S P L A T!

Yuck! What are they doing? Here's Mike and I ringing in the New Year! We spent New Year's Eve with Annie, Jim, Dana, Renae and Brandi. We went to Dana & Renae's traditional spot, Salty's, and waited for the countdown. Rooney was safely being watched by Natalie and Megan. Turns out he rang in the new year himself. Wide awake at midnight he got to watch the countdown with his cousins. To see the rest of the New Year's Photos click here.

New Year's Eve was a nice distraction from everything going on. Our house is still set to close on Jan. 18th. Mike and I have been running around providing all the additional documents they always need and signing papers. It's amazing how you can forget how to sign your name mid-way through a signing session. We are still in the process of removing our fallen tree and Rooney and I are just starting to get back into our groove w/our mom groups. My car is still not fully restored but I did get a new window installed and Sirius sent me a new receiver (free of charge). I'm still waiting for Car Toys to get the console replacement piece so my new stereo can be installed. It's a very quiet ride in my car now and I hate it. I've been driving Mike's car alot lately.

But there cannot always be good news...yesterday a terrifying thing happened. Mike, Rooney and I went to Target to reestablish supplies. Rooney was getting a little fussy and wanted out of the cart. I figured we were almost done, so if he held my hand, he can walk around with us. Of course that ended up not being good enough (you give these kids an inch) and Rooney wanted to start running all over so I had Mike put him on his shoulders. Rooney really seems to like this and everything was going smooth...until Rooney was able to grab a wine bottle off an upper shelf. Of course the wine bottle was too heavy for him so he dropped it. I'm watching this whole thing unfold and I gasp, but then Mike catches it and for a second I'm relieved and Mike is really proud that he caught the bottle but then...

my eyes grow really wide and I remember hearing myself say "Oh my god!"...

when I see Rooney fall off Mike's shoulders...

and SPLAT right on the ground!

I think that second, that Rooney was laying on the ground, must have been the most terrorizing second of my life...so far (I know there will be more). He cried when we swooped him up, but thankfully, he was wearing his hat and his jacket, and I think when he fell the jacket hood helped cushion his head and he just got the wind knocked out of him. He did a low cry for a little while but finally settled down and seemed fine by the time we got to the store. We've been keeping an eye on him and we haven't observed any odd behavior.

Poor Mike. He feels so awful. He feels like he's a bad dad because Rooney slipped off his shoulders. The whole incident happened so fast and natural reaction was to catch the bottle. I tried to reassure him but he still feels awful. I think they'll both be OK though.

One day, in the far off future, we'll be able to laugh about this and talk about when Rooney was dropped on his head, but for now, with everyone, I think it's a pretty sensitive subject (literally).