maternity leave thus far:

My first booze! It happened on a warm Friday night while my sister was here. The hubs played bartender and mixed my very first Captain and coke since October 2011. It was delicious, and according to Jeff, made me "Talk-y McTalk-ster" at dinner that evening. Whatev. Mama liked.

The pour.

The finger stir. It's the only way to mix a Captain. Unless you're my brother, then you use a butter knife.

Elbows up, baby!


Now before you go all child protective services on me and start freaking out, I only had the one drink, it was right after I nursed, and even our breastfeeding class instructor talked about how it's fine to have a drink while breastfeeding. While I'm not a complete boozehound, it does feel good to have a little "snort" (as my dad calls it) in the evening.

Ben and I are getting the hang of this maternity leave just fine. He's into our morning strolls around the neighborhood, and understands that 7am really is the only time we can go outside together since we hit over 100 degrees just about every day.

Maxin' and relaxin'

I'm also getting a little too comfortable in my pink robe, comfy pants and slippers during most of the day. We've moved onto Bravo marathons as our programming of choice.

The thought of my leave being 1/3 over already makes me want to puke and cry. Let's not talk about it. For now, I'll continue enjoying our time together and hope Ben continues to sleep enough for me to keep my sanity. He's been pretty awesome.

Mary

Our Little Texan

He finally made it! Benjamin Scott was born on July 18, 2012, weighing in at 7 pounds, 12 ounces (the nurse originally told us 7lbs, 11oz) and measuring 20.25 inches. He's perfect, and he's got one hella-crazy head of hair.

Stretch it out, big guy

Holy moly what a labor and delivery. I started having contractions Sunday night (the 15th), and as you all know, we went to the hospital in the middle of the night only to be turned away at about 5am Monday morning. My doc prescribed a sleeping pill for me that Monday, and told us to "rest up" and that the baby would be here soon. Hmmm. In his defense, he also offered me some pain medicine, but I declined. I was still in my hippie state of saying no to narcotics and inductions.

I didn't sleep very much that afternoon, but I think I drunk texted my dear friend Blow during my haze of sleepiness and contractions. I have a very low tolerance for pain meds, and apparently Ambien.

That night, I was on all fours in the living room trying to sway my hips to get this baby moving down and the contractions were getting super intense. I finally woke up Jeff and asked for some assistance. I had him rub my back and he started timing the contractions again. Since they were even closer together and I was in way more pain, we packed up again and went back to the hospital.

I was still just 1 centimeter dilated. I almost cried to the nurse. She let us walk the halls again, but this time Jeff coached me around the deserted hospital hallway at 3am like a sprinter. He walked about 6 paces ahead of me and forced me to walk through each contraction rather than letting me stop to hold onto  a rail and grimace through them. Then my husband-of-the-year pulled out his camera phone and had the nerve to take a picture of me shuffling along in my giant hospital gown and flip flops with tears streaming down my face. When Ben was born and things were all said and done, he pulled that picture out and told me how it epitomizes our labor and delivery experience. The picture is dark and grainy, and I look absolutely pathetic and exhausted. No one will ever see that picture of me.

The nurse sent us home again because I was still just 1 cm after our hour of walk-jogging. I was nearly inconsolable on our drive home. Tuesday morning, I called up my favorite Asian doctor and went in for acupuncture to induce labor. (I had already called my Western doctor and confirmed that I would be induced Thursday morning if no baby before then; that wasn't good enough for me.) I got up on her table, laid on my side, and she put 4 or 5 needles in my calves and ankles while pushing on my belly. She actually made my uterus contract right there, and twisted and pushed the needles in farther to make each contraction stronger and my belly tighter. It was incredible. After about 40 minutes, I got up and she told me I would have the baby that night.

We went home and I labored like a golden retriever for the rest of the afternoon. Jeff set up blankets and pillows on the floor of our bedroom, turned on the ceiling fan, turned off all the lights and just left me alone to somehow try to relax and get through each contraction. I told him he should just put me in a cardboard box in the garage.

This is also about the time I seriously thought I was being punked by Ricki Lake into having a home birth.

I couldn't walk around our house without holding onto furniture and could hardly even stand up straight. The contractions became so bad that Jeff took control, called my nurse and told her we needed to be admitted to the hospital now. She and my doc agreed, and we went back to the hospital to be induced at about 5pm. I'll never forget that hour-long car ride to the hospital while contracting. I couldn't brace my hands and feet into the floorboard and car door hard enough, and the only words that would come out of my mouth were terrible cuss words. Sorry baby.

I get there and am 5 centimeters dilated! I'm admitted and the epidural is ordered. Sweet relief. The nurse lets Jeff and I sleep for the rest of the night. I'm fully dilated and we decide to try to start pushing just before 5am Wednesday morning.

I pushed, and pushed, and pushed. No baby. The nurses shift changed at 7am, and I got a new one. I knew things were going to get better when I saw she was Asian. She told me to rest for an hour. At 8:30 am, the pushing continues. The only way to describe my new Asian nurse is "militant." She forced me to use a mirror to push, which was the number 1 thing I refused to do in preparing my birth plan. Hell no. Not only did she force me to look, the woman forced poor Jeff to move farther down the bed to hold my leg and made him check out the state of our delivery. She was probably all of 90 pounds and had full control over us.

At 10am and still no baby, she calls the doctor in and we all agree this baby needs some help getting out. This is when shit got real. Lights were turned out, masks were put on, an anesthesiologist was brought in, more nurses came in, and it felt like my entire body was scrubbed down in iodine.

After 2 major contractions, lots of pushing and the help of scary forceps, Ben was born at 10:26 a.m.! The little stinker came out sunny-side up and peeing a fountain. And he basically had a unicorn horn on his head from being stuck for so long and then being dragged out. We were a little nervous about his appearance, but his cone head miraculously recovered within hours.

It was not the labor and delivery I had ever expected, and although the nearly 5 hours of pushing wasn't even all that terrible, it was a long and exhausting 3 days of trying to get this baby out.

We're all doing fabulous and couldn't be happier. Enjoy some more of our very first pics.

Serious hair.

Proud Papa

Ben and Grandma Barb

The Fam. Getting ready to leave the hospital.

 ~Mama

Triage is for Babies

I guess I'm a baby. On Sunday night, after taking 3 semi-serious outdoor walks throughout the day, I started having real contractions. I definitely thought something was truly finally happening. I tried to go to bed at 9:30 to see if I could sleep through them or at least get a little rest, but that was to no avail. Jeff started timing them (after we argued about who had downloaded the better *** mobile contraction time app on our phones...he won) around 10:30 p.m. By midnight, we realized they were coming pretty fast, some even only 2 minutes apart. I got up and showered and let the hot water beat on my lower back. We keep timing them and they were averaging about 45-50 seconds each, and coming just about 5 minutes apart. From everything we've read and been told, that's go time.

shaving and packing his daddy-o bag

So Jeff shaves and drinks his carnation instant breakfast (at 1:30 a.m. - does this really surprise you?).

And we go. All the way down to Dallas to our hospital about 23 miles away. We got there a little before 2:00 a.m. We go through the admission process and are then escorted to triage.....dreaded triage.

During our childbirth class at the hospital a few months ago, MaryAnn, our instructor, gave us a tour of the labor & delivery area of the hospital. As she pointed out triage, she said to our group, "You do NOT want to end up sitting in triage." She then proceeded to say throughout the entire 6-hour course to stay home and labor as long as possible before going to the hospital.

Sounds so freaking easy. ***

When my contractions hit that point on Sunday night where they were averaging the right length for the right amount of time, we thought we better get a move on it. I was declared 1 whole centimeter dilated at my last doctor appointment a week ago, so surely the week wait and 4 hours of steady contractions meant things were happening. Not to mention I was 4 days past my due date. I wasn't risking a home delivery.

I'm checked when we get to the hospital and I'm still only 1 measly centimeter dilated. And my contractions have tapered off and lost their steam. Awesome. The nurse tells us to walk for 40 minutes, come back and be hooked up to the monitors for 20 minutes, walk another 40 minutes, monitor for 20, and then she'll check me again.

We dutifully do as we're told, and walk the deserted hospital hallways for the full 40 minutes - both times. Since you're *** reading this post, you can guess what happened when she checked my progress after those long, boring, quiet, incredibly tiring middle of the night walks up and down hallways. Still only 1 centimeter.

She sent us home a little after 5:00 a.m. We didn't make it out of triage. We drove back in near silence, exhausted and defeated. No baby. I curled up on the couch and Jeff went to bed. I miraculously slept for nearly an hour before my contractions just wouldn't let me sleep any longer. Jeff was able to sleep for a few hours, and stayed home from work. We had a doctor appointment at 10:30 a.m. this morning, so we packed up all of our bags and headed all the way back down to the hospital for our appointment. We told him what was going on, he checked my progress again (still 1 centimeter dilated), and he offered me a sleeping pill.

I took his instructions, and somehow the sleeping pill worked. I woke up only about 3 times an hour to deal with a really painful contraction, and then passed back out. I think the pill also made me a little drunk, because I *** responded to Ali's text messages when she asked about the sleeping pill saying, "doc said nighty night today so i can push this melon out later gator." This was about 2 hours into my medically induced sleep. I also made a comment about the nurse trying to choke me with her progress checks (no need to elaborate there) before sending my "happy ass" home.

Ali checked *** on me later tonight and I assured her I had sobered up. I hope Baby didn't get a little sleep-bombed like I did. Yikes.

Anywho, I'll be walking laps throughout our house for the rest of the evening, stopping only to deal with the particularly dreadful contraction. Jeff has called it a night and is trying to get some sleep. He's been a trooper, and must be exhausted from walking all those hospital laps last night and then coming back to work from home for the rest of the afternoon.

Praying for seriously intense contractions as this labor thing is starting to last a loooong time. ***

Mar

*** just for fun, i put in these asterisks each time i had a contraction while typing.

Armadillos and spiders and lizards, oh my...

This morning Jeff and I are doing random cleaning because this baby is still inside my belly. I’m 3 days away from the due date and can only prepare so much. Let’s get on with it, Baby.

We’re in the nursery and I spy two more of those tiny little brown spidees along the bottom of the wall. We’ve noticed them every so often along the baseboards since we moved into our new house. They appear to be harmless and are super tiny, so I haven’t gotten too outta whack about them. Although Jeff may say differently, because I keep telling him he’s got to do something about them. I don’t like the thought of any size spiders in our house. Yuck-o duck-o. He flushes them for me.

Baby room: spidee-free

Then we wander outside to check out Jeff’s landscaping and to see if the zillion begonias he planted are truly starting to die. They’ve been beat up by the heat in the past month. We quickly notice that there are holes dug all over our mulch, and even some begonias have been completely uprooted and strewn about. We’re bewildered, and I start getting a little bit panicky about what kind of animal was roaming around our house last night. We notice the holes are all over and Jeff starts to get p-o’d. Big time.

He immediately goes to the garage to get his shovel and whatever other landscaping things he uses, and is down in the dirt before I know it re-planting and probably silently cussing to himself as he isn’t saying much. I ask, “Dog?” and he grunts, “Maybe. That or an armadillo or something.”

Armadillo?? WTH? Did he just pick a random Texan animal out of his butt and decide to freak me out by suggesting a dinosaur-like animal is creeping around our house?? Don’t even get me started on dinosaurs….

So my belly and I go inside to the AC and I start googling. Of course I do. I first look up a picture of an armadillo to make sure I’m thinking of the right animal. I am. Holy mother.....nasty.

Dang 'dillo

Then I google all sorts of things about “holes” “mulch” “animals” “landscaping” “ruin” and “armadillos.” What do I find? That it’s probably (most likely 100%) a freaking armadillo! Holy moses. I can’t handle this. After reading about how to get rid of them, I learn the best thing to do is “Get a gun.” Seriously. That was the one recurring answer posted by fellow Texans. Next to that, suggestions were to try cayenne pepper and coyote pee. Yep, coyote pee. People say it’s expensive to buy over the internet, so to just use your own pee instead. Hmmm.

I immediately think we need to call our friend Tony in Indiana and offer him a buddy pass ASAP to get down here, stake out the ‘dillo at night, and shoot the damn thing (and there better only be one and not an entire dinosaur-armadillo family feasting in our front yard). He was out shooting squirrels in his back yard just the other day, so I’m sure he’d be game for a ‘dillo attack mission.

I go outside to tell Jeff what I’ve learned. I’m impressed he even thought of an armadillo, and we talk about what we should try to do. As I’m standing on the path leading to our front door, I see a neon green lizard go scurrying across the front stoop. No freaking joke. It was probably 5-6 inches long and scooted right into the mulch. Unbelievable. “Awesome,” I say to Jeff who’s still packing in dirt around the broken begonias, “a freaking green lizard just ran by our front door.” I’m so disturbed about the whole ‘dillo situation that I don’t even freak about the lizard. And trust me, normally I would freak. Jeff responds, “hm,” or some noise to that effect. He’s preoccupied.

Dear Jesus, help me. (not the actual lizard, but very similar)

When we moved into our house in May, we noticed two lizards in our garage the very first day. They scurried somewhere toward the backyard. Then about 2 weeks later, I went to get our mail and a lizard slithered along the brick and behind our mailbox (which happens to be right up at our door). Total freak outs both times. I couldn’t run into the house and slam the door fast enough. Today, either the giant baby in my belly or the armadillo invasion (or combo) has made me completely indifferent toward seeing a lizard a foot away from the door of my house. This is not me.

When Jeff is done re-planting, we talk inside about what to do. We decide chili powder (since we don’t have cayenne) and our own urine (since we don’t have any coyote pee). Good timing, since I’m peeing upwards of 10-12 times a day. I grab the giant Dickey’s BBQ plastic cup, and Jeff grabs the chili powder. Then he says he’s going to mix them together. ????. Gross, but whatever. I don’t care what he does as long as the ‘dillos are gone. So, you can only imagine what took place next and now we’ll wait and see what happens tomorrow morning.

Taking care of business

During this saga, Jeff stopped and looked at me and said, “What did the ‘dillo do? Just walk down the street last night and decide to stop in our yard? I mean what the hell, we live in a neighborhood surrounded by other houses.”  I couldn’t help but laugh at the thought. Then he says, “Well if I catch the damn thing, maybe I can take it to the Fort Worth Stockyards and have boots made out of it.” Only in Texas.

That ‘dillo better stay away from my baby. (I can’t help but think of the dingo baby…)

I’m hoping my sister doesn’t read this post, since she’ll probably re-think her trip down here in a couple of weeks. I haven’t even mentioned the black snake in the middle of street a few weeks ago….

Soon-to-be-a-true-Texan-mama