In Which I Discover The Best Game Ever

So today after school and Eden's physical therapy, I drove the kids to the mall to take pictures with Santa.  They have an amazing Santa at our local mall, and this was Eden's first time to take pictures with any Santa, since the only one we saw in Thailand last year was terrifying.  No, seriously-- he was a twenty-something year old Thai man with white pancake makeup on all over his face and the backs of his hands, with a fake beard that was pulled halfway down his chin and an outfit that was obviously stuffed with toilet paper.  He looked like Insane Clown Serial Killer Santa.  Good times.

Anyway, the Santa at the mall isn't like that at all, and he apparently is such a nice, relaxing Santa that he puts Connor to sleep.  The little guy started drifting off about halfway through the photos.  When he wasn't nodding off, Connor was staring fixedly at the giant blue-lit snowflakes on one side of the set.  He paid zero attention to the photographer this year.  But the pictures still turned out pretty cute, and I'm glad we went.  In the evenings it's not crowded at all, and the photographer probably took thirty photos of the kids.

So other than Eden using her "super cheese" photo smile and Connor trying to nod off, the kids were pretty well behaved.  That ended the second we hit the parking lot.

Connor immediately started making that yelling, set-your-teeth-on-edge noise where he manages to hit two dissonant notes at once.  Eden, on a sugar-high from the complimentary candy canes and overexcited from her first successful Santa encounter, began yelling "jingle bell" over and over in an offkey, sing-song voice.  Don't ask me.  She stopped this only long enough to ask me what would happen if she cracked her head open in the parking lot and to tell me that when I peered at the pictures through the translucent bag I "look really old, like old lady."

I tried turning on the radio in the car to calm them both down, but unfortunately it was turned to Christmas music and the song that came on was "Jingle Bell Rock," which instantly encouraged them both. So my car sounded something like this:

Radio: Jingle bell, jingle bell, jingle bell rock
Eden: JINGLEBELLJINGLEBELLJINGLEBELLJINGLEBELL
Connor: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
Radio: Jingle bells swing and Jingle bells ring
Eden: JINGLEBELLJINGLEBELLKITTYCATJINGLEBELL
Connor: aaaAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaAAAAAAAAAAA
Me: ....(beating my head against the steering wheel)

This is when I discovered a secret weapon.

See, it turns out that apparently in Thai Orphanages they don't play The Quiet Game.  So my daughter has yet to learn that this is not, in fact, a legitimate game and is instead a sneaky way to get peace and quiet for five minutes.  In addition, Eden has a serious competitive streak.  So when I suggested we play an exciting new game in which the first person to talk loses, she not only stopped jingle belling for the remainder of the car ride, but all the way through dinner preparation and halfway through the meal-- a good solid forty minutes of blissful silence.  And much to my surprise, Connor actually played along too-- he stopped yelling the second I said "Go" and didn't start up again until we arrived home and he got mad about how cold it was outside.

So I have apparently discovered the best parenting tool ever.  I just have to remember to use it sparingly so that the novelty doesn't wear off!

~Jess

In Which We Chill Out And Connor Plays At Gumby

Photo taken by the talented Emerald England.

It's blissfully cool in our house, because we have air conditioning! 

The gentleman who installed it arrived this morning and was finished in about three and a half hours.  It's very quiet-- I can't tell when it's on unless I go stand over one of our floor vents, where it becomes very obvious.  I'm so glad that we don't have to worry any more about what the temperature is outside, because Connor will be comfortable and safe in our house.  I'm really, really not going to miss those twelve hour days in the mall.

Connor had physical therapy today, which went well.  His hamstring, torso and neck flexibility is slowly improving as I've started stretching him out two or three times a day.  He's still not really thrilled with the stretching (except for the torso rotations-- he seems to like those) but he's tolerating it a lot better as he gets used to the regime. 

The next step will be to order him some leg extension splints.  Basically these are wraps that will fit him from thigh to ankle; they have rods that will run down the sides of his legs to keep his knees from bending.  They help with stretching him out, and he'll also eventually be wearing them to bed.  I don't think he'll be terribly thrilled with that development, but it should really help with keeping his joints loose and mobile so he'll be wearing them anyway.  It'll be a while though, because we still have to order them.

Em stopped by shortly after Connor and I arrived home from PT to pick Mary up; they were headed up north so Mary could shoot some portraits for Em and her family as part of their photo exchange.  While she was here, she dropped off the rest of the gorgeous images she took of Mary, Connor and me, and they're all so good I can't figure out which ones I like best!  I'll probably post some of them over the next few days-- like this ridiculously cute shot of Connor in his fedora. 

He's totally wearing that hat on the first day of school, and if I can find him a pinstriped suit he'll be in that as well.  You only get to do the first day of elementary school once, and Connor's going to do it in style!

~Jess

In Which There Is A Photo And Sisters Are Awesome

Here's one of the great shots of me and my gorgeous sister Mary that Emerald England took at our photo shoot yesterday.  Mary and I are demonstrating our ability to have the Exact Same Facial Expression, because it's so difficult to tell that we are sisters.  No one would ever guess. 

Yay for sisters!  Yay for photography!

~Jess

In Which We Pose For Portraits

Connor, Mary and I got up bright and early this morning to head up the road aways for a photo shoot!  My sister is a talented professional photographer, and she'd made plans for a photography swap with Emerald England, another wonderful photographer who works in the local area.   Mary wanted Connor and I to come along for some sister and nephew shots, because she is awesome like that. 

Connor was not thrilled with this whole idea.  No one consulted Connor on whether or not he wanted to get up at early-o'-clock and take pictures, even if they were in a garden with gravel roads, which he considers far superior to any other type of road when it comes to entertainment value.  In Connor's opinion, he would have been perfectly fine if we'd taken off without him and let him sleep in. 

But Connor is not in charge around here, which is probably a good thing.  I don't have anywhere in the house to keep grizzly bears, sixty foot tall Christmas trees or the entire tulle aisle of the fabric store, which are all things he demands on a regular basis. 

Anyway, he was a good sport, though towards the end of the shoot he kept trying to fall asleep on us.  Em got some fantastic shots, despite having to work with the fact that my sister and I have the exact same facial expressions and also that Connor was there under protest and as a result Was Never Smiling Ever Ever Again.  He also felt looking in the general direction of the camera was a horrible idea and refused to do it on principle. 

Em did an amazing job with Connor; she didn't talk down to him, put him at ease quickly and he seemed very comfortable with her even if he wasn't excited about being there.  She even knew some sign language, which I think helped tremendously.  The shots that I've seen so far are stunning (if I get permission I'll post one or two here or put up a link to where you can find them), and I can't wait to see the rest.  I wish Jeremy had been able to come too; once Ellen comes home we'll have to get some new family portraits done!

After the photo shoot we drove straight over to the hospital, where Connor had his feet measured for his new ankle-foot orthotics.  Today they just measured his feet to make the custom foot boards for the AFOs, and in mid-September they'll be making the plaster casts of his feet.  Connor managed to try and fall asleep during this appointment too despite having someone messing with his bare feet, which is usually throws him into hypervigilance in anticipation of possible tickling. 

Connor was bound and determined to get a nap in, dang it.  He fell asleep again in the car, and one last time within five minutes of us getting home.  He ended up taking an almost four-hour nap, which is pretty impressive for a child who considers sleep to be more of a hobby than a necessity.  He really needs to get used to getting up early again though, because he starts school up in just a couple of weeks.  Hopefully he'll adjust quickly and we're able to get him back on an early routine before then, or he's going to have a long, long year.

Of course I also got to take a four-hour long nap, so I didn't really mind all that much.

We rounded out the day by watching a terrible movie (Mary and I have an ongoing competition to see who can find the worst B movie in existence) and then spent the late afternoon and early evening scouting out photography locations for the shoot Mary will be doing for Em and her family. 

All in all it was a pretty fantastic day!

~Jess

In Which Connor Meets Santa

Connor made Santa Claus cry today.

The little guy woke up feeling pretty chipper and with zero fever, much to my relief.  So we decided that if the morning went well we'd take him down to the South Hill mall to see the giant Christmas trees and to get his picture taken with the Big Man In The Red Suit.

Yes, I know it's not even past Thanksgiving yet, so it's awfully early to be taking Christmas photos and whatnot.  But we have a reason for doing it this way; no one is at the mall taking pictures with Santa on the day before Thanksgiving.  That way we miss the crazy holiday crowds which are overwhelming for me and Jeremy, let alone Connor with his sensory issues.  Plus we don't have to wait in a huge line, and we can spend a bit more time making the little guy comfortable with the idea of sitting in some stranger's lap while another stranger snaps pictures of him. 

The plan worked out perfectly.  We dressed the little guy up in his nice Christmas outfit, parked him in front of the giant tree for a while and he stared at it in utter fascination before declaring, just like last year, that he wanted one for his very own.  We took a couple of pictures in front of the tree; isn't he cute in his Christmas outfit?  Then we headed across the practically deserted mall to visit Santa Claus. 

When we got there only one family was ahead of us.  It ended up working out perfectly because Connor got to see those kids get their picture taken and we could talk him through what was happening so he knew what to expect.  Then it was Connor's turn. 

He behaved just beautifully; he snuggled right into Santa's arm and turned on the charm.  The guy playing Santa was fantastic, and the photographer kept snapping away until he was sure he'd gotten at least one or two really good ones.  By the time we were finished, a line of waiting children was forming, but Santa stopped me anyway as we were leaving to tell me how touched he was by Connor and what an amazing kid he is, and that's when Mr. Claus teared up a bit.  We didn't tell Santa anything about the little guy's story, but I guess we didn't have to because Connor's such a sweet-natured kid anyone can see how special he is. 

So yep, Connor made Santa cry.  He tends to have that effect on people.

The photographer got a couple of great shots-- one of Connor and Santa reading a story together, and even one of those rare, glorious shots of Connor smiling!  I don't have digital copies of the photos, but trust me when I say that they're absolutely adorable.  While Jer and I picked out which pictures we wanted to buy, Santa and the photographer took a little break and spoke with the assistant handling the picture sales.  Then when we went to the counter with our selections, we were told that our pictures were free of charge, which is when I teared up a little too. 

So I know it's a little early, but today we discovered the spirit of Christmas is alive and well. 

Thanks, Santa.

~Jess

In Which I'm Home And Chocolate Mustaches Abound

I'm back home!

After a leisurely breakfast, I spent the first half of the day driving back up to Puyallup.  It was a pleasant trip; the company was lovely, traffic was light and the weather cooperated, making for a pretty easy ride.  Connor gave me a huge smile and one of his rare hugs when I got home; he seemed excited to see me back, which doesn't happen very often!  Usually the little guy is so excited about his Daddy Time that he doesn't seem to even notice my absence.  At any rate, he apparently had a quiet (and thankfully seizure-free) weekend, which was probably just what he needed after last week's seizure excitement.

I did find out late last night that one of my teammates who took a bad fall at yesterday's bout broke her ankle and will need surgery, which was some rough news.  Hopefully she'll have a quick recovery and be back on her skates soon; it's so hard to see one of my ladies hurt and in roller derby it happens more often than I'd like.

My sister posted up her lovely pictures from her trip to Seattle on her photography website.  You can check them out here.  Connor looks extremely dapper sporting a chocolate mustache.  I look rather disturbingly like my father.

I miss Mary already.  Sister, come back soon!

~Jess

In Which I Do A Whole Lot Of Stuff

Today was a very busy day!

I spent the morning running errands, and doing a bit of shopping.  Connor has been growing really rapidly; he's in 5T clothes now, which means we're just one size away from moving over to shop in the boys section instead of the baby/toddler section.  I find this mildly terrifying.  Anyway, he'd outgrown (or pulled completely out of shape, as he just loves to pull on long sleeves) pretty much all of his heavier winter shirts and sweaters, so I picked up a couple for him at the mall.  I also picked up a new pair of flats for me, because I've worn my old pair into the ground.  I'm kind of hard on shoes; basically I wear them until they have huge gaping holes in them and they fall apart.  Huge gaping holes in shoes aren't very pleasant in the rainy season here. 

Then I stopped by the photo center to pick up the large pictures of Ellen I'd had them print.  We wanted to send her some more recent family pictures of us, and thought it would be neat to hold a photo of her in some of them so she knows she's part of the family.  Of course, what would be really crazy is if we then received a photo of her holding the photo of us holding her photo.  Whoa.

So then this afternoon it was off to the park, where Connor absolutely refused to cooperate as far as having his picture taken.  Mostly he wanted to look at the ground, and while the top of his head is as adorable as the rest of him, it's not really the focus we were going for.  Eventually he perked up a little bit, so hopefully there's a good shot or two in there.  We'll just have to see!

So we came home after that and I made some fruit salad, hopped in the car and was off to a potluck party with my roller derby team.  It's always great hanging out with the gals, and also I got to eat a whole lot of yummy things that somebody else fixed, so I thoroughly enjoyed myself. 

To finish out the evening, after the party I stopped by the house, grabbed my skates and was off to Derby Appreciation Night at one of the local rinks.  I spent the next hour and a half or so skating around and chatting with some more lovely ladies both from my roller derby league and from others in the area.  It was a great way to end the evening.  I'm pretty sure I'll sleep well tonight!

~Jess

In Which Connor Smiles For The Camera

Today was school picture day for Connor, and it sounds like he actually might have smiled this year!  Usually Connor's school pictures are Very Serious, because taking pictures is apparently a Very Serious Business.  So we'll just have to wait a few weeks and see what we get!

Connor had one seizure today in the school parking lot right before I dropped him off in the morning, but the rest of the day went really well.  He did spend a good portion of the day feeling around in his mouth; he's got two loose teeth on the bottom right now and I think his back molars are starting to come in; he keeps shoving his fingers back there and feeling around, and he's drooling like crazy right now.  Poor little guy; cutting teeth is no fun! 

The steampunk roller derby costume is moving right along; I finished off both my bloomers and my bustle today, and I'm pretty darn proud of them both!  Of course I didn't think to factor in all the fabric when I sent in my measurements for my corset, and now it's a bit too small.  Oh well-- I'll manage.  If nothing else, I'm sure I could find a new one when I'm at the convention!

So I was looking back on the my older entries, and I discovered that I actually strapped on my first pair of roller derby skates exactly a year ago yesterday.  Crazy, huh?  I look back at that picture of me in my gear for the first time and it drives me absolutely nuts because I have my knee pads on the wrong knees, so the Velcro was probably catching every time I touch my knees together.  Oh well.

I'm glad I'm still having so much fun with skating, and I haven't managed to seriously mangle myself or anything.  I can't believe it's been a whole year!

~Jess

In Which Connor Makes A Comeback

So I've been growing my hair out for a while now, and it's gotten pretty long-- a few inches past shoulder length, which is the longest I've had it since high school and certainly the longest Jeremy has ever seen it.

I've been having fun playing with different ways of putting it up, and enjoying being able to stick it back in a ponytail, and today I spent a bit of idle time why I hadn't started growing it out years ago.  And then today I was lying on my back playing with Connor by lifting him up, turning him upside down and "flying" him around, which he finds hilarious, and he laughed so hard that he threw up.  On my head.

And now I remember why I used to have my hair cut so short.

So after I washed my hair eighty bajillion times and felt sort of clean again I plugged my camera in with my shiny new USB cable and pulled off the 100+ pictures I've taken since I lost my previous cable.  It's going to take me a while to go through them, but I have to say that so far they are not really an awe-inspiring bunch. 

Highlights that I've posted here for your viewing pleasure of those taken in the last few weeks include "I'm not feeling great and you're forcing me to play the keyboard on top of that," "Look, I'm really, really not feeling so hot right now and Hospital Monkey is the only one who understands me," and this morning's "I just got up three minutes ago and I'm not really awake enough for pictures." 

Lovely, huh?

So in all of these photos he has his hearing aids out and his hair is a mess-- he'd just woken up in all of them.  The difference is that in the first two he was in the middle of a long seizure run, and in the last one he might have just woken up but he's feeling pretty good.  Looking at these the difference in his appearance to me is pretty striking-- the gigantic dark circles under his eyes have started to go away and his color is a whole heck of a lot better, even if he does have his blanket pattern imprinted on half his face.  He also doesn't have that scary zombified expression on his face that we've seen a whole heck of a lot of in the past few weeks-- the one that says "Absolutely all of my energy is focused on surviving these seizures and I don't have any leeway for anything else." 

It's scary to look at these photos and have visual proof of just how depleted his stores were getting in the past two weeks, but it's pretty heartening too to see what an amazing difference just a few seizure-free days can make. 

That's my big boy!

~Jess

In Which I Take The Easy Way Out

I just got home from a late derby practice (where I bought new skates!) and I'm pretty tired, and also we didn't do a whole lot today.  So I'm taking the lazy way out today and showing you ridiculously cute pictures of Connor and Jeremy playing together out on our deck instead of writing an actual post.  Here you go:

Back to your regularly scheduled programing tomorrow!

~Jess

In Which We Get Pictures And Connor Is Kind Of Coughy

Our pictures came in the mail today!  I'm super excited to get the chance to see how Ellen has grown; the last pictures we have of her are from when she was eleven, so it's been a while!  She really looks like a young lady now.  There are a couple of really cute ones of her seeing our pictures for the first time and grinning from ear to ear.  I might frame one of those and put it up in the house.

It was back to the gloomy, rainy weather here so we spent most of the day indoors.  I still have to put all my plants in the ground; since Connor doesn't have school on Wednesdays and I had a derby event this evening I didn't have the chance to plant anything today.  Hopefully the ground won't be too muddy tomorrow and I'll be able to put some of the garden in.

Connor had another good day; he was a little tired and ornery at occupational therapy but otherwise seemed to be fine.  I'm a little concerned that he still has a lingering cough from the cold he had earlier in the month, so I may end up making him an appointment with his primary care manager because he's still doing some pretty good chest coughing and seems kind of fatigued.  His sore throat and runny nose are completely gone though, which is a pretty good thing.  He certainly coughs when he gets up in the morning.  Other than being kind of tired he did a great job at occupational therapy today though-- no coughing there-- so it's hard for me to tell if I'm just being an overprotective mother or not.  I've gotten seriously used to him not doing well over the last few months, so maybe now that he's doing better I'm just paranoid or something.  He's due for his five year old check-up anyway, so when I bring him in for that maybe I can get her to listen to his lungs too.

I need to reset my mom radar for a kid who's not having seizures every minute or so.  It's quite the adjustment!

~Jess

In Which I Ask Your Advice

So our adoption agency will be traveling soon to Thailand to visit the waiting children in their program, and so we have the opportunity to send Ellen a small gift.  It's too early in the process for photo albums or letters, but something small that she can keep with her is appropriate.

I'll confess that I'm a little gun shy about this trip; I'm kind of worried that they'll get over there and discover that for some reason Ellen is suddenly unavailable for adoption and we'll get another sad phone call.  But I'm excited too, because we have the opportunity to have some more questions answered about our daughter, to receive updated pictures and video, and to send along something just for her filled with all the love we can cram into it.

The question is, what do we send?

Ellen loves Thai comic books and soap operas, but I don't have a good source for Thai comics here (and wouldn't be able to read them yet to make sure they're appropriate).  She also enjoys playing chess, so we're thinking about maybe sending her a little travel chess set.  Stuffed animals aren't necessarily appropriate for her age level, but we're going to send a small piece of jewelry like a necklace or a charm bracelet.

I think I'm also going to applique a little zippered bag for her-- maybe with a white elephant, as they're an important cultural symbol for Thailand.  Since I have the time it would be good to send her something handmade.  I might have Jeremy take a picture while I'm sewing on it, and then when we're allowed to send her a photo album she can see that I made it for her.

So what do you all think?  Do you have any suggestions for age appropriate (she's thirteen) gifts we could send her?  They need to be of fairly low monetary value, non-electronic and probably not easily breakable, and they need to take up very little room in a suitcase.  Any ideas?

~Jess 

In Which Connor Continues To Be Better And I Pick A Derby Name

No seizures today!  Connor still had a bit of a fever this morning, but he was obviously doing a lot better.  We're going off the Tylenol tomorrow and we'll see how it goes.  I'm happy that the little guy is on the mend!

We had our team photo for derby today, which was completely awesome.  I've chosen an official derby name-- I am now skating for the Trampires as Gita Kraken!  My number is 20K Leagues.

I was planning on skating under the name Lee Viathan, but there's already a Vitamin V on the team.  "Lee" and "V" sound really similar when you're yelling them in the middle of a noisy bout.  So I went with another gigantic sea monster instead, since I thought the general theme was appropriate. 

After all, if there's one thing more terrifying than a gigantic evil squid, it's a gigantic, sort of promiscuous, evil undead squid on roller skates.

For those of you who have no idea what the heck this name is in reference to (and I know you are out there), it's a play on the expression "get cracking."  And also it involves one of these.  And my number, 20K Leagues, comes from Jules Verne's novel 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea, in which not just one kraken, but seven kraken make an appearance.  Which is about seven more kraken than I'd generally care to meet down a dark alley.

So anyway, we had our photo shoot and I was dressed appropriately.  Dressing appropriately for the team picture in my case involved a black shirt and skirt, red tights, hair that was teased about four inches off the top of my head and rolled in a sort of crazy punk rock bouffant style, really heavy black eyeliner and mascara, red lipstick, and an awesome red octopus necklace (made by another derby girl!) to complete the ensemble.  Oh, and my skates, of course.

It felt sort of like I was dressing up as my alter ego.  Who is way, way cooler than me and actually able to pull off four-inch high hairdos, really black eyeliner and roller skates-- something that I would normally never be able to do.  I don't have any pictures of me in my glorious Gita Kraken attire, but when one goes up on the Dockyard Derby Dames website I'll be sure to post a link to it so you can see me in my crazy getup.  Also then you can check out the other lovely ladies on my team, who collectively manage to be gorgeous and unbelievably terrifying all at the same time. 

So from now on, whenever I strap on my roller skates you can call me Gita!

~Jess

In Which Connor Has An Adventure And I Put Batteries In My Camera

Look-- I put new batteries in my camera!  Aren't you all proud of me? 

Thanks for putting up with my blog in its pictureless state for so long.  I know ya'll don't really come to read my rambling posts; you come for the adorableness that is the little guy!  So here he is in all his glory, complete with fuzzy Cookie Monster slippers.

It was pajama day at school today.

So there he is in his shiny new wheelchair with his rocket pajamas on.  He was a little bit confused about pajama day when I told him about it, but once he found out that he got to wear his Cookie slippers to school suddenly he didn't have any objections.  He loves those things!  Mostly I he likes the way they feel-- he spends a whole lot of time very carefully petting his feet when they're on. 

He's sporting another festive accessory-- a big ol' lump on his noggin!  He managed to launch himself out of a chair today at school and broke the fall with his face.  Poor little guy!  So he's got a large goose egg on his forehead and some friction burns down the side of his nose.  Maybe instead of being a yeti he should have picked a prizefighter costume!  I suppose these sorts of bruises and scrapes are part of most kid's growing up, but it freaked me out a little bit because Connor doesn't get hurt very often!  It obviously looks far more dramatic than it actually is though, because he felt absolutely fine today and it didn't seem to bother him at all.  Oh well-- the swelling was already going down by the time he went to bed tonight.  I should mention this chair was a whole foot from the floor, and I'm not totally not upset with his teacher or any of his aides-- they are awesome!  Could have happened to anybody. 

I'm not feeling so hot right now either, to tell you the truth.  My nose is pretty stopped up and I'm doing a lot of coughing; since I don't have allergies I'm pretty positive I'm sick.  So far Jer and Connor seem to be feeling okay, and I hope they stay that way!  I'm hoping that this'll be a 24 hour bug and I'll be feeling better tomorrow; we'll just have to see!

No word on whether or not I've made the derby team yet; I'm really hoping I hear something tomorrow because I am going nuts!  I'd just like to know one way or the other, you know? 

I hate waiting.

~Jess

In Which We Catch A Breather, And Receive Some Awesome Photos

Well, today went much better.

We got a call back from the hospital this morning.  They had us give Connor a low dose of Ativan to break the cycle of seizures he's in, and we have instructions to give him a low dose any time in the next three months that he starts having another cluster of seizures.  Hopefully as the Lamictal dose is ramped up the number of seizure clusters like these will taper off. 

Connor actually perked up after we gave him the Ativan, which was not quite the response I was expecting as Ativan is in the same family of drugs as Valium and normally has a sedating effect.  But hey, I'll certainly take it!  He was much more perky and vocal after the dose, which makes me think he was feeling a bit better.  We don't want to give it too often because it can be habit forming, but with any luck he'll have a nice break between his next round of seizures and we won't have to resort to it again for a long while.  Keep your fingers crossed for us!

In other news, remember that second photo shoot we did with Kat and Justin of Persimmon Images at the Tacoma Glass Museum?  Kat just posted some of the gorgeous shots from that session over at her blog-- go check them out!  Didn't they make us look just adorable?  Not that I'm surprised by this or anything, as the two of them are ridiculously talented. 

I'm especially in love with the closeups of Connor as well as the family shot I've got posted here.  Now we just have to figure out which of the photos out of our two awesome sessions (remember these?) are going to go up on the wall. 

How in the world are we ever going to choose?

~Jess

In Which We Pose For The Camera, And Receive Some Wonderful News

You might recall that a while back we won a photo shoot from Persimmon Images, and did an extremely fun (if wet) session with them at the Olympic Sculpture Park in Seattle.  We had the second half of our photo shoot with the always lovely Kat and Justin today, and all of us had a blast!  Happily we were not rained on this time-- and the sun even peeked out a little bit from behind the clouds, so that was great.  We've become friends with Kat and Justin over the past few months as they happen to be not only very talented photographers but also pretty awesome people, and so it was really great to get the chance to hang out with them.  Knowing we'll get some fantastic pictures out of it is an added bonus!

This time we met in Tacoma and posed outside the Glass Museum for a while.  It was fairly uncrowded, though we did see one other photographer photographing a gorgeous couple in what was probably an engagement session.  Connor behaved just beautifully-- not just for the photo shoot, but all through dinner afterwards as well.  He didn't even tell Kat to "go away" this time; which makes the session a big success in my book! 

And to top it all off, we got our home study rough draft back today.  Our approval is contingent on our background check from Texas coming back clear, but otherwise we're approved to adopt a child from Thailand of either gender who has physical/medical special needs and is up to eight years old!  This is fantastic news because it puts us one step closer to adopting Sylvie.  The home study is fairly general so that if for some reason we are not able to adopt Sylvie (because another family adopts her first, she transfers to a different orphanage and the adoption agency is unable to locate her, etc) then we'll be able to adopt another child who falls within those parameters.  But hopefully it won't be an issue, and we'll be able to move forward on bringing her home!

All in all it was a pretty perfect day!

~Jess

In Which We Get Some Exciting News!

Today was, all in all, a lovely day.

We didn't get much done on the fence because of the rain, but we did get to spend some quality snuggling time with Connor.  He was back to his usual happy self today, for which I am very grateful.  We're still waiting on the neurologist's orders, but hopefully we'll get those tomorrow.

The really exciting news, though, was that we got a call from our adoption agency today.  They found some more recent photos and video of Sylvie!  They hadn't made it into her file.  The photos we had of her before this were from two years ago, and these new ones are from last November!  The video is on its way to us in the mail, but we got the pictures today, and she is absolutely adorable.  We're talking massive amounts of cuteness here.  It's didn't even factor into the equation when we were making the decision on which child we were going to pursue for adoption, but let me tell you it sure isn't going to hurt the bonding process any.  Sadly, since we're not matched with her yet you will just have to content yourselves with a general description of how ridiculously adorable she is, but trust me when I say that she is just precious.  And for me to use that term in a completely non-sarcastic way, you know the kid has got to be coma-inducing cute.  She's 7,000 miles away and already has me wrapped around her little finger, but I don't really care.

Of course we're all freaked out over here by Thailand's current political situation, and we're worried that Jer won't be allowed to travel, or that they'll be in civil war or something, or that the adoption program is going to shut down, or any number of other possible disastrious things.  But since there's not a thing we can do about it, and a lot can happen in a year, we're just going to go ahead and fall in love with her now and hope for the best.  I think it's far better for us to go ahead and be excited, plan for her coming, and then be disappointed later than spend the entire time being Eeyores and trying not to get our hopes up.  So our book on Thai Sign Language arrived in the mail today, and I'll be studying up so that we can talk to her right away when we get to meet her!

 We're hoping to get another update on her soon, and we can't wait to see how she's doing now! 

~Jess

In Which We Look Better Than Life

Check out these gorgeous pictures!  Kat and Justin, the photographers behind Persimmon Images, did an awesome job, and we're really happy with these shots-- not to mention the 50 some odd more that aren't posted here.  We are not exactly the easiest family in the world to photograph, so that makes these pics especially great.

Take Connor, for example.  I mean sure, the kid is unbelievably cute, which makes things a little easier.  But he also drools a ton, sticks his fingers in his mouth, refuses to look at the camera or smile, self-stims by flapping his arms a lot, and since he doesn't stand on his own is a challenge to pose.  Then we have Jer, who was switching between crutches and a wheelchair at the time and tends to do that cheesy-smile thing for the camera. 

Finally there's me; not only do I wrinkle my nose up when I smile, but when I laugh I throw my head back and so there are no doubt a ton of rejected pictures of shots that would have otherwise been great if I wasn't showing off my nostril hair.  This laugh is a family trait that both me and my sister inherited (Tom, do you do this too?), so it's not going anywhere any time soon.  And because I was having a great time despite the bad weather, and also because Kat and Justin are both hilarious, I was laughing a lot.  The fact that they still managed to get seventy five absolutely awesome shots of us is a testament to what fantastic photographers they really are. 

You should check out some of their other photo shoots, where they had models that, you know, cooperated.  Amazing stuff.  Because they are totally awesome, you should also look for them in October at this year's Get Hitched, Give Hope; where they and a whole bunch of other bridal vendors will be raising money for end-stage cancer patients.  Future brides take note!

At any rate, enjoy the eye candy! 

~Jess

In Which We Encounter The Easter Bunny Of Doom

We went to the mall today because we needed cat food and our local Target is located inside the mall.  Our mall has an OfficeMax, too.  It's a very strange mall.

Anyway, all of the handicapped parking spaces outside of Target were taken, so we ended up having to drive around to the other side of the mall to park.  We walked back through the mall towards the Target and there, in the plaza just outside the store entrance, was a long line of mothers waiting to have their children's pictures taken with what was quite possibly the scariest Easter bunny of all time. 

This was no Harvey.  Six feet tall and with a head vastly out of proportion to its body, this bunny apparently exuded some sort of evil aura that children under the age of six could all sense but parents were totally immune to.  It might have been the gigantic teeth this rabbit possessed.  They were at least six inches long.  I tried to take a picture of him but was waved off by the Easter bunny guards, who demand that you pay for said pictures or delete them, even if the bunny does not have any victims children at that particular moment.  I like you all, but I am a cheapskate.  So no pictures for you.

At any rate, we must have walked by this bunny at least three or four times and each time saw the same little tableau being played out on the Easter grass covered stage.  A mom, gritting her teeth in a strained approximation of a smile, was sitting on the cheery white bench and clutching a screaming, hysterical child who was madly windmilling their arms and legs in a desperate effort to escape.  Next to them both squatted the sinister Rabbit of Doom.  The slightest movement on his part would throw the child into new paroxysms of terror.

Connor and I decided NOT to get his picture taken with the Easter bunny.

So we came back home and Daddy brought out an Easter basket he'd brought home a little early for Connor.  Jer and I like those prepackaged Easter baskets because Connor normally doesn't eat any of the candy due to the whole not-chewing thing, which means we get to "help" him with it.  And by "help," I mean eat all of it.  Well, not THIS year!  I decided to see if maybe Connor would be okay with trying a sucker, and he went for it in a big way!  Not only did he repeatedly open his mouth for it, but after just a couple of minutes he actually started lunging for the candy.  He probably worked on it about five minutes-- just long enough to make his drool bright blue-- before deciding he was done and shaking his head "no" when we tried to give him more. 

So he can have all of the suckers now, which is perfectly fine as far as I'm concerned.  It's when he starts developing a taste for Twix bars that I'll be in trouble.

~Jess

In Which We Play At Being Models

So we drove up to the Olympic Sculpture Park this morning for our photo shoot with Kat and Justin!

The Olympic Sculpture Park, for those of you not familiar with the area, is a free public park affiliated with the Seattle Art Museum. They have several really cool permanent installations outside, and a large pavilion that contains a rotating exhibit. We met the very talented Kat and her awesome husband (and second shooter) Justin in the pavilion and went right to work! After taking some shots in their awesome orange chairs we headed outside some shots near the waterfront and with some of the large sculptures. Jer and I had a blast, but Connor seemed rather unsure about the whole situation. He finally warmed up and even gave us a few cute smiles and giggles, but then unfortunately the weather went south and it began raining. We ended up moving back indoors for a few more shots, and then we all drove over to Espresso Vivace for some very tasty coffee (or in my case, a very tasty steamer) and cookies.

We had a ton of fun! I can't wait to see some of the shots that Kat and Justin took-- patience is not on of my strong points. Hopefully Jer's somewhat cheesy I'm-Smiling-For-The-Camera smile and my ridiculous Throw-My-Head-Back-So-You-Can-See-Up-My-Nose laugh didn't mess up too many of the photos. I'm not worried about Connor; I have no doubt that he looks adorable in every single picture, even if he does have his hands in front of his mouth in half of them. He was switching between signing, "Don't like" and "All done."

Silly little guy.

~Jess