Justified.

So Brad goes through Netflix binges where he becomes completely obsessed with one show at a time.  Sometimes, I get roped in and enjoy our binge-watching, but mostly, I suffer through however many episodes there happen to be of one show until it's finally over, and I can breathe a sigh of relief.

One of these shows was Justified.

It just wasn't for me.

It was absolutely perfect for Brad.  So perfect, in fact, that somewhere between watching however many seasons it was and traveling to Texas for work, Brad decided he needed a cowboy hat so he could walk around the house, tip his hat, and say, "It's justified."

I'm not even kidding.

Up until this past weekend, Brad decided to keep his hat at work...probably because I laughed when he returned home from Texas with a Justified-looking hat.  But on Friday, he brought it home from the office and promptly made sure that UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES were the little ones to touch his hat.

And ever since then, they've both been dying to do just that.  

If he hadn't said anything to them, they probably wouldn't even have noticed he had a hat, but since it was forbidden, they were chomping at the bit.  (I'm taking this as a lesson learned, that's for sure!)

So tonight, as Brad was wearing the hat during our typical bedtime routine (well, typical, except for the fact that Brad was wearing a cowboy hat), the kids were attempting to reach the hat and Brad was enjoying their feeble attempts.

As I finished reading to Jack and Brad came in from reading to Hannah, he leaned over and teased Jack, "I let Hannah touch my hat!"

I gave him the "stop teasing" look and as Brad allowed Jack to ever-so-carefully touch the hat, I made my way to Hannah's room. 

Hannah, grinning from ear to ear, eyes glowing, whispered to me, "Daddy let me touch his hat," as I snuggled down next to her and she giggled away.

I know exactly what Brad was thinking.  The look on their faces and the happiness Jack and Hannah got from one little touch, made it all worth it.

I'm sure he'd say, "It's justified".

10, yes. 15, no.

This boy - I love him so very much.  I can't believe he's already eight, and every time he snuggles with me, I soak it up as much as possible because I worry that one day, he won't.

Having a sister (and no brothers), I never quite know what to expect from my ever-growing son.  We are very close, but I try hard not to baby him or smother him.  He seems to be at the age now where he's easily embarrassed.  He likes to pre-approve his pictures for my social media...  At the same time, I don't want the fact that he'll always be my first-born baby to slip away.  I don't want our closeness to disappear over time.

The other night, he came up from watching a show to snuggle me.  So as we snuggled, I asked him, "Will you still snuggle me when you're 10?"

"Yes."

"What about when you're 15?"

"No." 

So there we go.  I have at least two, but no more than six years left to snuggle him.

Good to know.

our newest addition

Don't get too excited.  This is not a post about babies...at least, not of the tiny human variety :)

Our newest addition came in the way of a teeny, tiny turtle.

Halfway through our very snowy, very chilly winter, Hannah decided that she'd like another baby turtle.  Mid-winter is not a very good time to get a new turtle, for a couple of reasons.  One, we already had a turtle in her tank that she'd raised since it was a quarter-sized baby, and bigger turtles and tiny turtles can't go together in one tank.  Two, you can't release a turtle to a new home in the middle of winter.  So we told Hannah Bear she'd have to be patient, and that once it got warm outside, we'd be able to give her turtle a new home, and only then, we could get a new baby turtle.

Hannah remembered this conversation very well, and as soon as she could wear short sleeves to school, she'd ask about getting a new turtle.  We'd explain that we needed to let the ponds warm up a bit, and she'd wait another week or two before she asked again.  Until it got to the point where she started to ask every day, and then Brad gave in and finally ordered a new baby turtle.  Just like that.
One Monday night after dinner, he called a turtle guy, and before we knew it we were expecting a special delivery the following morning.  Hannah was beyond thrilled.

This morning, we got up, had breakfast, and got ready.  As we were getting ready to go for a bike ride, I got a text from Brad:

As you can see, Hannah wasn't the only one excited about the new turtle.

We came inside and opened the package, and there he was:

(Hannah looks scared in this picture, but I can assure you, she wasn't!)

We named our new friend Key Lime, but Hannah mostly refers to him/her as Mr. Turtle, which is just as cute.  She checks on Mr. Turtle every so often, just to be sure he's okay...the way I used to check on Hannah when she was just a tiny baby.  It's adorable.

Mr. Turtle is here to stay...at least until Hannah decides she'd like to release him to a happy pond and start all over again.