Bet you didn’t know a bebehblog week had EIGHT days in it. But I absolutely positively could not hold any kind of handmade giveaway without bringing you something from the lovely and talented Becca from Hugs & Kisses Designs. I have absolutely no idea how I wandered over to her corner of the internet but I stalk read her blog every day and love seeing her pretty face pop up in my Twitter. She has an adorable son named Cayden who is almost the same age as Little Evan so I think of them as growing up together…even thought they’ve never actually met. And neither have Becca and I. And there’s no plans for that to happen any time soon. Ahem.

But how can you not feel like BFF’s with someone who sends you this?

I literally made a "squeeee!!!" sound when I opened it

I once commented on Becca’s blog that this fabric she uses is my absolute favorite, because it matches my hummingbird tattoo. Obviously she READS her comments and has a fabulous memory, since when she said she was going to make me something special she went straight for this stuff!

She even used the fabric for the inside pockets, so I get to look at it every time I have to grab a diaper.

Because that’s what this is: a beautiful handmade diaper bag. At first I thought it was going to be a little small but after jamming a whole day’s worth of snacks, two sippies, my day planner, my keys, my wallet, three diapers, a wipes case, a toddler-size change of clothes AND my DSLR in there, I can assure you it is LARGE.

Adjustable strap? LOVE. It goes over the handle on my stroller or over my shoulder, or across my body when I'm hauling the baby around too.

But besides the brand new diaper bags available NOW from Hugs & Kisses, Becca also makes a ton of other beautiful fabric items from paci clips to clutches to wet bags. Personally though, these are my favorite:

Custom silhouettes of your kids?!?! AWESOME. (She also does pets!!)

Custom prints of your wedding date or your children’s birthdays?!!?!?! So cute as a gift or for yourself! And for the record, I take 100% of the credit for those wedding date prints. I asked her to make one for me for my friend Erin’s bridal shower and now they’re in the shop!

And because she rocks, Becca is offering one lucky reader a $25 credit to Hugs & Kisses Designs!

To enter, just visit Hugs & Kisses (either here on Etsy or here on Big Cartel – Becca is switching over to BC so she’s got stuff in both shops) and leave a comment telling me what item you like best!

Giveaway open until November 8th, winner will be chosen using Random.org and notified via email so make sure you use a real one when you comment.

You should also check her out on her blog and The Twitter, because she’s wonderful, her kid is cute and she’s adding new stuff to her shop all the time.

Disclaimer bit: Becca sent me the diaper bag free of charge to photograph and review, but also because she likes me. For the record though, I’ve purchased from her shop before and plan to again as soon as I can get Little Evan to sit still long enough to take a good profile shot. I NEED one of those silhouettes!!

THAT’S IT! ALL MY GIVEAWAYS ARE UP! You can enter as many of them as you want!

Day 1 is open until November 1st! Allora Handmade (Closing this one tonight!!)
Day 2 is open until November 2nd! Uff Da Designs
Day 3 is open until November 3rd! Taradara
Day 4 is open until November 4th! Peggy Ann Design
Day 5 is open until November 5th! aPearantly Sew
Day 6 is open until November 6th! Gussy
Day 7 is open until November 7th! A knit Phoebe Mouse…by ME!

Today I get to take the dog to the vet, something I’ve been seriously dreading because a) he is impossible to control in the presence of other dogs b) it always costs an arm and a leg and c) he has fleas. Now I HAVE to take him to the vet to get some of the real fancy flea medicine instead of the stuff they sell at the pet store and get a speech from the vet about how if I had been keeping up the regimen monthly the way you’re supposed to he wouldn’t have fleas at all. Thank you, yes, I know. I am sufficiently contrite over my lack of good pet care. Fleas are one of those things you forget the awfulness of when you haven’t had to deal with them in years and years. And then suddenly you notice the cat keeps scratching her neck and within hours you can feel them crawling ALL OVER YOUR BODY ALL THE TIME. BECAUSE THEY ARE.

And then you find a flea on the baby’s head and you are the worst mother in the whole world.

So I’m taking the uncontrollable dog to the vet to spend an arm and a leg and get the speech and buy buckets and buckets of Frontline or whatever it is that actually kills these damn creepy crawlies. The dog and the cat version. Then we’re all going to the aquarium for a few hours while we bug bomb the house, floor by floor. Because if we don’t do something soon the cat won’t be the only one scratching her skin off in an attempt to feel less itchy. EW.

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In less disgusting (but probably incredibly boring) news, we drove up to USA Baby yesterday to actually try out the Uppababy before buying it and…um…I don’t think I want it anymore. The rumble seat is not the magical solution to all our double-stroller issues. The whole reason I NEED a double is for Stroller Strides and/or sightseeing type trips to the zoo or aquarium or city and the rumble seat of the the Uppa only faces in. Not great for, you know, seeing stuff or keeping a toddler entertained during mommy’s workout. I think if I was buying a stroller for our first baby that had the ability to work for a 2nd (or 3rd) baby I would be totally sold but after actually putting my toddler in it and imagining how it would work with an infant I’m less in love. It’s more of a “single stroller that can accommodate more than one kid” stroller than a “works great for 2 under 2” stroller.

Plus, we got to try out the Baby Jogger City Select, one of the strollers from my original list but a brand no one I know seems to have any experience with. It’s…cool. Really cool. It works the way I had imagined the Uppa would – baby/toddler can sit in either seat, face all different directions, works with an infant up to a 45 lb kid – AND it can be a single stroller when you don’t need both seats. E loves it & is MUCH more excited about it than he was the Uppa. I was very impressed, despite not wanting to be impressed. I WANTED to love the Uppa and join the Kool Kids Who Have One Klub. I WANTED a pretty orange stroller. I WANTED to buy a stroller NOW, not spend another week thinking about it.

Also, even buying the Uppa from the (stupid) baby store on sale, it costs more than the Baby Jogger.

So the only thing keeping me from committing to the City Select RIGHT NOW is…it’s not orange. Tell me that’s the worst reason ever for making such a big decision.

Or how about this one: I don’t want to tell the baby store I’m not buying the Uppa they had brought over from the other store. Even though as of Sunday they STILL didn’t even have a rumble seat (hence driving somewhere else to try one). It’s that same feeling of dread I get when a salesperson in a clothing store helps me find stuff and then I have tell them I don’t want it after all. Shopping guilt. As if the inconvenience of helping me some how means I’m obligated to spend my money, even if they weren’t that helpful to being with.

Does that sound crazy or do you know what I’m talking about?

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I asked for advice this weekend on what sort of stuff you love/hate on blogs. If you have a second, can you offer me your suggestions?I’m getting all itchy to redesign stuff (or maybe it’s just the fleas) and don’t want to accidentally ruin a good thing.

And speaking of things you hate on blogs, they reset the Top Baby Blogs, which means I’m going to beg for votes for a few days. I’ve met a TON of other awesome bloggers through that list so staying in the top 20 40 50 100 gives me the chance to meet even more mamas. I appreciate it bunches and bunches!

TOTALLY INACCURATE

My neighborhood has a skunk problem.

Let me rephrase that.

My neighborhood, which is well within city limits, where I can look into at least four other houses’ windows from my own because they are so close, where emergency sirens and roaring trucks are far more common than bunnies and birdies, has been taken hostage by skunks.

The week we bought the house, back in the good old days BK (before kids) when I still took my poor long suffering dog Brutus for real walks several times a day instead of just shoving him out the door and glaring at him to hurry up and pee, we ran across a skunk wandering down the sidewalk at 7 am. I managed to drag Brutus, howling and whining, two blocks home before the poor, dazed skunk even realized what was going on. I breathlessly called animal control to report a TOTALLY CRAZY skunk sighting but apparently they don’t work at 7 am so I got the front desk of the police station. I described in great detail exactly where I saw the skunk, the intersection he was waddling towards and (sigh)what he looked like, as thoroughly and completely as I would have described a robbery suspect.

I bet those cops laughed about me for DAYS.

The skunks are everywhere. They’re digging in my trash cans making a mess. They’re standing in my driveway in the middle of the afternoon. They’re wandering around my yard in the evenings making Brutus go apeshit. They’re squashed flat in the middle of the road, making me gag and my eyes water.

I am sick and tired of these motherbleeping skunks in my motherbleeping town.

Tuesday afternoon the baby, the groceries and I were trapped in the car for 10 minutes while a clearly dazed and unwell skunk wandered through the garden, so when Brutus started pacing and whining around 8 o’clock I figured the beast was back and terrorizing our street. I slammed the door and yelled at the dog to sit down muttering about moving back to the country, where my landlord took care of lost skunks the old fashioned way – with a .22 and a shovel. (True story.)

When the dog woke me up with MORE whining at 4 am I spent 20 minutes debating whether it was worse to ignore him and clean up dog poop in the morning or let him out and deal with a dog-skunk death match and the smelly horrible after effects before dawn.

You can see how that might be a hard decision.

Eventually I felt enough dog-mommy guilt that I decided to let him out – after turning on every exterior light and peering out the back door suspiciously looking for skunky signs like…I don’t know. Wilted flowers. Droppings. A squirrel holding it’s nose. When poor Brutus was eventually released to the yard he barely made it off the porch before he started peeing. And peeing. And peeing. I started counting mississippis when he was STILL peeing after what felt like 10 minutes and I made it to 45 before he stopped to poop. And then he peed some more.

I am a terrible dog owner. I blame the skunks.

But what can we do? It’s not like I’m going to set traps – I couldn’t bring myself to use any kind that killed the skunk (especially since there are a dozen or so outdoor cats in my neighborhood) and an angry, trapped LIVE skunk sounds even worse than skunk eating my trash. Animal control doesn’t seem to care. They’ve been staging this attack since early spring and it just gets worse every year. Advice appreciated.

Brutus & Evan

Baby Evan really really really really loves our dog Brutus. Really. He likes dogs in general – “dog” was the second sign he ever learned (after “milk”) and “dohg!” is one of the only things he says clearly and consistently – but I suspect he loves HIS dog best. Actually, I don’t suspect. I know. I know he likes the dog more than he likes pretty much anything. Including me.

Does he say or sign “mama”? No. Never. But every morning when I get him out of the crib he says “dohg! dohg!” until we come downstairs and say good morning to Brutus.

Clearly the dog wins.

Loves.

Sadly, I don’t think the dog feels the same way.

I mean, obviously Brutus tolerates Baby Evan. He’s never snapped or barked or intentionally knocked him over. Letting someone use your tail as a rope so they can climb up onto YOUR chair and then jump up and down on your face is definitely a sign of like. But I’m pretty sure Brutus wishes we had never brought this creature home in the first place. I can’t bring myself to tell him about the second baby.

What did you just say about about a second baby?

I like to think if Baby Evan ever fell down a well, Brutus would come and tell us. Or that he would bravely defend us from burglars. Or come wake everyone up if there was a fire. Unfortunately, I doubt he could be bothered to get out of his chair. Because that is His Chair, just in case you were wondering.

Not that you’d want to sit in it anymore, what with the smell. And the hair. And the smell.

But Baby Evan doesn’t seem to mind.

The dog was created specially for children. He is the god of frolic. ~Henry Ward Beecher

I’m just kidding about the not-saving-us-from-disaster thing. Of course he would save the day. Otherwise there wouldn’t be anyone to feed him.

Most mornings, Baby Evan is awake before I am so after I get him from his room I let him play on the bath mat while I brush my teeth and rub yesterday’s mascara off my face so I can start my day looking less like something the cat dragged in (oh the irony of that expression in relation to my life). Tuesday morning I threw on some yoga pants and socks in preparation for a relaxing day at home before I scooped up my little monster and headed to the bathroom. Two seconds before I set him on the ground I noticed what I thought was some of the pink and gray yarn I had been winding and kicked it a little to clear a spot. As soon as my (thankfully sock-clad) toe touched the yarn, I realized it was not yarn at all but a DECAPITATED MOUSE CORPSE WITH IT’S ENTRAILS PULLED OUT AND SPREAD ALL OVER MY BATH MAT. Apparently, some poor little field mouse thought my house looked like a cozy place the spend these last few rainy days. Unfortunately for that mouse, my cats are excellent hunters.

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I need to interrupt myself right here to tell you a different story, a far more horrifying story in my opinion, to illustrate just how little chance that mouse had of surviving even one night in my house. I think I may have told this story before, although I mostly tell it when I’m drunk since it involves a lot of hand-flapping and shrieking, but I think you’ll get the picture in writing too.

After getting their first taste of blood hunting mice in the adorable but totally uninsulated cottage we rented our first year in Connecticut, Blushes and Rabbit are always on the lookout for opportunities to kill things. During my first month in the new house (E was stationed up in New Hampshire) I woke up one night to a weird chirping sound coming from chimney wall. I figured a bird had gotten stuck somehow and planned to investigate in the morning but totally forgot, the way you forget almost everything that happens in the middle of the night. The next night while I was sleeping, several things happened in quick succession. First I felt the cat jump up on the bed. Then I heard that weird chirping sound again. And THEN I felt disgusting, leathery wings beating against my face as the live bat my cat had somehow managed to catch tried desperately to escape. I had NO IDEA how it got inside, NO IDEA how my cat managed to catch it, and NO IDEA why she put it on my head. All I managed to do at that moment was cower under the covers and whimper, wondering if it was OK to call 911 for a bat attack. Eventually I took the whole comforter off the bed and – peeking out through a tiny hole – punched out a window screen. Then I used a broom to smack the bat until I stunned it enough to scoop it up with the dust pan and threw it out the window.  I slammed the window shut, ran out of the room and spent the rest of the night on the couch, trying to remember if bats traveled in packs or could lay eggs in your brain while you slept. I still have no idea how any of that happened, but I haven’t seen a bat  since so I’m hoping that one warned all his friends about the evil attack cats in residence.

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So I wasn’t really that shocked to find a dead mouse in my bathroom, although I can’t say it was the highlight of my day. I screamed and jumped and hid the baby’s face from the carnage until E picked it up with some tissue and threw it away. Once I got over the ew ew ew ew ewwwwwwww of having touched it with my foot I actually felt a little sorry for the poor mouse, since I know it’s death was neither fast nor painless. Rabbit, the eviler of the two cats, likes to chew off a mouse’s feet first, letting it try to hobble away before she kills it. And by kills it I mean “eats the head and leaves the rest as a little present, usually somewhere I will step on it barefoot”. So yes, I felt bad for the poor tortured mouse.

That is, until I found ANOTHER dead mouse on the bath mat this morning. Those little rodents are trying to invade my house. Get ’em kitties.