Oh what to do. . .

. . .when all the presents are wrapped?  My usual modus operandi is to have everything sitting in bags until Christmas Eve and then engage in a wrapping frenzy.  It's getting old.  So today I decided that I would hang out and just get it done.  No computer, no other distractions, just me, the tape, the scissors and the gift wrap taking on the bags of stuff.

And it worked.  It's done, other than the stocking stuffers.  Oh, happy day. 

Now I just need to remember to charge the camera battery and work on the side dish menu for Christmas dinner.

This will be our second Christmas staying at home, so we still haven't gotten down our Christmas schtick, yet.

'Twas Three Days Before Christmas. . .

Time to take down the Hanukkah decorations . . . .and get out the glue gun to secure the bolts (candle holders) onto the paint stirrer that is the newest addition to our menorah collection.

The stockings finally got hung up on the bannister today; the tree was decorated last weekend after standing in the living room for a week with only four ornaments on it.  Tomorrow I may get around to hanging a wreath, which is the sum total of my outdoor decorations.  All those who put up light displays that can be seen from the International Space Station are just putting money into PSE&G's pockets.  And in our neighborhood, it is always those who have the ugliest combinations of lights who put them up the earliest and leave them up the longest.

I have seen enough sappy made-for-the-Hallmark-channel Christmas movies to last me for the remainder of my life and they have served to eradicate what little Christmas spirit I was able to muster.  I'm not usually overjoyed by the holidays, but this year's holiday malaise is worse than usual due to Retail America starting to put up Christmas displays before  Halloween had arrived.  Thank you, Target et al.

The kids are excited about being off from school until January 2, 2013, particularly no Chinese language school until January 6, 2013 though no let up in the homework from Wang LaoShi.  She's a wonderful teacher, but the amount of homework given on the last day before break puts her up there in the stratosphere range as far as buzzkills go.   At regular school, each of their classes each held holiday parties and made gingerbread (read: graham crackers masquerading as gingerbread) houses.  Both kids are relatively clueless as to the events in Newtown, Connecticut.

Fortunately most of the holiday shopping was done on-line, so I have not had to set foot in a shopping mall since sometime in early November.  All the stuff is waiting in bags in the family room waiting for divine inspiration or time finally running out before I get out the wrapping paper, tape and scissors.

Meanwhile back in every day life, both of Micah's BAHAs are out of commission.  One has a nasty case of feedback, the other died while Micah was at school.  Micah and I went back to Audiology at JFK Hospital in Edison, where Micah was first evaluated and fitted with the BAHAs, but if we sent the BAHA back to Cochlear via Audiology the repair cost would be over $800.  So it's been sent off to Centennial, Colorado and the cost will be around $400 per BAHA.

The experience was a lesson as to how spoiled we were while Micah was at Summit Speech School.  When one of the BAHAs needed repair several years ago, the school's pediatric audiologist sent it off and it came back within a week good as new. No muss, no fuss and very little in the way of effort on my part.  Just how I like it.  As Forrest Gump said so eloquently, "One less thing."

And instead of helping with ordering a newer model BAHA, the audiologist at JFK, who is the same one who saw Micah in 2007 to 2009, was all over the options map:  should we have Micah seen by an ENT surgeon who would implant the titanium post so Micah would not need to wear the softband, or since air conduction is always better than bone conduction so maybe since over the ear hearing aids are so small and lightweight some sort of loop could be made to fit over Micah's ear cartilage if Micah's ENT would allow for placement in the canals of an ear mold?  or we could just get the new BAHA3 and continue on as we have been doing.  Personally, I think a nice hit of Ritalin on a regular basis would help her achieve some focus and lessen the stream of consciousness-type chatter that drives me nuts.

I'm in favor of continuing on with the softband.  The BAHAis anchored with a safety tether to the band in case it falls off. -with the over-the-ear hearing aids, if one fell off, it would be near impossible to find it due to it's small size.  No surgery (for now), and if there would be any surgery, I am not going to some new specialist at the recommendation of the audiologist, I am going to Micah's current ENT surgeon, period. 

Happy Easter & Passover

Easter weekend at our house has been pretty laid back.  Saturday night Steve, Thea and Micah went to the seder at Temple Micah; I went to The Sew Must Go On at Olde City Quilts.  It's usually 4 pm until 1 am, but I got there a little late, and most everyone was packing up and ready to head out at midnight.  I finished 32 more pinwheels, whose fate I am still contemplating - and since on a good evening at home, finishing 12 is an accomplishment, it was a good night.

The kids' Easter baskets were thrown together in haste at around 1:30 this morning.  Oma provided a good bit of the chocolate, a patient gave me a pink bunny and a yellow duck stuffed animal and chocolate bunnies for them, so I did next to nothing other than throw a few quarters in the plastic eggs (also supplied by Oma.)

Easter breakfast was the usual three-way split: Thea with her steamed eggs, Micah with cereal and pancakes for Steve, sausages and pineapple for all.

Then the kids and I got going on making food for Steve to take with him when he goes to visit Grandma.  Micah made matzoh balls with me, and Thea was in charge of the potato latkes and was fearlessly flipping them despite getting hit with a few pot shots of hot oil.  She also took on cooking the chicken for the soup without much in the way of supervision from me.  This was one of the first times that boredom didn't get the best of  either one of them mid-project; they stuck with me until the last latke came out of the pan and the matzoh balls were transferred into the soup pot.

Now it's just a question of airing out the house to get rid of the fried latke smell and getting back to trying to get a little bit organized.

Closing Out 2011

It's Hanukkah already?  Micah's first year lighting candles on his own.  We live for danger, and the fire extinguisher is just ten feet away.

And so it begins. . . .

Seriously, Mom?  A puppy hat?

Christmas Day, after starting to cook dinner but before we remembered the stockings.

Dinner, with stuffing recipes courtesy of Mom and Mina

Creamed Spinach, Mom's recipe again, two thumbs up from Thea and it only took one call to Florida

The stunned look of people who realized that Mom cooked an entire holiday dinner and it's actually edible.

Photo by Emad Al Junaidi:  Dinner stop at Annapolis Mall on the way home from dropping off Oma.  Front row: Micah, Nadia and Thea, back row: Norah, Janet and me

11:59:59 pm New Year's Eve, Rocking in 2012 with a gang who knows how to party

Thea's contribution to the Third Grade Heritage Festival on December 23, 2011, German cookies

Second Night of Hanukkah

Christmas Eve, after the children were snug in their bed

The 2011 Christmas Card Photo

Our last day of 2011 included a trip to the Apple store at Freehold Mall to sort out an issue with an iTunes card.  It affirmed all the reasons why I prefer shopping online.  Noise, chaos both in the mall and particularly in the Apple store, and no parking.  Fortunately the geek girl helped me sort out the issue and by the time we were home, the email with the resolution to the problem was in my in-box.

The holidays were good, it was the first Christmas spent in New Jersey for us.  We're usually in Maryland with my mother - and I have been with my mother for every Christmas, ever.  And this year was no different because after opening presents, making Christmas dinner, I flew to Tampa to fly home the next day with my mother who was visiting her cousin.  Sauerkraut, red cabbage, lentil soup and roast pork - a second, near midnight Christmas dinner.   Sauerkraut and lentil soup for breakfast.  Heaven.

Oma spent another night with us on her way home to Maryland, which the kids loved - though out six hour drive in the rain down I-95 back to LaPlata no one loved.  On our way back home to New Jersey we met up with our friends at the Cheesecake Factory, and the kids got to torture Uncle Emad while I got to catch up with Aunt Janet.

Good-bye to 2011, you were a decent year, for me at least.  The kids are doing well, are happy and healthy.  Micah is in a 'regular' kindergarten, Thea is in third grade at Wicoff Elementary. This is the last year they will be in the same school until Thea's last year of high school and Micah's first.

Square Number Five on July 5

Square 5 of 12, no particular pattern, just squares laid out in a way I liked.

Square of the week, made using an interfacing grid that made all the corners sharp.  It seemed like cheating, at least until I walked out of class early (which was a miracle since I arrived late, had to re-cut my squares down from 2.5 inches to two inches.)

This is what you get when you hear 2.5" instead of 2" (boring!)

 We had a good Third of July with friends from our 2007 trip to China.  Jillian and Micah share a birthday, shared an orphanage for the first 16 months of their lives and share an adoption day which is coming up on July 9th.  Thea and Micah had a blast with Jillian and her siblings - having a family with five children visit is like an instant party: there were games, sword-fighting, swimming and food.  We're very lucky that they were willing to drive down, and we're looking forward to driving up to the 2011 Cash Bash.

Albin and Cash kids, 2011

Albin and Cash kids, this time without Leigh Ann being cut out

Saturday was devoted to doing a little bit of cleaning and shopping to get ready.  The kids spent the entire day in their pajamas or bathing suits, and managed to enjoy a day where we could stay home rather than chasing a schedule.

Christmas Photos

It takes a snow day to finally update the blog,

and thanks to today's snow day if it takes a village

  to raise a child, and I am in the market for a village or two

willing to take my two

for awhile.

In no particular order. . .

Micah on New Year's Eve, plastic champagne flute with ginger ale.

He made it to midnight, his sister gave up at 11:20 pm or so.

 We made a gingerbread house at Omas's.

 We got chilled to the bone at the ICE! show.

The little Whos in Whoville.

 The roast beast.

 You're a mean one, Mr. Grinch.

 Breakfast with The Grinch at the Gaylord.

Steve, Micah and Max, The Grinch's dog, who looked more gherkin green than brown.

 Two Grinches.

Now this is The Grinch I know and love.

I adore that devious expression on his face.

TBTB (Too busy to blog)

Too busy or so I think. It's just been more of the usual stuff on weekends, birthday parties for the kids' friends, ice skating lessons, the end of soccer, a few weeks were I worked all five days instead of having Mondays and Fridays off, and so on and on with the mundane details of everyday life.

Micah had both of his parent-teacher conferences and is a normal four-year old in terms of his speech and hearing, so this has us feeling confident enough to allow him to try the Mandarin-immersion charter school's kindergarten in the Fall.  He's still wearing one BAHA on school days, but on weekends at home, the BAHA is off more than it's on and it doesn't seem to make that much of a difference.  The post about his latest evaluation by the audiologist and Dr. Choe beat this one onto the blog

Thea's soccer and Girl Scouts have finished up for now; Brownies will start back up in January 2011.  Her only extra-curricular right now is the Mandarin language school on Sunday afternoons.

Our Christmas tree is up, we picked it up at a local farm.  The guy helping us was good at picking a nice full tree (I told him I have a lot of ornaments and we used to be able to have a 10+ foot tree at the old house.)  Decorating took until about 2 am after we got it in the stand, and it's a nice hodgepodge of about 80% of the ornaments that I've collected or been given.  We (read: I) decorate on the inside, I'm not into outdoor lights.  Why make PSE&G's holiday merry and bright?  Our neighborhood is a mix of Griswolds and Grinches, so there is no shame in not putting lights up.

Meanwhile the kids are looking forward to Winter Break and going to Maryland to see Oma.  I'm looking forward to a few days where I don't need to pack lunch boxes and make dinner - or look at a garage full of boxes.

Happy Easter

Thea's Easter Basket

Micah's Easter Basket

Bunny Bear Checking Out Micah's Basket

I got a puppy!

Got to love a kid who gets excited over lip balm!

Doesn't he look like he's up to something?

Can't we just get to the Easter Egg Hunt part of the day?

Easter Baskets were thrown together in haste this morning.  Micah had a fever and a bout of "my belly hurts" last night after we got home from Sesame Street Live.  He fell asleep on the sofa, so I don't know what was up with him.  He seems fine this morning, but there is the incentive of the almighty Easter Basket and an extra toy that I bought that didn't fit in the baskets.  Anyway, last night I just went to bed with Micah instead of putting together the baskets and hiding the eggs.

Today we're going to be moving stuff out to the storage facility to de-clutter the house.  Next weekend the realtor is coming to take pictures so it can be up on the MLS by Saturday.   I had to shove aside six cartons of books to get to the plastic bin with the Easter decorations, though with my children and their suitably low expectations, I could have given them a plastic grocery bag with their Easter swag and they would have been perfectly happy.

Happy Spring Weather to All.

A week withouth blogging. . . .

. . .is the way I'm closing out the year.  It's been a good week, but I am glad Christmas is over (though Micah has yet to figure that one out as he closed his phone call with me today by saying, "Merry Christmas! I love you! Buh-bye.")

Today was a half-day at work, so just acute visits which make for fast and easy notes.  The staff took all the holiday decorations down (yeah!), and people brought in a potluck of hors d'oevres, baked goods and whatnot that makes for cellulite on the hips and breath of death for those around you (but the cheeses and dips were delicious).

Steve had the children with him all day, so they are dressed like refugees from the rag-bag: Micah has orange sweatpants and a yellow Wiggles shirt with his blue, white striped puppy shirt over it, Thea has on lavender leggings with pink and white polka dots, a yellow Life Is Good shirt that she usually sleeps in under a white University of Maryland sweatshirt.  I regret the days I rush out without putting out clothes for them.  Fortunately they were not seen in public with me, Micah went to the grocery store with Steve.  I'm sure that more than a few mothers looked at that poor child and thought, "Weekend with non-custodial parent, poor thing."

Tonight we've invited a roast chicken in for dinner.  He's currently warming up in the oven so he can be the guest of honor.  Thea has probably already mentally claimed the drumsticks and wings, and she's likely to wolf at least one drumstick and both wings down.

Happy, safe, healthy and peaceful 2010 to all.

Peace on Earth, Goodwill to All

Merry Christmas all.  Stay warm, stay safe and be well. To all those family, friends and just passing through, thank you for reading, thank you for adding flags to the map, thank you for the comments.

Countdown to Christmas

After Saturday's monster snowstorm, I drove down to Maryland to my mother's.  Aside from a ten-mile stretch of I-295 just above the Delaware Memorial Bridge that had an almost un-plowed look to it, the roads were excellent, and almost no one was out and about.

Executive Decision:  The holiday cards got sent today.  No letter enclosed.  It was just time for it to be over and done with.  If I feel like it, I might work on it and send it out in early 2010.  Or not.

Present's got hauled to Oma's on Sunday, and wrapped or bagged today.  (Oma had promised she had wrapping paper, but not in the quantity needed.  A trip to Bed, Bath & Beyond solved that.)

Purchased what I hope will be the last two gifts today, stuffed the children's stockings - also left at Oma's waiting for Christmas morning.

Meanwhile Mom had her second chemotherapy session and afterwards we went to Fran's Nu Image and bought accessories to make her feel and look life her old self.  (We've named the wig "Robespierre" after one of our guinea pigs who looked like a wig on paws.)

Today she had an appointment with the retina specialist who injects my mother's left eye to treat her macular degeneration. Though I love most procedures, I just hung out in the waiting room with my laptop.  Needles and eyeballs meeting just isn't something I want to witness.  I'm a wimp.

10:30 pm back in Princeton, roads clear, but HUGE back up on the Delaware Memorial Bridge so it was the Wilmington/Philadelphia option - and fortunately the gas tank held out until I was back to the Land of No-Self-Service Gas Stations.

Holiday Photos

The 2009 Tree

It only took me two weeks to decorate it, and I am going to leave it up until every last needle falls off.  That's about the only way we'll be able to get it out of the door.

 Micah lights his first candle, Hanukah 2009

(and the house was not reduced to a smoldering pile of ash)

 Micah with his 1st Night of Hanukah presents, a non-flammable menorah

and Llama Llama, Red Pajama

A Jewish Asian Christmas Elf, now you have seen it all . . . .

 

In case you can't read it, Thea's shirt says, "My brother is the naughty one."

 

And Micah's shirt says, "I make noise and trouble."

 

After "A Night of Art and Songs" at YingHua, Micah giving Thea a ride

 

New snowpants, going for their first test drive

 

Bundled up for the first snow of the season, December 19, 2009

They were even cuter, with bright red cheeks, when they came in from playing in the snow.

Happy Thanksgiving to the Blog-o-Sphere

I am thankful that blogging is free, considering the costs and lack of availability of good therapists these days.

I am thankful for all those who have helped Micah make such gains in his language skills, and I am doubly thankful he doesn't talk in his sleep, so we do get a break for a few hours each day.

I am thankful for a million other things, I could type until my fingers are nubs, but I'll spare you.

To all those who are celebrating Thanksgiving, enjoy!  On this Thanksgiving, I will be missing my father, German dumplings, my grandmother and sauerkraut with pork spare ribs, not necessarily in that order.

We got our 'free' turkey breast from Shop Rite, so one of these weekends I'll try to make the dumplings and sauerkraut.  It's just not Thanksgiving without it.  My mother starts cooking it early in the day, so by the time I was up for breakfast, I could grab an early bowlful - which annoys her to no end.  Sauerkraut rules!

Another Weekend Update

. . .of nothing much in the way of excitement to blog about. This week was a recovery week from being away last weekend - getting all the laundry done, getting back into some shred of a routine, and seeing Steve's family.

We went to see Monsters vs. Aliens, all four of us. Thea actually knew a few of the characters through friends at school who've already been to see the film, and it was definitely more interesting than "Hotel for Dogs" so she managed to make it through the movie without the previously heard "Mama, I'm bored. . . ."

Micah actually managed to sit for about a half hour, maybe slightly longer. Until the popcorn and Coke ran out , at least. Then he got a case of wanderlust and had to try out various other seats, until I was ready to dig my old scuba diving weight belt to anchor his butt to one spot.

Today the kids and I went to visit their grandmother. Thank goodness for GPS because Steve's "it's easy just exit here, go there, turn here" directions which failed to include the really useful "stay in the middle lane" type details. Good practice, since we'll be going to Hackensack for Micah's CT scan.

And there's a weird sort of symmetry to having to make a trip to Hackensack to get something for Micah. In 2007, just a couple of weeks before our trip to China I had to make a Saturday morning run to the USCIS office there to be re-fingerprinted for our adoption paperwork. Back in the days before GPS (or my owning one, at least), going to find a hole-the-wall, utterly nondescript storefront office.

I'm crossing fingers that we can get the CT done during the spring break week, then get an appointment with the ENT surgeon to find out if atresia repair is possible and which ear will be first.

I've gotten semi-hooked into watching "The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency" on HBO. Sort of makes me wish I'd read Alexander McCall Smith's book first. "True Blood" is back in mid-June, one month after the ninth book in the series is published. It's going to be a good summer.

Next weekend is Easter - and I've already got the stuff for Thea's and Micah's baskets. We're into the more pagan and chocolate-fueled aspects of the holiday, and will probably be one of the few families having matzoh ball soup after the Easter egg hunt. Thea and I make a mean matzoh ball soup.

Good-Bye Winter Break

Tomorrow it's back to school for Thea (she's looking forward to it), and back to the last eight weeks of Micah's routine of Ela on Mondays, group on Wednesdays and Estra on Fridays. This year I think I worked more than all previous winter breaks combined - especially this past week when January 1 was the only day I didn't work.

Back to school uniforms, though I've enjoyed seeing Thea in her 'regular' clothes. . . .

Back to packing lunches - I stocked up on lunch supplies today while grocery shopping. . . .

Back to keeping to a more regular schedule, especially with bedtimes. . . .

Back to making 1,000,001 phone calls to get the missing part of Micah's evaluation scheduled, to talk with the Wednesday teacher before she talks to the social worker from the Child Study Team, to check with JFK's Audiology Department to see if Micah's second BAHA has been delivered, to check with the company that makes the blocks that we use for the BAHA since the double BAHA band from Cochlear is on back order for months and months.

What I learned from over the past few weeks:

- I suck at making potato latkes, and the ability to make hash browns (a sort of giant latke in my book) has no bearing on one's ability to make a decent latke;

- the quality of latke recipes availabe via Google sucks;

- I need to work on taking a holiday card picture in October, given the level of cooperation I receive from the photographees around here, but if push comes to shove as it did this year, I can take a picture, make a card on-line, bang out a letter and address labels in a relatively short time;

- in December 2009, if I use all the ornaments, including those that were held back to avoid any breakage due to a two-year old's curiosity, we're going to need a nine to ten foot tall tree - and a small step ladder would be a good gift;

- the batteries never wear down as fast as you'd like them to in the noisiest, most obnoxious toys;

- holidays are better when viewed through my children's eyes, I am thankful that they don't have a lot of expectations as far as presents, so they are thrilled with it all, especially the boxes.

- Thea is gorgeous in her red velvet dress, tights and 'high heel' shoes; with any luck she might not completely outgrow it by the next holiday (dream on, Mom - she's a weed).

Happy 2009

New Year, new background colors. I'm bored with pink and it's not my favorite color, it just matched the print background the best.

New Year's Eve was a total non-event here, at least three out of four of us were asleep when the ball dropped.

Wednesday the office was open from 8:30 to noon, and the office manager was desperate enough for the extra body, she said it was OK for me to bring Thea to work, and Micah's sitter was also working today. Thea brought her traveling art box and set up shop at the empty desk next to mine. I actually broke a few child labor laws by asking her to take a few charts I'd managed to strip for scanning into the EMR to the file clerks. It was nice to have the instant gratification of getting the stuff off my desk, and she felt very self-important.


Meanwhile, Micah was peeved that he didn't get to come to the office, but he seemed to have a good day at Lisa's since it was just him and two others.

Dinner was take-out Chinese, and Steve's take-out place gave its usual suboptimal, indifferent performance. But at least I didn't need to cook.

So far 2009 doesn't feel all that much different that 2008.

We're back home. . .

. . . after a slightly less than three day trip to Maryland for Christmas. I blew out of the office at 5 pm on Tuesday, leaving chart notes undone and picking up Micah from the sitter's (normally she delivers him on Tuesdays and Thursdays) and went home to pack.

With packing and dinner and whatnot, we didn't get on the road until shortly after 9:00 pm - and had to make stops to drop off the sitter's present and a couple of things at work. So we rolled into Southern Maryland after 1 am on the 24th. Micah awoke when were were almost in LaPlata, and when he spotted the turn onto my mother's street he bellowed out, "OMA-A-A-A ! Oma's house!"

Thea immediately changed into her pajamas and went off to her bed and back to sleep- the Queen was not granting audiences to anyone but her pillow and her tigers. Micah was wired until around 3 am. After unpacking the car, my immediate goal was to put together the holiday cards, address labels and letters to be able to drop them off at the post office on my way to the hair salon. So I worked until 4 am or so - thank goodness for my mother, for both folding most of the letters and bringing me snacks to get the taste of envelope adhesive off my tongue. My Mom rocks, especially when it comes to snackage.

The good thing is that the cards were postmarked the 24th (I hope), the bad thing was that I think that Kodak shortchanged me on a few so I have to go back to them, register a complaint and hope I can be given the balance. Next year, back to Snapfish.

Christmas Eve we got to see cousins - Micah is fortunate to have two who are close in age. And thanks to their (very cool) joint present, we are now chasing small horses, saddle blankets and plastic saddles all over the house.

Santa was good to the kids. Micah is thoroughly and completely enamored of a plastic train set that Oma got for him. Paradise runs on six AA batteries, complete with sound effects and smoke. When I finally got the batteries loaded and flipped the switch, the ensuing ruckus probably shortened my life by a few years. Thea got a wooden castle, complete with a dungeon. And the both got books, puzzles, games and things.

We all went to my sister-in-law's aunt's for Christmas dinner, which was very nice - we did it a couple of years ago. This time, instead of Thea being the only kid, we have Micah and my brother's family has Willi - they're two months apart, so it was very much cousin see, cousin do for the little guys. Thea stayed above the fray for the most part. We got turned on to a new game, Whack-A-Mole, which held the boys attention for a few minutes here and there. I could have smacked the little suckers all afternoon.

Friday we came home in the evening, I had to work Saturday - and we had a Hanukah party to go to on Sunday. Other than going to the grocery store, I have not hit the after-Christmas sales, so I am not doing my part for the economy.

Coming Soon on a Christmas Card Near You. . .

The Winner for the 2008 Holiday Card

The Runner-Up for the 2008 Holiday Card

Tonight was do-or-die time for our 2008 holiday card, it was either going to happen or we were going to take a pass this year.

So during dinner I put the squeeze on Thea. Mommy wants to take pictures for our Christmas card. And I want you to wear a dress. I want you to wear the dress that's been hanging on your door for the past two years (or more). The dress your cousin Norah wore when she was the flower girl for Mommy and Daddy's wedding.

No.

So I resorted to bribes. Money? No. Chocolate. No. (This was a sign she was serious in her refusal, my children would likely set their father on fire for chocolate.)

She would consider the red velvet dress that I bought last week. (Weakness, a crack in the armor, must exploit.)

Finally after a few more rounds of emotional blackmail that I am sure will cost us thousands of dollars in future therapy, Thea consented.

And thank goodness she did, because even though Norah was the same age Thea is now when she performed her duties as the best and most beautiful flower girl on the planet, Norah was a reed-like five. Thea is built like a five-year old stockade, solid, rock solid. Next year would have been too late, if she keeps growing at the rate she is.

What you don't see in the picture is that only the top button of the dress is buttoned, what you don't hear is the whining about something inside the dress itching/hurting/bothering her. (I remember no such complaints from the first wearer of the dress.)

Last year, I think I took close to 60 pictures; this year due to the lateness of the hour (we were doing this after Cyberchase, which ends at 9 PM), I took fewer than 30. It felt like herding cats while having a root canal, how hard can it be to get two people to sit nicely, smile in a way that isn't totally artificial and wait for Mommy's somewhat sluggish camera to snap the picture?

Micah making Play-Doh Cookies during his lesson with Ela. The Play-Doh practice run was followed a week later by baking sugar cookies.

Bonnie and Clyde free-wheeling at Storybook Land on December 14, 2008.