Halloween 2012

As promised, here are the much anticipated pictures of Mira in her Halloween costume. Mira is currently obsessed with the TV show Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, and whenever she sees a picture of Minnie Mouse she gets really excited. So Mark and I decided that would be a great outfit for her to wear because she would recognize it and get excited about it. We also decided to be ambitious and make the costume ourselves because we didn't like the ones we were finding in the stores. Of course it ended up getting thrown together at the last second but I think it turned out super cute!

Mira was definitely excited. She could tell she was Minnie Mouse and as soon as we got her all dressed up she started twirling around in her skirt! I made the tutu/petticoat portion of the skirt and Mark sewed the polkadot overskirt and the bow. I also made the ears. Keep in mind too that most of the sewing ended up being done by hand because our sewing machine was chewing up the fabric instead of stitching it all together. I think for a last-minute hand-made costume it came out really well and it was definitely recognizable.

Luckily it was really nice warm weather on Halloween so it was great for trick-or-treating. We did get the yard all decked out again this year but I honestly never got the time to even walk around the yard and admire the work Mark had done. Which is a shame but at least lots of other people got to enjoy it and lots of little kids got scared witless. Apparently some kids got so scared they left pieces of their costumes behind in their desperate attempt to get away as fast as they could. Sounds like a success to me!

This was Mira's first year going trick-or-treating so it was really important to me that I got to take her around the neighborhood. Which meant I tried to throw together a haphazard costume at the last second too. What I was going for was "tired" but I ended up looking like that scary lady in the movie The Ring. But a few people said I looked like a housewife and lots of housewives are tired so maybe the costume didn't fall completely flat.

As far as the actual trick-or-treating went, Mira didn't quite get the idea. I've spent so much time trying to teach her that it's not socially acceptable to walk up to every single house and knock on the door that she was so confused when I tried to drag her up to everyone's front door. In fact for the first few houses I had to carry her to the front door because she refused to walk up to anyone's house! Then when the door was opened she tried to walk into everyone's house. Then she'd get a piece of candy but didn't understand that even if she put it in her candy bucket it was still hers. She screamed if I tried to put her candy in her bucket and insisted on holding it in her hand. Then when we knocked on the next door and she was offered the bowl of candy to choose from, she put her old piece of candy from the previous house in the bowl and picked up a new piece, which she then would still refuse to put in her bucket. Finally once I showed her how some neighbor girls were putting their candy in their buckets as they went house to house she started to get the idea and eventually she would put her candy in the bucket right before we rang the doorbell - close enough! We didn't end up going very far, just around the block once. Then she got tired and overwhelmed with everything and wanted to go back so I carried her home. Once I got her into bed I still had to go to work for the rest of the night. The sad fact of working in a hospital is you don't ever get nights/weekends/holidays off until you've been working for like 20 years or something and your kids aren't little and wanting you at home anymore. But luckily I was able to find a nurse who was willing to stay a few hours late for me so I did have the extra time to take Mira trick-or-treating, which was so very much appreciated. It was so worth it.

As for me... I'm a work in progress, I suppose. It's barely been a week since starting the Prozac so of course I'm still having days or portions of days when I want to crawl under the covers and cry but those moments are already starting to be less frequent. I really think getting an answer for why I've been feeling and acting so out of character has been a huge part of it. Now that we know what the problem is we know how to tackle it. Mark and I will be doing some marriage counseling too. It won't hurt and it's free through my work so why not? I think it's just going to have to be one day at a time for awhile.

And of course something else that has been helping my mood has been this silly orange kitty:

Typical cat notices we're doing something so falls asleep right on top of the project.

What? Yes, I know I'm gorgeous.

I hadn't realized how much I've missed having a lap cat until Wally came around. In fact he's been asleep on my lap the whole time I've been working on this post! It's hard to feel completely miserable with a warm furball snuggling you.

Mira of course is too busy to bother with sitting on Mommy's lap for more than a few seconds at a time. She has one speed and that's "run." I've heard her starting to use a couple new words lately, like "fish," "doggie," "kitty," "shoes," and my personal favorites, "OOOOOooooooooooo!" and "Uh oh!" She can point to her belly button, feet, head, hair, ears, eyes, nose and mouth correctly. She eats using her fork or spoon most of the time now, except when she's really hungry and then she holds the utensil in one hand and puts the food in her mouth with the other hand. The other day I tried to sit her on the toilet before a bath, just to see what would happen, and she started crying so I guess we're not ready to try potty-training yet. She's also learned how to cross her arms, which is so funny, and what's also funny and I try really hard not to laugh at it is her temper tantrums. When she starts getting frustrated about something she lays herself down on the floor and, after making sure we're paying attention to her, she whines and kicks her feet. Sometimes her reaction is to raise her right hand and smack something as hard as she can - once it was the coffee table and after doing that she looked stunned, grabbed her right hand and said, "Ow!" When she's really really upset, upset enough for crying, she buries her face in her hands, throws herself dramatically face-down on the couch and sobs as loud as she can. I swear I have no idea where she learned how to do this. I don't think there was ever much doubt but now we know for certain we have a little diva on our hands.

I promised awhile ago to post a picture of my tattoo once it had healed - here's the final product!

I absolutely love how it came out. Obviously I have a short memory for pain because I'm already trying to decide what I'd like for my next tattoo.

These next several photos are going in an album entitled "Mira's Self-Portrait Gallery." I leave you with these works of art. :)