It's official.

I'm not sure when it happened, but Skylar is not a baby anymore. She kind of reminds me of a little teenager. She toddles all over the house bossing everyone around:

After almost stepping on a snake in my kitchen on sunday, I am terrified to live in my house. I now keep my feet up at all times. When I must walk around I make sure I am wearing protective footwear. I am always on the lookout.

I'm also having snake nightmares, especially the recurrent one from when I was five where I think a snake is at the foot of my bed and I have to turn on the light and look under the covers to check.

The whole experience was traumatic--from finding the snake, to watching my sister morph into a ninja and half-kill the snake, to me running out of the house with a writhing bloody snake on a snow shovel and throwing it in the street, to backing over it in my car to finish it off, to the bloody mess behind my oven where the murder occured--all very traumatic. The exterminator comes on thursday.

On a much happier note, most of Micah's guys are back from Iraq and his days as Rear-Detachment Commander are numbered. I went to a welcome home ceremony today to take pictures for my friend Jessica. Her daughter McKinley is a little older than Skylar and was a teeny little thing when her daddy left last year. It was awesome seeing all the families reunited, especially all the daddy's grabbing their babies--some of them were meeting for the first time. I think every civilian should go to a welcome home ceremony to fully appreciate the sacrifices these families make.

Jessica and McKinley waiting for Jonathan:

Together at last!