Our new additions

We have two new additions to our family. Please welcome our new mice, Buffy and Phoenix. Buffy is the white one, Phoenix is the brown one.
After our guinea pig passed away due to the recent heat wave, we spent some time figuring out what to get as a pet. I have always had pets and I feel a little lonely without an animal (yes, I know I have a husband and two children), so John's suggestion to be without a pet for a while didn't settle well with me. Plus, I think it's good for the boys to learn how to handle animals early on.
We decided that we should probably wait on guinea pigs until we have a house and are able to provide them with a larger place to roam than an old fishtank. I had a dwarf hamster as a child, so I thought we could go the hamster/gerbil route. We did discuss a cat (which I've been wanting ever since Aiden was a baby), but John wants to wait a little while longer.

Saturday, we took a trip over to Petco to browse the little animals. Their selection of hamsters and gerbils was surprisingly poor and John wandered over to the hoards of mice they had. We watched them for a while and I had to agree that they were awfully cute, even though they had tails (I have a small thing against hairless tails). So, we picked out two females and brought them home, saving them from becoming snake food (essentially what they're sold for and probably why they cost only $2). We had fun picking out a little wheel and a house for their cage. They adore the wheel and must run about two miles a day on the thing. They will occasionally sit on top of their house and squeak loudly, proclaiming their dominance over the plastic igloo. The boys love watching them, as they are much more active than the poor guinea pig.

I still shake my head at the fact that John was able to convince me to get mice. He used to work in research and would inject mice on a regular basis, so he is used to handling them. Once we brought Buffy and Phoenix home, he said he was surprised how much he missed playing with mice. I have held Buffy once and didn't flip out over her tail touching me, so I guess I can take this new adventure of mice ownership as a chance to get over my fear of hairless tails.

To end, tomorrow is Aiden's first day of preschool and I have a small stack of enrollment paperwork to finish before then. We will definitely take some photos of his first day and share them with you. I will stay behind the camera, so that there is no evidence of me crying as I send my baby off to school.