So, the phone app is helping a bit, in terms of allowing me to make short, on-the-spot posts, but I still find myself falling behind in sitting down and writing a full-on blog post.  At least we are moving in the right direction, though, right?  A little bit every now and again is better than nothing at all?  Maybe?  Yes?

News:

* My Hatchie is a sweet and loving and very tiny baby.  Ok, that's not news, but he just turned nine months old and, I kid you not, barely a day passes that we don't thank God for such a good little kid.  He is magic, just like his dad.  At nine months he:

1.) Still has two teeth.
2.) Can move around really well.  Pulling up, standing for a second or two on his own, crawling and climbing and moving, moving, moving.
3.) Loves to dance.
4.) Is a really good eater (important to note since we have failed miserably at actually sitting him down to feed him meals.  Up until this week, he has been almost exclusively breast-fed.  Embarassing, but true.)
5.) Is scrappy.  And I mean SCRAPPY.  He would eat my face off if I let him.  Two teeth or twelve, that kid can bite. 

He was baptized two weekends ago, and we failed any pictures.  Ugh.  However, everything turned out really well, my new brother-in-law nailed an incredible selection of smoked meats and we had some delicious (and theme-coordinating) cake balls, thanks to Spheres.  Check them out:












And because there is always a phone handy...or a helpful aunt to snap a quick family photo, we do have at least a couple pieces of proof that our William Hatcher Phillip Walden is now part of the Catholic Church:

*Leo-Monster had his two-year check up, which I anticipated going truly horribly.  If you know Leo, you know why.  As loving and affectionate as he is, he is...um...he's intense.  Which is exactly the warning I gave to the poor nurse administering his four shots that day.  To our surprise, Leo cringed for the first one, yelled "OW!" for the second, and ate fruit snacks for the others.  Not a single tear, and nobody got hurt.  Giant, giant relief.  And speaking of giant, Leo's estimated adult height is 6 ft, 2.8 inches.  Ok, maybe not giant, per se, but when his maternal grandfather is a mere 5' 3.5", anything close to six feet is tall.  OVER six feet is unheard of.  Check Leo out in the Dr.'s office, playing his favorite game of "Don't Give Me Your Mean Eyes":

You're just playing with your mean eyes, right?

Look me in the eye.  I am so cute.  I need to see that you are just playing with me. 

See?  I'm goofy AND cute.  And I am starting to get nervous.

Ha-ha!  Goofy face.  You cannot resist my goofy face.  I will make you stop the mean eyes.

Fine.  Keep your mean eyes.  But I will give you my mean eyes, too.

Haha! Tricked you again!  I am goofy and so funny and you cannot keep from laughing at my funny face.  Try it. 

But this game is old and I just want to sit here. 

*And Patrick.  My Patrick.  The older he gets, the more he enjoys not being in the spot-light...sort of.  He is very concerned with things being "special" for him (we have yet to figure out what he means, but when we hand he and Leo identical string cheeses and he asks if his is the "special one," we naturally say yes.  Who wouldn't?).  He wants everything to be fair and equally divided between he and Leo.  If we give Leo a compliment, we must immediately give Patrick one, too, for fear that his feelings will get hurt (and he'll tell you.)  Patrick is special; I tell him every day.  He's such a good kid.  Sigh. 

* Adam and I are in a place that feels new.  Familiar, but new.  Finally, I feel like I'm living my life again instead of working toward something else.  Adam is gone a lot, which means I'm left single-parenting more often than not, but it's not so bad.  He and I are in such a good spot right now that I don't even mind having to relay things a bit.  When he's coming, I'm usually going, but we manage to squeeze in at least a little quality time, and we really are happy.  Enamoured with each other again, which isn't to say that we ever weren't...we were just a little pre-occupied for a while.  How I lucked out with someone like Adam, I don't know.  (Well, I do.  God and I made a deal almost exactly seven years ago.  Maybe I will tell you about it one day.)  Anyway, Adam is a great life-partner.  He's a good man, and we're all lucky to have him.  Still, I feel a little unsettled.  I can sort of put my finger on it and sort of not.  I find myself stressed out, sleep-walking again, and just a little "off."  (Which you may have noticed if you have any intuition.)  I'm working through it, and feel at least a little lucky that I'm aware of my "off" nature.  If I could just fix it, but how?  I need to find my zen again.   It's in here; I just need to dust it off. After all, who wants a dusty zen? And who could be unsettled when this is your life? Right?

After all: