Church Dresses and Reptiles

This morning was one of "those" mornings where I was fed up by 8am.  The biggest issue (I think) is that the kids are rather manic the first bit when Todd is away.  He left for an overnight camping/rock climbing adventure with a friend.  I wish I could have gone, but with the belly being as big as it is, I doubt I'd be able to fit into a harness, let alone climb up a rock face!  So the kids and I decided to part ways and stick around the house for the weekend.  Thus, a morning where the kids were "just checking" to make sure Mommy could "handle" things on her own.  Thanks guys, always appreciate the votes of confidence :)  

So when the morning finally started to look up (as in, no one was trying to see how far they could dribble and drool their yogurt in the direction of their belly button) I got everyone dressed and headed out the back door so that I could tackle breakfast.  Harper is currently in between all her pants/shorts and t-shirts, so her only option at the moment is to wear dresses.  Many of them are too short, but she's got those pudgy little legs and bloomer-type covers, so I'm fine with it.  The problem lies in Em.  She doesn't think it's fair that Harper gets to wear "church clothes" and she isn't allowed to.  Thus, the girls got dresses and Cooper declared that he couldn't be their prince in a t-shirt.  I wish I was making this up, but who could possibly think of that kind of logic that early in the morning?!?  Fine.  Harper in a dress.  Em in a dress. Cooper in a polo and all to play in the muddy backyard.  Wonderful.  It was the squeals of delight from all three kids that brought me away from the yogurt-paste I'd been scrapping away at.  Normally, they don't go all-in, all at once, over anything so this was cause for investigation.  Upon arrival outside, it turned out that the kids had found a number of interesting bugs and what-not and were thrilled by their discovery.  I started to engage the conversation by asking questions when I saw something odd on Em's shoulder blade.  I popped into the house, grabbed the camera, and went back out.  Em was more than willing to have her picture taken, especially in her "church dress on a Saturday."

 Note, no signs of fear, worry or concern on her face... just her goofy I'm-posing-for-a-school-picture face she gets these days whenever a camera appears.  Also note the reptile on her arm which had moved from her shoulder blade onto her shoulder, and then down towards her elbow at a leisurely pace.

 I turned her arm to get one of the lizard I'd seen earlier and less than one second after this picture was taken (and Em looked at her arm), she FLIPPED OUT screaming like only a four-year-old-girl who has been startled by a reptile can.  The commotion caused the placid lizard, who had been perfectly content throughout this whole time (at least 5 minutes) to go racing around Em's neck and down her leg.

 It settled on her shoe just long enough for me to get Em to calm down and realize she wasn't going to die, which then brought another round of shouts and screams about how "mean" I was for not telling Em sooner, at which point I lost it laughing.  Nothing gets by this girl... except, apparently, a lizard on her arm  :D

Then Cooper pitched a minor fit because he hadn't been in any picture and he was in his "prince" shirt.  The three of them decided to make a train on the slide so Mommy could get pictures of them all together.  I think this means that we (officially) force them into too many family pictures when they know how to set up the shot all on their own.  That said, they were so cute and the pictures were adorable, so I'm not about ready to complain!