Tattoo time!

i'm not a personal fan of tattoos, myself. at 16 i attempted to give myself a tattoo of a flower (the only thing i was fairly confident i could "draw," lol!) on my right thigh and i still have the nasty thing to remind me how dumb i was (the joys of thinking you know it all at 16!).

so, when Trev said, "Let's get superhero tattoos for Luke," a part (the overly mature, overly responsible, overly boring part, haha) of me wanted to say, "heck no! what kind of message are we sending..." and then the other, more cool and easy-going part of me that felt like saying, "Super cool, let's do it!" jumped up and said, "Cool! Which Superhero should we get him?" without hesitation! Lol, this is so typical me! The constant bickering that goes on inside my head!

and much like every decision that is made amongst us, i lobbied to get only 1-2 tattoos... and Trev lobbied to get 4 (the max that Luke had credit for at the arcade)... and so, of course, true to fashion, we walk out with 4!

in all honesty, i don't know who was more excited to get home and stick these puppies on; Luke, Trev or myself! I'm fairly certain that Luke was the least excited of the three, lol!

I put the first tattoo of Spiderman (his favorite!) on his left arm

then ran to get the camera to document Trev putting on #2, Ironman (a close second favorite!)

and tada! two awesome Superheroes (three, if you count Luke ;)

and don't let the face fool you, Luke doesn't look too impressed but he loved going to bed with his new little friends on his arms! i asked him for a hug good night and he said, "I can't, I got these tattoos!" in his sweet little singsong voice ♥

and of course, little Yogies there in the background.. got a hold of the wipes ;)

i could vomit

a normal symptom after i've detained.

no matter how much i love my job, removing children from their parents custody will never get any easier :( the actual process and act of telling the parents that the child(ren) are being detained, however, has gotten a lot easier (thank God!). i've finally accepted that with each detention (for the most part, let's not talk about those political, i-don't-agree-with-my-supervisor-and-or-upper-adminstration, decisions - luckily that hasn't happened here in this office (YET!)) there's a clear child safety concern that validates what i'm doing, so an understanding of that, in itself, it what has helped to ease the process of me explaining this part to parents. not like i'm unsympathetic, of course, i could cry right along with the parents (which is odd, child abuse is disgusting to me yet i never seem to get angry with the parent(s), i just feel really bad for them when they plead for a different outcome - maybe this will change in time, too, hmmmm).

physically and emotionally removing the children... nope, that still hurts... a TON!

even worse... having to separate the children and place in different foster homes. talk about vomit!

i'm thinking the Department would do good if they had a therapist on staff, available for immediate debrief upon every detention. i think this might help. until then, i'll continue to question my career choice after every detention :(

and still, no matter how much abuse these children take, most of the children always, ALWAYS plead for their parents... and here my kid can go an entire day, morning to night, without seeing me around and not even ASK for me! ha - not the same, i know, but ouch, that hurts. especially on a night like tonight ;)

it's been awhile...

i've conscientiously been making an effort to put the phone down (limited fb'ing and blogging) to spend more time with my family and i have to say... i'm a happier person :) Logan's growing so fast that i just wanted to take and enjoy this time with my family, with our two growing boys, and hold on to it. i get too caught up in documenting every.single.moment that i felt i was missing out on just being present.

i was going to share photos of Logan in this post but came across these two first ♥

this is Luke on our way to the elevator. we live in a condo complex and it's always a race to the elevator. i love how playful he is... all the time! he definitely keeps us on our toes! i just love this little boy SO, SO much!

i'll be back in the next couple days for a Logan update :)

Life is busy...

And I love it! I've been spending a lot of time with my family, going on walks, a trip to the Science Museum (if I can only get around to those photos!), going out for breakfast, making the decision to lose weight and get healthy (yay!), planning a trip to Vegas, booking my first wedding, sewing superhero capes, shooting a maternity session... The list goes on.

I'm up at 4:30 a.m. pumping, building my supply of liquid gold so we don't have to put Logan on formula while we're away in Vegas for three days next month. Did I mention how excited we are?! Of course there's the usual guilt that follows any time away from the kiddies.. I'm trying not to give in to it. Regardless of how hard that is! This will be the first time away together for any period of time since Luke was born. It feels nice, Logan will be 6 months and I just feel ready. Maybe being consistently busy these past few months has made this trip more of a necessity than a luxury.

I'll be back later to update on the kiddies. Logan is already 4.5 months!! How did that happen so fast?! And Luke is just that sweetest big brother!

eta: back from my "formal" workout that included weight lifting.... omygosh, my body feels detached from my head, i look like a t-rex, sitting here typing with my arms against my side for support because i can barely lift them! it feels GREAT! i feel exhausted, but GREAT! now to boil my water for some yummy lemon water to replace my morning decaf coffee... YUM ::insert sarcasm::!

and adding a photo that i don't think i've shared, i just love, love, LOVE!

This is EXACTLY how I feel right now...

side note, my "pink" baby boy really is this pasty-looking ;) just to document a funny story (though Trev, to this day, says it was a fluke thing, but he's just in denial, haha!), the four of us were sitting at the dinner table a couple weeks ago, Logan, of course wasn't sitting, he was strapped in his bouncy seat (his usual place at the foot-of-the-table while we eat) when out-of-the-blue, Luke looks down at his forearm and says, "I'm brown..." looks at me and says, "Mommy's brown..." then looks at Trev and Logan and says, "Daddy and Yogan are pink." Just like that. Matter of fact, a 2.5 year old's first observation of skin color. Lol. It was the funniest thing EVER... Unless, of course, you were one of the "pink" ones... who promptly replied, "Luke, Daddy's not pink!" Lol! I just LOVE some of the things that come out of Luke's mouth these days! So much so that I recently purchased this book :) At the end of the night I asked Luke, "Luke, what color is mommy?" "He studies my skin for a few seconds then replies, "brown." "And what color is Luke?" "Brown." "And Daddy?" "Pink." My kid is a genius! Lol.