opalise everything

Sylvie is A-OK!

2009-01-13T13:17:00.001-05:00

Thanks so much for all your concern and well wishes!

Yesterday's procedure went very well. We got to the hospital around 6:30am for our 7am appointment so we had to wait a bit before things got going. Poor Sylvie was irked that we refused to give her her morning milk & CIB and kept very slowly and deliberately saying/signing: "I...want...milk." as if we were maybe just having trouble understanding her request. Considering we've spent a great deal of time and effort on helping her to gain good communication skills, I was doing my best to let her know that we did in fact hear what she was saying but that she just wasn't allowed to have anything to eat or drink before the procedure because the sedation would make her nauseous. Her response?

"I...WANT...MILK!"

So Theron and I just did our best to distract her until the nurse came to escort us back to what would be Sylvie's recovery room. Once there, the nurse went over the specifics of the procedure and what to expect afterwards and asked if we had any questions. Then another nurse, Steve, came in. He informed us that he would be the nurse in the room with Sylvie during the procedure and also asked if we had any questions. (You gotta appreciate the fact that the doctors and nurses at CHB like to keep the parents informed!) Steve took our cell phone numbers so he could keep us updated on the status of the procedure. Finally, Sylvie was given an oral sedative that she did not at all care for and after a bit she grew drowsy. When she finally succumbed to the soporific, Steve gathered her from my arms and took her off for prepping.

Theron and I went down to the main floor to grab some much needed coffee and overpriced but delicious nibbles at Au Bon Pain. Since the cath lab waiting room had two big signs that stated NO FOOD or BEVERAGES, we hung out in the seating area by the big fish tank in the lobby to eat. To pass time and try and keep everyone updated on the situation we'd brought our laptops and made use of the hospital's wi-fi. Shortly thereafter we got a call from Steve saying that Sylvie was fully prepped and they were preparing to place the coil. Pretty fast work! We weren't sure if wi-fi was available in the cath lab waiting room so Theron remained in the lobby while I went back upstairs.

About 30-40 minutes later, Sylvies cardiologist Dr. Lang came into the waiting room and told me everything had gone splendidly and that Sylvie would be able to see her shortly. I went back downstairs to fetch Theron and when we got back upstairs, Sylvie was in the recovery room, completely zonked. Steve informed us that they'd had to give her another dose of sedative right at the end because she'd started to come around while they were removing the catheter and as a result she'd most likely be out for a while. She did sleep a great deal waking up occasionally for longer and longer periods. We started giving her water which didn't want to stay down at first. Karen, the nurse who cared for her during the recovery phase, gave her some anti nausea meds in her IV which helped.

Around 4:30pm Sylvie had an xray to ensure that the coil hadn't migrated and was staying put (it was fine). Then Dr. Mazwi, the cardiologist who had assisted Dr. Lang, was kind enough to show us some images--both still and video!--of Sylvie's procedure which was pretty neat to see. He also told us the repairs from her surgery in '07 looked perfect and that she wase unlikely to require any further surgical interventions. Yay!

Since both the xray and the puncture sites from the catheterization looked good we were free to take her home after a final dose of antibiotic and Tylenol. She got a little bit sick again in the car and after we got home. We were trying to gradually reintroduce her to just liquids but she began all but begging for real food: "Chip!"...Pizza? Pizza!"..."S'getti!"..."Lunch!"..."Chicken!" We started off giving her just some milk and CIB and she did throw it up after a bit but I think it was because she'd had a coughing fit and gagged more than because her stomach was still upset. We waited a little bit longer and gave her more milk. When that stayed down we gave her some goldfish crackers and then some beef broth and a little bit of white rice from the Chinese takeout we'd ordered for ourselves. Thankfully, there were no further upchucks and we all slept pretty well last night.

Sylvie seems perfectly fine today but per doctor's orders we're keeping her home from school until Thursday. Right now she's chowing down on chicken nuggets, mixed veg and grapes while singing her own particular version of "I've Been Working on the Railroad." All is pretty right with the world if you ask me!

Second---and hopefully FINAL--heart procedure

2009-01-11T21:40:00.003-05:00

Tomorrow morning, Sylvie will be having a follow up cardiac procedure to close off the PDA that was unsuccessfully ligated during her open heart surgery last year. Luckily, this procedure is much less invasive. A tiny stainless steel wire, or coil, will be placed in the PDA via a catheter threaded through the femoral artery and vein via a small incision in Sylvie's groin while she is under concious sedation instead of general anesthesia. We've been assured that Children's Hospital performs several of these procedures each day and that the risk associated is akin to having one's tonsils or appendix removed. In fact, it's considered an outpatient procedure in most cases and in all likelihood we'll be on our way home by late afternoon.

While we are not 100% relaxed and at ease with the situation by any means, we are far less freaked out than we were last time. However, any and all thoughts/prayers/healing energies etc you'd care to send our girl's way tomorrow are very much appreciated!

Oops

2009-01-10T19:48:00.003-05:00

Hey! Guess it's been a while since I posted, huh? I never meant to quit the blog but I just never seemed to have the time to sit down and write things. I was sure that I'd pick it up again after Sylvie started school but obviously that hasn't exactly been the case. Part of the problem was that after so much time had passed I felt like I was required to write a hugely epic post about all that had occurred and I even started it back in Sept but, well...that didn't get finished. So I've decided to start again with little bits and pieces from each day as it occurs.

Today's bit has to do with Sylvie's ever increasing ability to communicate verbally which has really come quite a long way:

In the midst of watching an Elmo's World DVD, Sylvie jumped down from the couch, turned to me and exclaimed, "Chicken! Pizza! Pnuhburr!*Apple!" Translation: "Time for dinner mom!"

*peanut butter

NSTAR's Walk for Children's Hospital Boston

2008-03-28T16:19:00.000-04:00

Please support our walk! as you all know, Sylvie has been a fairly regular visitor to Children's Hospital Boston--seen various specialists, been treated for dehydration after a bad bout of GI bug and this past fall had open heart surgery to correct three (thankfully minor) heart defects--and the quality of care there has always been top notch. Children's Hospital Boston is a wonderful place, a truly unique hospital—one of the best pediatric institutions in the world, giving hope to so many kids and their families, constantly finding new ways to treat or cure an amazing variety of diseases. The doctors and nurses here never say "never" and they treat kids from all over the world. Some have families who can't afford to pay for their care. Children's takes care of them all! And it's very involved with the neighborhoods around it—helping low-income and at-risk kids.

Your donation will make a difference in kids' lives!

Click HERE to sponsor one of us!

Long overdue post part 2: School is IN..and off to a bumpy start

2008-03-26T09:16:00.000-04:00

Because of Sylvie's stomach bug, she unfortunately missed her last EI playgroup on Monday and what would have been her first day of school on Tuesday...so it wasn't until Wednesday that our girl began her student life. Theron and I took her into school so that we could meet the teacher and her aides and see what the classroom was like. It was quite spacious and had it's own bathroom--a side benefit of this school is that they help potty train! Sylvie seemed immediately to feel at home and wandered around the room looking at all the varied activities available to her. Once the other five kids arrived and the teacher got them all together for their morning circle, Theron and I snuck out marveling at how amazing it is that our daughter is in school!

I dropped Theron off at the T station so he could get to work and then I went home to our weirdly empty house. It was just a few hours later when I got a call for the school nurse; the teacher had concerns about Sylvie's hands being cold and bluish. I let her know that it wasn't an unusual occurrence for Sylvie and that I too had poor circulation in my extremities. I think they were being extra cautious because of her history of cardiac issues which I definitely appreciated. When the school bus (which is actually a van) dropped her off later that afternoon, she seemed very happy to be home but not especially tired from her first full day at school.

Each child in the class has a folder that comes home each day with daily status reports for us parents; if the child had a good day/tired day/hard day what activities they participated in how much (if any) of their snack or lunch they ate etc. There's also usually a personal note about any special accomplishments or troubles on that day. They kept things light on her first day and basically just let her explore the room on demand. According to the day's note, Sylvie especially loved the rice table and classroom computer!

Sylvie's second day was the bumpiest so far...literally. About an hour after we put her on the bus to school, I got another call from the nurse; this time because Sylvie had fallen and hit her head right after arriving at the school. Apparently, the teacher had taken her off the bus and was helping another kid off who decided to make a break for it in the direction of the street. In grabbing the runaway, Sylvie was accidentally knocked off balance and fell. The nurse said that Sylvie was fine but had a large goose egg on her forehead and that the teacher felt terrible. Of course I wasn't thrilled to hear that this had happened but I am aware that accidents do occur and there have been days when Sylvie sported two lumps on her forehead from tumbles she took at home so I assured the nurse that as long as Sylvie was ok then I was ok too.

Guess who called me AGAIN a few hours later?
Yup.
The school nurse.

Sylvie had bumped her head a second time, this time after tipping over backwards in her chair. The nurse assured me that she'd checked her out again and that Sylvie was fine...but that the poor teacher was practically in tears at this point!

Despite her bumpy second day at school, Sylvie came home in a fine mood. And though she was indeed sporting an enormous scraped knot on her forehead her 'voluminous' hair seemed to have provided enough cushioning to prevent a bump on the back of her head.

Sylvie has been a preschooler for almost a month now and seems to be enjoying it...and we've not had (and hopefully won't have) anymore calls from the school nurse!

Long overdue post part 1: Sylvie is THREE!!!

2008-03-18T14:42:00.000-04:00

Sylvie's birthday fell on a Tuesday this year and since we wanted to have a party, we decided to celebrate a couple of days early on Sunday. We knew we'd have several small children ranging in age from 1-3.5 yrs, we wanted to make sure that they'd all be kept busy (and happy!) so we set up two play areas: one in Sylvie's room and one upstairs. The upstairs play area had a pop-up house/ball pit, tubes to crawl through and even butcher paper on the walls with a large can of crayons at hand for any aspiring muralists. Plenty of fine and gross motor therapy for all, heh.

All told we had about 25 people at the party and everyone seemed to have a great time. Sylvie enjoyed herself but seemed mostly oblivious to the fact that the party was for her. Still, she did run around saying "happy birthday! happy birthday!" at random intervals which was adorable. I managed to get a party hat on her (briefly) and she cracked up at her reflection and said "happy birthday!" a few more times because the pointy hat symbolizes birthdays to her ever since we attended baby Bryce's 1st birthday in December where many of the guests wore the hats.

We had one minor upset during the cupcake eating when Sylvie gagged and threw up. The mess was mostly contained on her booster seat tray and we were able to whisk her off to the bathroom for cleanup and a change so quickly that almost no one knew what had happened. We kept an eye on her for a bit but after a while we thought (as it turns out, incorrectly) that it was just a case of 'too much birthday' as she went right back to being her smiley self. When it came time to open presents, Sylvie was pretty 'meh' about it but Sara's enthusiasm as our self-designated helper more than made up for her lack of interest. Sylvie received many fabulous gifts including cool clothes, fun books, art supplies, a scribbly spiral pen, a wooden sandwich set, character dress-up magnets featuring Elmo and Zoe, a bucket o' play-doh fun...(plus many other things that I hope the people who gave them will not be offended by my not listing!)

The party eventually wound down and everyone headed home. Randy and Alayna stayed a bit longer and helped with the clean-up (thanks guys!) before they too departed. All was right with the world until later that night, about 2 hours after Sylvie had gone to bed, when suddenly we heard her coughing...followed by the unmistakable sound of her vomiting. Turns out the cupcake upchuck from earlier in the day was not an isolated incident as we'd hoped because the poor girl was unhappy-go-pukey all through the wee hours of the morning. This also alerted us that Sylvie's birthday soiree that day had been a possible disease vector because it was a little too coincidental that Theron had puked his guts out 2 nights prior and that he'd likely had a GI bug and not just food poisoning as we'd originally believed. (We learned later that only one party guest ended up being sick as well and her parents thought she could just as easily have gotten it from another friend she saw that same day.)

Sylvie stopped throwing up around dawn but was completely wiped the whole next day and developed a high but short lived fever of 102 that afternoon. I made sure to keep her hydrated and cooled her off with a damp cloth during the worst of the fever and after a good nights rest she was much better the following day.

Welcome Siobhan Elysées Flora!

2008-01-13T23:27:00.000-05:00

For the second time in less than a week, I have another birth annnouncement! Happy Day and *!!congratulations!!* this time to our dear friends Christy and Jay on the birth today of their daughter, Siobhan Elysées Flora Fedosoff! Siobahn arrived at 8:23pm and weighed in at a respectable 7lb 15oz.

Welcome Edward Lowe!

2008-01-09T23:04:00.000-05:00

Happy Day and *!!congratulations!!* to my cousin Chloe and Rich the proud papa on the birth today of their son, Edward (Eddie) Lowe Hincman! Eddie arrived at 3:44pm (central time) and weighed in at a respectable 7lb 8oz and measured 21 1/4".

A Sad Goodbye

2007-11-24T14:19:00.000-05:00

Smudge suddenly appeared to be in great distress yesterday afternoon: yowling, cringing in the corner and having problems walking. We took her to our local vet who then recommended we take her to the animal ER a few towns over. Both the local vet and the ER vet said that Smudge appeared to be having some sort of neurological issue. She'd lost control of her bladder twice, once at each vet and was extremely upset and disoriented unless holding absolutely still. The first vet noted that one of her legs did not respond to pain and the other one just barely. The second vet noted this and also that she did not react to stimuli to her face and did not seem to "know where her hind legs were." The second vet said that it was possible she had a brain tumor or meningitis or something else entirely but that they'd have to perform an MRI to see...and if that showed nothing, they'd have to do a spinal tap. The cost for the diagnostic tests alone were looking to run upwards of $3000-4000 with a high likelihood of showing her case to be terminal anyway. So it was with a breaking heart that I decided to go ahead and have her put to sleep. The vet said that she agreed it was the best course of action. It was so awful because Smudge had been fine just that morning!!! Theron, Sylvie and I were able to say a final goodbye and we were there with her when she got the overdose of sedative. This was the first time in my life that I was there...that I had to make the final decision and it is really, truly awful. I sobbed the whole time and here I am going again dammit. Maybe some of you might think well she was just a cat, but she really was one of the sweetest, most loving creatures I've ever known. Even people who didn't like cats liked Smudge. She was my friend for over 11 years and I so wish we could have done more to help her get better.

Goodbye sweet kitty. I love you very much.

Why living in Taxachusset is a GOOD thing aka the post with many abbreviations

2007-11-07T17:37:00.000-05:00

Sorry for leaving it so long between updates, especially after the events of this past September. At least I'm sure you all know that no news is good news, right? Anyway, Sylvie is doing fantastically well and is pretty much fully recovered from her surgery. Most of the swelling is gone and the scar is healing nicely. We saw the pediatrician today and she recommended rubbing Mederma on the scar to help fade it. We saw the cardiologist last week and he had Sylvie's chest xrayed --which she hates with a PASSION--for the zillionth time. She fought so hard during the xrays that two adults (me and a tech) couldn't hold her still so they finally had to put her in a contraption that enclosed her torso and forced her arms up over her head. She was seriously pissed about that and I certainly didn't care for it but it was necessary to get clear xrays. Upon review of the films, the doctor said it appeared that although he couldn't hear it through the stethoscope, she still had some excess fluid in her lungs. Not a big deal but she has to continue taking the Lasix and we're to go back and see him in another month.

How many therapists?
Because of Sylvie's Noonan's diagnosis and because of the developmental delays that can be associated with such a diagnosis, Sylvie has been seeing an occupational therapist (OT) and a developmental specialist. She also recently started seeing a physical therapist (PT) ans a speech therapist (ST). Each of these therapists comes for one hour, one day a week. All of this is through Early Intervention (EI). EI services are only provided up til age 3 when the public school system takes over and Sylvie has been receiving them since she was about 10 months. Payment is based on income bracket and ours is a whopping $60 for the year. She also attends a 2.5 hr playgroup every Monday through EI...they even provide a bus service that takes her to and from the playgroup. Not bad, eh? We also have begun attending a free, once a week music and movement class through the Malden/Everett Family Network. The class is 1.5hrs and they give us lunch! And a new toy (so far a mini kickball and a cheapie electric drum) every week!

On the advise of EI, we also recently had Sylvie assessed by Building Blocks. If you click on the link you'll see that they specialize in kids who are on the autism spectrum. We decided to do the assessment because Sylvie seemed to be displaying a few of the red flags associated with autism; seeming to become less, rather than more, verbal and less willing to make eye contact. There was nothing terribly off, but we thought it would be better to get it checked. The lady who did the evaluation said that while Sylvie has many strong skills she would like to see her socializing better and engaging in more imaginative play. She says that while she does not think Sylvie is autistic, she believes that she has Pervasive developmental disorder not otherwise specified (PDDnos) A diagnosis which is often given when all the criteria for autism or Asperger's syndrome have not been met but the child's difficulties are of the kind found within the spectrum of autistic disorder. As a result, on top of the 4 EI therapists she sees weekly, Sylvie will now have a 5th therapist working with her 2hrs a day, 3 days a week! When I mentioned this new diagnosis to her pediatrician today the doctor was incredulous, saying that Sylvie does not seem at all like any of her other patients with PDDnos. She also said that she thinks PDDnos is often "diagnosed" just so a kid can get the services. All I know is that enough people who are experts on child development have suggested that Sylvie would benefit from such services, so since she's getting 'em, we're taking 'em!

As I stated earlier, these services will only continue until Sylvie turns 3 whereupon it becomes the public school system's responsibility to address any delays or difficulties she may still have. There is a practically brand new preschool just a little over a mile away from us that from all reports is excellent. It opened just 4 years ago and is solely a preschool. Apparently the waiting list to get into this place is huge but because of Sylvie's "special needs" she gets an automatic spot. We had a meeting with the school just last week so they could assess Sylvie and see just what kind of needs she might have that would need to be addressed and we're supposed to go back sometime next month to go over their findings and create an Indivual Education Plan (IEP) for when Sylvie turns 3 and begins to attend the school. Hard to believe, but she'll be 3 in just over 4 months!

All of this talk of Sylvie's delays/issues/special needs sounds a lot scarier and upsetting then it is. I believe that our girl is one smart cookie and I doubt very much that these "delays" will have any effect on Sylvie achieving whatever she sets out to do in life. Sylvie has actually been a lot better about making eye contact and she is FINALLY starting to put two words together, if only rarely: "sing me" "help me". Though she may not be making sentences yet, her vocabulary is really rather extensive. She doesn't shy away from multisylliballic words, thats for sure : Heh'copter! Ock'puss! 'Nocerous! and though I haven't heard it myself, Theron claims she's said Ridiculous! several times...probably quoting from her Teletubbies book that has been loved almost to shreds. She quotes from it constantly saying "jabberjabberjabber 'tubbies jabber jabber veh much. Bih' Hug!" (Translation: Teletubbies love each other, very much. Big Hug!) She's really into fish right now and when Theron took her to the aquarium this past weekend, she was ecstatic, pointing in the tank and saying, "shock! tuh'tul! FISH!" Theron even called and left me a message so I could hear her excitedly naming the various sea creatures but sadly there was too much background noise for me to make it out.

Watch the video below to see Sylvie naming her sea creature magnets!

POTTY TRAINING...Hooray#1!

2007-10-20T15:40:00.000-04:00

**WARNING: possible TMI ahead!**

This afternoon we had the first successful "deposit" in the potty...and also the SECOND!!! While she didn't exactly indicate that she needed to go, the air had become perfumed with "the funk" (as we like to call it) and she was squatting and grunting a bit so I ran her to the potty. Once seated, nothing happened for a few minutes so I distracted her with Where is Thumbkin? until --at last!--the pooping commenced. I clapped and cheered for her and as she is very self affirming, she clapped for herself also. She started grunting again about 40 minutes later so I put her back on the potty and although she did get a few nuggets out before she was seated, most of it went where it should. Much clapping and cheering again ensued. Yay, POOP!!! in the POTTY!!! NO DON'T TOUCH IT!!!

*flussssh*

Welcome to the world, Wee Cousin Wallis!

2007-10-19T14:43:00.000-04:00

Congratulations to Chad and Lindsey on the birth today of their son, Carmine Dante!!! He was born at 9:30 am this morning weighing in at 8lbs 7oz and measuring 20" long. (I'll add a photo once the proud parents have a chance to get some posted.) Much love to you all and we can hardly wait to meet the little guy!

POTTY TRAINING Day #1

2007-10-11T11:44:00.000-04:00

Current score:
Oopses 3
Hurrays 0

So one trial is over and a new one begins...the dreaded potty training! We started off the morning watching a DVD called "It's Potty Time." Then I put her in some big girl undies (which are really much too big altho they were the smallest I've been able to find). So far today, we've had a poop and 2 pees...none of which was in the potty. However, I have been able to get Sylvie to sit on her potty for upwards of 10 minutes at a go by reading to her. I am plying her with peanut butter and goldfish to amp up her thirstiness and keeping her sippy cup at the ready. Also at the ready: paper towels & antibacterial wipes! I'll try and post further updates as events warrant.

Sylvie's Surgery Care Page. Read the daily updates.

2007-09-26T11:25:00.000-04:00

(Theron filling in for Paige) With no allowance of cell phone usage and spotty wireless internet reception inside the ICU, we haven't had a lot of contact with the outside world for updates on Sylvie's condition. We are sorry about that. Paige started up a Care Page (you'll have to create an account first) for Sylvie where we can update on the odd moment we can get away from the room. Invites for the page were sent out to everyone we could think of...only to find out lots of folks never got them. So if you are interested, take this time to jump over to the Care Page and read the details as the unfold.

Happy 28th Auntie Manda!

2007-09-11T21:59:00.000-04:00

Long overdue update

2007-09-11T20:23:00.000-04:00

Hi all.
I know I've really not been great about keeping up with the blogging for several months now and when I have it's been mostly "hey look what I can do" type stuff when I know that all you really want to see is "hey look what Sylvie can do!"

The answer to that is A LOT.

She's like a little monkey these days, climbing on and off furniture and up and down stairs...with supervision of course. She loves running around in our back yard or taking a stroll around the block. Unfortunately, she also loves picking things up off the floor/ground: hair, rocks, dirt, sand, lint, paper...this kid will eat almost anything if I don't keep an eagle eye on her. Even if I do keep a close watch, she's so quick that I still have spent time scooping crud out of her mouth. GAH! I hope this phase ends soon. I understand that small children learn a great deal via sensations but I just wish our child didn't favor so many new 'taste sensations' of non-food items!

She has long been over her Elmo obsession and now prefers the Teletubbies. She'll drag me to the TV at various times of day demanding, "Tubbies! Tubbies!" and I have to explain to her again that we don't have Tivo or On Demand (or cable) like our friends so we can only see the Tubbies at their regularly scheduled time. I fear this mostly goes over her head at this point though, heh. She doesn't much care for when the Tubbie tummy TV segment happens, but she performs her signature dance move (spinning in a circle) when they do their little synchronized dance. She has a Po doll that she loves and calls "Tubbie" and a Teletubbie book that she never tires of having read to her.

When she sees her reflection she says "Sylvie!" and when she's in the mood, she loves to give kisses. She'll turn your face to hers and purse her lips while making an 'mmm' sound. After you kiss her, she'll push your face away, then turn it back to her and repeat the process, sometimes several times in a row.

Her two most favorite toys right now are Bruin Bear and her Touch and Teach Busy Books. She asks for--and will play with--these all day long if we let her. It was a little monotonous for me at first but now I can pretty much block them out. (They tend to make Theron a little crazy however.)

My least favorite subject that I can't stop talking about
Surgery day (Sept 24) fast approaches...too fast and yet not fast enough. I don't want it to happen at all, but since it has to I want it to be OVER. We got our "Congratulations! Your child will be having open heart surgery with us soon!" packet in the mail from the hospital recently. It contained several brochures on the various areas of the hospital that we'll be intimately acquainted with. Sylvie's pre-op appointment in Sept 21 and will last 6-8 hours as they do various tests which may include while not limited to: echocardiogram, EKG, chest x-ray, blood work, cardiac MRI and lung scan. We will also meet with members of the cardiovascular team (which may include): cardiologist, nurse practitioner, cardiac anesthesia, cardiac surgeon and child life specialist. If we so desire (which I think we will) we'll be able to tour the Cardiac ICU and Cardiac Step-Down Unit. Sounds like a fun-filled day doesn't it? Then we get to go home and spend the weekend trying not to lose our shit.

While we can't help but be freaked out about the upcoming surgery, we are comforted by the knowledge that Children's Hospital Boston is a leader in the field of cardiovascular surgery, and they have a site specifically to help children and their families cope. It also helps that I have friends whose children also had surgical procedures performed there who have shared their experiences with me and have told me that both the staff and the care that their kids received were exemplary.

You can help support Children's Hospital by donating here.

In other hospitalization news
Sylvie's second cousin Abby came home today after being released from the hospital. She was admitted this past week with dangerously high blood sugar and later diagnosed with Type I Diabetes. Luckily, she's recovering nicely and seems to be dealing with the necessary life changes remarkably well for such a young lady. As someone who is needle-phobic (especially when I was a kid) I know I would have been a basket case! Welcome home Abby and know that you've got a lot of people praying for you :)

Please donate today to help fund diabetes research.

On a much happier note
Theron and I have FINALLY gotten new bedroom furniture. For those of you who don't know, we've been sleeping on our mattress and boxspring directly on the floor for over a year. We've really wanted a platform bed and weren't having much luck finding one we liked in stores so we scoured the internet until we found a great deal on 3 pieces of this set. We got the bed, the 5 drawer chest and a 2 drawer nightstand which just arrived last week.

Sylvie has some newish furniture too! We found a used set for less than a quarter of the retail price on craigslist thanks to our friend Marla. She had just acquired the same set (for $10!) on craigslist and Sylvie really liked it when we visited on Friday and she (Marla) told me she'd seen another set available. According to the guy we got it from, his family had owned it for 8 years and 4 kids and yet the thing looks hardly used at all now that Theron scrubbed off the crayon marks...for Sylvie to replace with her own!

Snake Bouquet - my second featured design on shirt.woot!

2007-09-11T10:56:00.000-04:00

Check it out here. $10 today only, then still available for a limited time for $15.

(Non-shirt design related post coming soon, I promise.)

You wanna piece of me?!

2007-08-06T09:36:00.000-04:00

Then buy my shirt : Sci-Fi Weenie Roast! Get it today to lock in the low, low price of $10! (Tomorrow it goes up to $15)

*UPDATE aka Wa-HOOO!*

SCARFACE pictures, yay!

2007-07-11T14:29:00.001-04:00

Happy !60th! Birthday G'pa Dave!

2007-07-03T13:50:00.000-04:00

Is it just me or does he look more and more like Wilford Brimley (albeit thinner and with more hair)? Eat all the Quaker Oats you want dad, but please try not to get the diabeetus, m'kay?

Love ya!

Just call me SCARFACE

2007-07-02T17:17:00.000-04:00

Today I went and had a small cyst excised from the side of my face. It wasn't a huge lump, but it had the potential to grow so I figured it would be better to remove it before it got any bigger. When I consulted with the dermatologist initially, he wanted to make sure I understood that removing the cyst WOULD LEAVE A SCAR. No, really?!

He told me it shouldn't be a big scar, maybe about a centimeter or so, but for some reason he kept saying it over and over. He asked me if I was really sure I'd prefer the scar over the lump and I said heck yeah because then I can tell people I got it in a fencing duel.

*CAUTION: If you are easily grossed out you might want to skip this next paragraph*

The procedure itself was pretty quick and relatively painless. After he placed some covering around the site, he swabbed the lump down with betadine and then injected lidocaine 5 times in a circle around the cyst. As some of you know, I have had somewhat of a terror of needles from an early age and yet the knowledge that a needle was being repeatedly injected into my face was somehow not that disturbing. It hurt like hades at first, kind of a burning sensation when the lidocaine went into the skin, but after the 3rd shot it was pretty well numbed up. After that, I didn't feel much but pressure and a pulling sensation (somewhat like I imagine a face lift would feel). Then I could hear him scraping the cyst away from the underlying tissue which seemed very loud. He had told me earlier that if he left any fragments of the cyst behind then each piece would likely develop into a new cyst---YIKES!--but he was able to pull the cyst sac out intact. At my request, he showed me the cyst and it was yellowish-white and about the size of a small store-bought blueberry. Are you retching yet? If not, check out this other dude's cyst removal surgery on youtube!

Goofiness

2007-06-19T20:28:00.000-04:00

Paige Wallis --

[noun]:

A person who is a master of making ravioli

'How will you be defined in the dictionary?' at QuizGalaxy.com

Guess I should have studied the culinary arts instead of the visual arts, huh?

May Sylvie photos

2007-06-11T13:18:00.000-04:00

Pictures...now with extra PDA!
Here at long last what I know you've all been waiting for, the photos for this past May! And let me tell you, there are some pretty darn cute ones this time. We visited Boston Commons and the public Garden with pals Sara and Peyton and us moms succumbed to a typical tourist photo op and snapped some shots of our offspring astride some of the duckling statues commemorating the classic children's book Make Way for Ducklings. I also got some cute photos of Sylvie and Sara sitting in the "picture spot" in Sara's house and some of Sylvie with Peyton slip slidin' away at a local playground. The absolute best shots for May though are of Sylvie and Peyton being VERY huggy while cooling off in Peyton's back yard. They were just so friggin' cute! These two kids have always been physically affectionate, hugging and holding hands (without any prompting for Kelly or I) but this time it was a marathon hugging session.

Medical Updates
Sylvie recently saw a neurologist because of concern that she'd possibly been experiencing absence seizures. On a few rare occasion, I had noticed Sylvie 'spacing out' for periods that seemed (to my admittedly untrained eye)to be longer than normal wool-gathering. My mother also noticed an episode while visiting a while back. Because of Sylvie's diagnosis, combined with a family history of epilepsy, it was recommended that she see a neurologist and have an EEG. My sister had had several EEGs because of her epilepsy (which she has since outgrown, which happens in some cases) and I had had one because of migraine headaches so i knew that the test wasn't painful or really a big deal. Sylvie was slightly fussy, but mostly cooperative while the technician applied the electrodes to her scalp. We'd been told to bring her in somewhat sleep deprived as part of the test needed to be conducted while she was asleep. Apparently we did a good job because she zonked before the tech was done applying the electrodes. After about 15 minutes or so they had to wake her up in order to get a wakeful reading as well and she was not happy about that at all. Despite Sylvie being cranky about her abbreviated nap, the test went smoothly and quickly and she even stayed fairly agreeable while the electrodes were removed. (The tech then did a partial hair wash to remove the goo that had held the electrodes in place but there was still alot left. In fact, it's been over a week now and despite sveral more washings, there is STILL some goo in her hair, but I have faith that it will all come out eventually!) We were told that the neurologist would examine the readout and get back to us in a week or so with the results, but he actually called the next day and said that the test was completely normal. Yay! While I know that the scan would only be indicative of epilepsy if she'd had a seizure recently and it's possible that she has had seizures, I'm not really going to worry about it. I've only noticed the 'space outs' a couple of times and I think if it was really a problem then they'd occur more frequently. And sometimes, a 'space out' is just a 'space out'!

Sylvie also saw her cardiologist recently and had an EKG and an echocardiogram. She'd had both of these tests before and (with the aid of a pinwheel and a sticky blue lizard toy and an Elmo DVD respectively) was pretty cooperative during them. When her cardiologist came to discuss the results with us he said everything looked the same as before which was what he expected. Then he said what I've been expecting/fearing he would say: there was no good reason delay surgery to repair the defects (which I previously discussed here). He also said it wasn't necessary to do it now either but that it would need to be done eventually, and kids Sylvie's age typically recovered quicker after surgery. Theron and I had discussed the future likelihood of Sylvie having heart surgery and we both agreed that we wanted it done while we were still in the Boston area since Children's Hospital has some of the best doctors in the world and also before we had another child. We both know that the surgery will be an extremely stressful event for us, but at least Sylvie should be mostly oblivious to what's happening because of her age. From what the cardiologist told me, one of the reasons he is encouraging the surgery now is because young children don't seem to have the same 'psychic' pain during recovery as older children or adults do because they don't realize that it's in any way strange to be up and playing the day after open heart surgery!

I know all about that 'psychic' pain because words like "open heart surgery" and "heart/lung machine" would frankly scare the shit out of me when used in relation to anyone I care about...but especially our tiny sweet child. I held it together at first while talking to the doctor, but while we were going over the step by step for the day of surgery I lost it for a bit. I'm sure these doctors are used to the reaction given their line of work and he was very compassionate and reassuring. He said that there were several surgeons at Children's that just did this kind of operation, that they were all topnotch and that Sylvie would most likely be out of the hospital less than a week after the surgery. I occasionally read a blog called Wonderbliss written by a woman whose son was born with a severe heart defect and has had a couple--and will require more--heart surgeries. I'm sure that Sylvie will make it through the surgery just fine but reading the stories this women posts as well as seeing photos of her healthy, thriving (and adorable!) son helps to ease the fear I can't help but feel.

We don't have an exact date yet, but the surgery will be sometime in September. I'll keep you posted.

On a brighter note...
Sylvie's first ever dance recital is this Saturday! They don't allow photos or video during the actual recital but the dress rehersal was on Monday and we got some photos and video then of Sylvie's group shaking their maracas (no really) to Jump in the Line. Sylvie did not seem the least bit fazed by being on stage under blinding lights and blaring music but neither did she seem to care to perform, preferring instead to watch the other girls in her troupe, but she still looked very cute in her costume! We'll have photos--and maybe even a bit of video!--posted soon.

Gimme a high 5!

2007-05-28T18:45:00.000-04:00

All right folks, the time has come to gimme a high 5! (But only if you really think the designs deserves it.) Click on the images below to vote for In one ear, out the other and Crab Raccoon!

(Alas, the above submission did not last more than 24 hrs having been removed from voting due to a low score. Hopefully Crab Raccoon and Monster Truck will fair better! If you were really hoping to own a shirt bearing the ear illustration...I'm obligated by threadless to wait 90 days after submitting a design before removing it and making it available elsewhere so check my cafepress store in about 3 months!)

*UPDATE*

Here is one more design that I've submitted: Green Eyed Monster Truck Rally. Personally, it's my favorite of the three I've entered so far. It has to be preapproved before it's opened up for voting (which takes 4-8 days) but you can go ahead and preview it by clicking on the image. Make sure to check back within the next week to see when voting has started so that you can cast yours!

Happy Birthday Cousin Jack!

2007-05-27T23:12:00.000-04:00

Hard to believe but Cousin Jack is ONE YEAR OLD today, hooray! We've got prezzies for you Jack, but we haven't sent them just yet because we want to get 1 or 2 (or 3..) more but they'll be on the way to you soon. Lot and lots of love from Auntie Paige, Uncle Theron and Cousin Sylvie XOXOX

One more 'Get Rich Quick' scheme (yeah, right)

2007-05-22T17:07:00.000-04:00

Another day, another website that has caught my eye.

This time it is threadless.com, a site which sells graphic tees featuring some pretty kickass art. What particularly intrigued me about this site is that anyone can submit designs for the tees, have them critiqued, and then submit them for voting. People then can give your design a score from 0-5. Designs with the highest average score after a week are then in the running to be chosen by the folks at threadless as a new printed design. The very, very best part of the process is that if your design is chosen...you get beaucoup bucks! $1500 smack-a-roos! Not exactly chump change, especially considering that I've made less than $100 so far from all of the designs on my cafepress store, (which, btw, I'm not giving up on).

Anyway, I figured why not sub a few designs and see what happens? At the very least I'll get some feedback on my illustrations, which is nice.

Here are my first two efforts, currently in the critiquing phase:

Crab Raccoon
In one ear, out the other

Please let me know what you think, good or bad!

Help Theron (and Sylvie!) raise money for AIDS research

2007-05-17T09:49:00.000-04:00

Dear Friends and Family:

I hope this letter finds you happy and healthy. I am writing to tell you about a challenge I have taken on and to ask for your help. On June 3, 2007 I will be walking with over 10,000 other people in the AIDS Walk Boston 2007, benefiting AIDS Action Committee.

In addition to committing my time and spirit for this event, I have committed to raising money for the 22nd AIDS Walk Boston that will go to the AIDS Action Committee of Massachusetts (AAC) to help provide needed services to people living with HIV/AIDS. AIDS Action provides housing/legal assistance; meals and social support; rent and utilities assistance, just to name a few. AAC is also involved in essential advocacy and policy efforts on current issues such as passing the statewide needle exchange legislation or increasing funds for HIV/AIDS services. These programs and services are in need of funds, and I hope to be able to generate some through my efforts and your generosity.

It is faster and easier than ever to support this great cause - you can make your donation online by simply visiting my personal walk page. When determining your donation amount please keep in mind the BIG commitment I have made.

Maybe making a donation on my behalf isn't for you? Maybe you'd like to join me as a participant! You can register on the website listed below as well as learn more about the event.

I hope that you'll support me in this effort. Check out the Walk online.

Thank you in advance for your generosity!

Sincerely,

theron wallis
To donate online, please click here.

(In case you were wondering why I'm not participating, it's because I'll be out of town that weekend visiting a friend)

Five Years and counting

2007-05-16T14:13:00.000-04:00

Last Friday marked the fifth anniversary of our wedding. As they say, time does fly. My mother, who was visiting, stayed home with Sylvie while Theron and I went out to celebrate with a swanky dinner. (Being a SAHM, I'm generally a jeans and tshirt gal so it was nice to have a reason to dress up a bit. And because I am a maudlin sentimentalist, I wore the same dress that I wore the night before our wedding at our rehersal dinner...yay it still fits!)

We shared a bottle of Asti Spumante while we enjoyed our seafood and chatted comfortably like the old married folk we are. At one point I heard the John Denver song "Rocky Mountain High" playing over the sound system, which seemed like a funny song to be playing at a fancy seafood joint looking out over Boston harbor. "Annie's Song" would have been much more appropriate all the way around, since, as those of you who attended the ceremony know, it is the first song we danced to.

We are very aware that have a great deal to be thankful for: A happy marriage (despite occasional squabbles), an adorable daughter (despite occasional tantrums), good health (mostly, more on that in a sec), loving family and friends that we can count on it times of crisis. This last blessing was especially brought home to us when what could have been a major life changing event occurred this past March: Theron suffered a minor stroke. For those of you just finding this out, please be assured that there is no need for alarm; Theron is COMPLETELY recovered without even having to undergo any sort of speech or physical therapy.

He was on his way to work one morning when he started to feel 'funny' and realized we was veering into the hedge lining the sidewalk. He made it to the corner where he decided to sit down and try to figure out what was wrong. his right side went entirely numb, no feeling whatsoever, and he collapsed onto the ground. Luckily, it was a high traffic area and lots of people were on their way to work so some folks came to his aid immediately and dialed 911. He said that by the time he was being lifted into the ambulance, he'd regained most if not all feeling on his right side but that he couldn't seem to communicate very well. He was rushed to the hospital where they proceeded to do a battery of tests on him. He was able to call in to his work and tell them he wouldn't be in and then called me to fill me on. Obviously I was horrified because even though they had yet to come out and say he'd had a stroke at that point, it sure sounded like he'd had one from his description. He sounded almost normal on the phone but I could tell something was off in his speech. I was somewhat relieved that Theron sounded mostly ok, but still incredibly freaked out. Do 32 year old men in good shape normally have strokes??? What exactly had happened? WHY? What did this all mean long term?

I wanted to go to him right away but he said to wait because they were still doing tests and hadn't put him in a room yet; he'd call me again when he was settled. I figured that when I did go it would be better to leave Sylvie with someone because for all I knew he could end up in an ICU where children aren't usually allowed. So I called up our close (literally and figuratively) friend Amanda. She in turn got a hold of her husband Sean and filled him in. He offered to leave work early to come take me to the hospital while Amanda stayed at our place with her baby Bryce and watched Sylvie. So once I knew Theron had a room we did exactly that.

Despite having had a stroke, being poked multiple times with needles (including 2 IVs), Theron seemed pretty good. The only obvious sign that something had happened was inability to clearly communicate all the time. His speech wasn't slurred, but he had trouble thinking of the right word, at one point substituting 'mayonnaise' for 'artery'. He was aware that he was saying the wrong word at times and was very frustrated about it. He was put in the Neurology ICU overnight in case of another stroke, but moved back to a regular room (still in the stroke unit) the next day. Though the doctors initially thought he'd require speech therapy, his speech improved rapidly and was almost completely back to normal the next day. With the continued help of Sean and Amanda, as well as our friends Joanna and Dave and my cousin Randy, (Thanks again all of you!!!) I was able to see Theron every day he was in the hospital while knowing that Sylvie was well looked after. I did bring her in to see Theron once for a short visit, but her toddler energy could only be restrained for so long before she wanted to go exploring and we had to say our goodbyes for the day.

Amazingly, Theron was released from the hospital in less than a week. He initially had to give himself injections twice a day as well as take the pills he's still on in order to get a certain level of the medication in his bloodstream. A visiting nurse would come every few days to check on him and take a blood sample to test the level of meds. In fairly short order, the home visits and self-injections ended but Theron still has to go get his blood drawn once a week for now to monitor the levels. The good people he works with showed great concern over his and even sent us a ginormous fruit basket. He was out of work for 2 weeks but has since returned with no problems.

While Theron was still in the hospital, we were told a variety of things about what had happened and why so we were a bit confused. We knew he had a stroke for sure but a lot of the details were still fuzzy to us since the doctors themselves were still assessing all of his test results. After a recent follow up visit, many things were cleared up. In a nutshell, what happened is that Theron developed a dissected carotid artery, probably from a blow to the neck. The doctors told us that it could have been received in a car accident (which he hasn't been in since he was a teenager), via playing contact sports (which he doesn't)or even simply rough housing with Sylvie. It definitely was NOT from all those times I karate-chopped him in the neck. (Yes, I'm kidding.) Basically we don't know how he got the injury in the first place and probably never will, but at least we know that it was more of a fluke occurrence and not anything to do with some undiagnosed congenital defect or disease.

Anyway, while the injury healed, it developed a clot which broke loose and went to Theron's brain, causing the stroke. The medicine he takes is an anticoagulant to prevent any further clots from forming while the injury finishes healing. The doctors will scan his carotid again in a few months to ascertain it's state of repair and hopefully Theron will be able to discontinue his medication by this fall if not sooner.

As I said, we have very many things to be grateful for. I am especially grateful for the fact that I didn't lose the love of my life and that he came through the other side of this potentially cataclysmic event 100% intact; that we were still able to do something as simple as go out for dinner on our 5th anniversary and to toast the times past and the times yet to come.

I love you very much Theron.

April Sylvie photos

2007-05-05T22:55:00.000-04:00

Not many good photos for April I'm afraid. Sylvie has become somewhat camera shy...or at least almost always manages to move so I get a photo of the top or back of her head. This one was taken during a visit to the ICA.

Spring is finally here!!!

2007-04-24T22:25:00.000-04:00

More cafepress shop yammering
I know I haven't posted very much lately but ya see, when I have spare time to get on the computer--which as the mother of a toddler is getting less and less frequent--I tend to use the time to work on new designs for my shop. While I'm not exactly raking in the dough, I have had some modest success with my Make Everyday Earth Day design and I've made enough sales to be within a few dollars of paying for a full years shop fees...and that's just in the first two months! Even more incredibly, the bulk of my customers have been total strangers! Look out Old Navy!

Ha ha ha...er, ahem, yeah.

But seriously, I'm constantly adding new stuff to the shop so please check back every so often to see what's new. In fact I've just today added a Cinco de Mayo design and there's several Mother's Day designs if you're looking to get your mom (or yourself if you have ungrateful wretches for children, heh) something a little different this year. Wink, wink nudge, nudge..I'll say no more 'bout that.

Yay Spring!
It's taken a while but spring has finally, really and truly sprung around here. Magnolia trees are laden with fragrant blossoms, daffodils wave their sunny heads in the breeze and those little yellow flowers on the viney tree shrub things (obviously I don't what they're called) are like visually delicious pats of butter dotting the local landscape. Mmm...tasy, tasty spring.

Yay dirt!
Sylvie and I have been hitting the playground every day where she mostly prefers to play in the pebbles. I've been trying not to hover so much when she does go on the playground equipment but it's hard. She has no fear really, but does seem to be aware of drop offs and steps and navigates them with care. It's amazing and wonderful to see how much more capable she is on the equipment now. Her real love currently though is to grub in the dirt/sand/pebbles. She seems to relish the feeling of different textures running through her fingers. Theron and I took her to the Stone Zoo on Earth Day and she was far more interested in playing in the mulch then in looking at the animals. Maybe we have a budding landscape artist on our hands?

March Sylvie Photos

2007-04-02T16:47:00.000-04:00

If you aren't completely blinded by this photo of Sylvie in her dance recital outfit, you can see more March photos of our darling girl here.

More shameless self promotion

2007-03-19T21:24:00.000-04:00

Here we see the lovely Sylvie modeling her soothedbyrainfall designer original.

ImageKind Sale!

2007-03-18T21:20:00.000-04:00

If any of y'all are thinking about possibly ordering a framed print from my ImageKind store, you can get 20% off of custom framing through March 23 with the promo code: SPRING.

Just sayin'...

Holycrap-olageeWOW! Sylvie's done gone and turned TWO!

2007-03-17T20:51:00.000-04:00

While we kinda sorta went all out last year for Sylvie's birthday--lots-o balloons, first birthday themed napkins and tablecloth with color coordinated cups and plates and even a bunch of tulips--this year we kept it low key. So low key in fact that we did nothing, heh. Well, I did make some cupcakes but it wasn't until the Wednesday following her birthday on a Sunday.

As you can see from February's photos, Sylvie is doing fantastically well. She's finally topped 20lbs (and 2oz!) and is 31" long/tall. At a follow up visit last week with GI, the doctor was very pleased with Sylvie's growth and said that after one more follow up in 4-6 months, we would likely be able to drop her from our list of specialists! Yay! Now that she has some teeth (8) with 2 more soon to pop through, she's really enjoying foods with crunch, like apple or bell pepper strips.

Sylvie seems somewhat stuck at the single word stage of talking. I figure she thinks she's gotten by pretty well with one word/sign and pointing...why upgrade? Long strings of indecipherable jargon still spill from her mouth on a regular basis though so I have faith that one of these days soon the mommy/daddy translator node will kick on in her brain. She likes to use action words while doing the actions, or at least her version of the action. For example: "Kick! Kick!"--said while kicking a ball around the house or "Jump!"--said while throwing her arms up in the air and occasionally kicking one leg out simultaneously. She does the "Jump!" one a lot at dance class.

A new trick she has learned is to grab us by the hand and lead us to whatever snack/activity she is currently interested in. Or sometimes she'll just take us for walks around the house with no apparent destination. I think she just likes asserting her perceived (well ok, at least some of that perception is accurate) control over us. Another newish trick is that she can do all of the accompanying motions to "Itsy Bitsy Spider" and she even says some of the lyrics while doing it! A sample:
Eesee beesee...raaaaain...dowwwwwn...suuun...eeseebeesee...all said in her most serious voice.

We have yet to start serious toilet training but we did buy her a new-fangled talking potty. She likes to play with all it's bells and whistles (and there are A LOT) and she even understands that she needs to lift the lid before sitting on the seat. She likes to go sit on it after she's pooped, but at least she seems to have the general idea. I'm planning to start training her once it's warmed up a little so that there will be less layers of clothes for her to have to struggle with.

Thank any-and-all-deities for the wonderful childproofing products available at Babies R Us! She's all about opening doors and drawers (while saying, "Opeeen...Shut!"), turning knobs and dials and pushing buttons. We've 'proofed the stove dials, all but one kitchen cabinet (which contains no toxic cleaners or easily breakable cookware), the entertainment center and the bathroom cupboard. Sadly, there are still many things that she attempts to get into or play with that have no such protective shields and so like the most parent's of toddlers, I spend the majority of my day following her around saying: No, no Sylvie...don't touch!...leave the kitty's tail alone...etc.

The cutest/scariest new development? Interest in boys. We had a couple of little male friends come play recently and Sylvie suddenly morphed into this super giggly, huggy girl. When her friend Riley came over, she was at first wary, as was he, but after about 10 minutes or so they were all over each other! Hugging, wrestling, tickling, even pushing each other around on a little car. Sylvie interacts a little with best pal Sara, but nothing like this! then when new friend Peyton came for a playdate, she was instantly hugging on him which seemed to cause him some distress at first. Luckily, he warmed up to her and on subsequent playdates has hugs her, offers her snacks and even holds her hand. In fact, when Peyton's mom Kelly drove us all to the Science Museum (where we met up with Marla, Sara, Carrie and Simone), Sylvie and Peyton held hands in the car most of the way there and back. How cute is that?

Buy prints of my art online!

2007-02-28T17:42:00.000-05:00

I got a wild hair that maybe I could make an occasional extra buck or two by taking advantage of one of these online sites that allows you to upload images of artwork for printing on pretty much anything. I was all set to create an online store with cafepress.com (which I may still do for my more graphic/illustrative stuff) when my pal Sean sent me a link to this website which I thought was better suited to selling fine art prints of my work. While CafePress is cheaper, it only has the most basic framing option for prints whereas ImageKind allows potential buyers to pick and choose from a variety of mats and frames.

It's a loooong, slooow process to upload the hi-res images so I've only uploaded five so far, all watercolors. Later I'll add some of my more arty photographs and perhaps some acrylic paintings as well. If it looks as if there might be any real interest in my work, hopefully it'll spur me to get off my lazy keister and produce more recent pieces.

So check it out and tell your family, friends, enemies, neighbors, co-workers, random strangers at sporting events/coffeeshops!

*UPDATE*

And heeeeeeere is my CafePress shop!

A mother/daughter holiday collaboration

2007-02-14T13:39:00.000-05:00

January Sylvie Photos

2007-01-31T15:25:00.000-05:00

Hey look, I'm posting the photos for January in January! Crazy, huh? Yes, I am trying to make up for my past lapses in posting and I have to say that I think I'm doing a pretty good job so far. I doubt that I will be able to maintain this pace though so enjoy it while it lasts.

Tutu cute
We recently enrolled Sylvie in a nearby "Baby Dance" program. The class description is as follows: For ages 12 months through 21/2 years. This class will foster a love of music and movement in your child. A variety of music and song along with several movement tools are used to help children explore movement. It's not a real dance class as you can see; there's no bony old Russian woman with hair pulled severely back in a bun snapping commands at a room of tiny, terrified toddlers. In fact, there are two youngish (late teens or maybe early 20 somethings) who work with the kids very sweetly. They do simple follow along songs like Itsy-Bitsy Spider while sometimes incorporating small hula hoops, maracas and ribbon wands. Us moms wait in the adjacent room watching the proceedings on a closed circuit tv so as not to distract our wee dancers. There's a recital in mid June featuring all of the groups who currently take classes, including the littlest ones whose part of the performance will be probably be little more than controlled chaos.

If Sylvie likes the class, (and so far she appears to not hate it) we may consider continuing with the next level class "Preschool Dance": Pre School Dance is for ages 2-4. This class is a delightful introduction to the basics of dance technique and performance. The basic fundamentals of ballet and tap are taught with simple terminology and activity songs. Students will learn balance, coordination, dance steps, timing, rhythm, teamwork and dance technique. I can't say that I really want to encourage a career in dance, especially not ballet as I know it can be quite brutal. But I do feel that given Sylvie's gross motor skill delay, taking these dance classes will help to alleviate and hopefully close the gap between her and her peers in this regard.

And she does look awfully cute in her tutu, tights and ballet slippers!

A new fascination

2007-01-30T20:41:00.000-05:00

I've always thought that I was aptly named because I love pages. I especially love pages full of words. I especially, especially love pages full of words collected in books full of other such pages. My parents nicknamed me "bookhead" because when they looked in my room, they often saw a figure lying on a bed with a book where the head should be. I am what is known as a "constant reader." I lovelovelove BOOKS! I must have read hundreds, possibly even thousands of them. And now I've found a neat way to try and actually get a complete tally of the books I've read with this way cool website, LibraryThing. My one complaint (so far) is that I wish there was a faster way to add books because it is rather annoying having to add them one at a time. Why not enable a feature where one can type in an author's name which would then list all of the books by that person. Each title should have a checkbox. One checks all the books they have been read and then clicks a submit box at the bottom of the list to add all of the books simultaneously. Is that so hard LibraryThing?

This might take a while.

Bit o' braggin'

2007-01-30T17:45:00.000-05:00

I suppose it could've been a fluke but today while waiting for the subway train to come and take us to Harvard Square for Elmo's birthday party , Sylvie counted pigeons! I had pointed out a group of them on the platform and she said, quite clearly, "Birds! Birds! One...two...fee...fo...fi." There were actually six pigeons, but still, fairly impressive for a kid who is still about a month shy of turning two wouldn't you say?

Of course all attempts I've made since today to try and get her to count again have been ignored, but that's her usual MO: demonstrate some new and somewhat advanced ability like knowing the entire alphabet (written and signed!), numbers 1-10, solving quadratic equations (kidding!) and then looking blank when asked to "perform" the same again...unless/until she just happens to be in the mood to do so.

Maybe we were on our way to Harvard today in more way than one!

Happy Birthday CHF Amy!

2007-01-16T16:07:00.000-05:00

Ya, I know I am lame for cadging your photo off of myspace but that's because all the photos I have of you are at least 2 years old. Guess we'll just have to take lots more when you are visiting...in a few weeks! EEE!!!

Welcome Sophia Leonie!

2007-01-15T18:08:00.000-05:00

Hooray!!! and Congrats!!! to Alicia and Marcus on the birth of their beautiful daughter at 6:14 am today. She was 6 pounds, 8 ounces and 20 inches.

About time someone else had a girl...all the other people I know who recently had babies had boys! Thanks for helping bring balance to the world Alicia and we hope we'll get to meet Sophia in person soon!

Happy Birthday G'ma Judy!

2007-01-11T15:35:00.000-05:00

Hail to the Queen Mum of the Crimson Goddesses! Did you know that she was recently crowned the reigning monarch of her Red Hat group?

Happy birthday mom. Love ya lots!

I guess it wouldn't be the holidays without a visit to the ER...plus December Sylvie Photos!

2007-01-10T22:51:00.000-05:00

Here and here are the photos from December. Enjoy!

I know there's an "er" in every "Merry Christmas", but this is getting ridiculous
As you've already been made aware, we had another fun-filled trip to the ER this past holiday season. Luckily, there was only one trip, it lasted for less than five hours and Sylvie was not treated like a pincushion.

The story is during the final flurry of activity to get ready for our roadtrip to Canada, Sylvie fell off the couch. Despite the fact that there were no--immediately--obvious bruises and she was moving all of her limbs normally, she would not calm down and continued to cry in a very high-pitched, distressing way. I rolled up her sleeves and found that her right elbow was purple and swollen. YIKES.

Now Sylvie and I were both slightly hysterical.

Right about this time, Theron came home from having gone to fetch our rental van. We got hold of Sylvie's pediatrician and she recommended taking her in to the ER. Once there it was the usual wait an hour, see some nurse/doctor, wait, get sent to xray, wait, hold down squalling child for xrays of her elbow (always a pleasure...but at least no needles were involved!), wait, see a different nurse/doctor, get told xrays looked fine but that they wanted to take more xrays-of her collarbone this time-just in case, go to xray, wait, repeat hold down squalling child, wait, see different nurse/doctor, get told second set of xrays looked fine and that there was no reason why we couldn't follow through with our travelling plans and just to give Sylvie some Baby Tylenol if she had further discomfort. So while it was not at all pleasant experience, it could've been a lot worse.

The Long Drive
Because of the ER trip, we'd had to cancel dinner plans that we'd made with some extended family so that they could see Manda and Travis and meet baby Jack. When Theron, Sylvie and I returned home we found that cousin Chloe and her boyfriend Rich, (who made a long drive of their own a few days later as they moved down to Nashville, TN) had come over to hang out and were kind enough to get Chinese takeout for us all. Theron and I chowed down in between bouts of tossing stuff into bags while Sylvie acted as if the prior several hours hadn't happened. After a bit, we bid farewell to Chloe and Rich, finished loading up the van and took off for Canada, only 2.5 hours later than originally planned. It was a looong drive, around 10+hours in fact. The kids slept pretty much the whole way thankfully, so we made do with only a handful of stops for refueling and one-ing and two-ing.

Highlights

Ok, in the desire to just get this damn post POSTED already, I'm just going to sum up the rest of the trip as quickly as possible. So here in brief are highlights from the trip:

Seeing G'ma & G'pa Johnson!

Seeing local friends! Christy & Jay, Doah & Owain, Michael & Danielle. Sadly, we missed seeing Dorie & Paul and Alan...hopefully we'll catch 'em all next time.

Eating at the Imperial! I'm talking huge buffet, all-you-can-eat pan-asian dishes; everything from curry to sweet and sour chicken. My favorite was the sushi bar. Sylvie conked out in the car on the way there and ended up sleeping almost the entire time on a pile of our coats in the corner by our table.

Christmas! Christmas Cinnabons! Christmas presents! Christmas dinner!

Scrabble!

The boys got put to work! Theron and Travis spent a lot of time on ladders helping install and wire stuff. They didn't look closely enough at the marriage contracts, did they?

Seeing long distance extended family on the way home! We stopped to visit with Great G'ma Ginny on the drive home, so she was finally able to meet her newest great grandchild Jack. We also got to see Sylvie's second cousins (I think that's the relation) Shannon, Sara and their mom Elisa as well as little William and his folks Amy and Peter. Sadly it was a very brief visit but as we all live in widely scattered parts of the country it was nice that we got to see them at all!

uh....I forget, but I'm sure there was lots more. Mom, Manda, feel free to add stuff I've left out in the comments. I knew that the longer it took me to post this the less I would remember so if I've left out anything/anyone special please don't take it personally. My poor brain is a sieve these days.

Happy New Year!

2007-01-01T22:18:00.000-05:00

Theron and I rang in the New Year with good friends, good food and Guitar Hero I and II. It was awesome. Wow...I don't know why but somehow it's hard to believe that 2006 is over. Kaput, even. Also that we no longer have a baby...we have a KID! And what a kid she is. Beautiful, clever, funny, compassionate. What strikes me the most about Sylvie as I think of my sweet girl on this first day of the new year though is where on earth does ALL THAT SNOT COME FROM?! Her nose has been leaking like a faucet all day. She even projectile snotted while we were getting groceries. Come on, say it with me now...EEEEeeeewww! Other than the snot-nosed thing (which I know kinda comes with the territory) she really is just incredible.

On to the point of this post: New Years Resolutions! (In no particular order)

Potty train Sylvie
Eat more vegetables
Don't eat mac n cheese directly out of the pot anymore
Start working out again
DRIVE
Paint/illustrate/craft/design more
ORGANIZE
Cook more from scratch
Blog more often
Collect unpaid woot winnings ($100)
KARAOKE
Procrastinate less (Yeah right. I might as well type "Give up chocolate")

I'm sure there's more I could put down but nothing is springing to mind at the moment.

I'll write about our holiday vacation when I get around to posting the December photos. In the meantime, here's a little teaser for ya: I guess it wouldn't be the holidays without a visit to the ER...

November Sylvie Photos

2006-12-17T12:35:00.000-05:00

I know, I know...I'm a little late putting up the November photos. As you can imagine though, we've been pretty busy this month with getting ready for the holidays and all. Speaking of which...

Holiday Plans
Manda, Travis and Jack are all flying in later this week and then Theron will man the helm of our rented minivan for the drive up to Canada to spend a few days with the Johnson g'parents. Much hijinks and photo taking will surely ensue. We're also hoping to get together with as many (hopefully all!) of our friends in the vicinity which means that our social calendar for the last two weeks of December will be quite jampacked. Yippee! and also, yikes!

A Toddler's Progress
At long last, Sylvie has reached full toddlerhood. By this I mean she's a walkin', talkin', jibber-jabberin' cuddles machine. Except without the machine part I guess. She was recently evaluated by EI and they said she's age appropriate in everything but gross motor (which is not surprising considering she really just started walking a couple of months ago.) Meanwhile, she was off the charts in other areas since kids her age (21 months) aren't expected to really know their letters like she does; upper and lower case in some instance...and not just the easy ones either. She also recognizes most of the numbers 1-10, (7 and 1 seem to confuse her a bit). She loves bubbles, coloring with her crayons, dancing to music, singing "The Wheels on the Bus", kicking/throwing balls, Signing Time and of course, Elmo.

Drive-By Moms SUCK
We recently signed up for another playgroup so she (and I) won't go stir crazy this winter. I'm trying to set up more regularly scheduled outings which has been hard because for some reason when it comes to meeting with other moms and kids I inexplicably become overly concerned about my parenting skills being judged. I'm hoping that this new playgroup will provide friendship possibilities for both Sylvie and I, and not just more opportunity for me to feel squashed like bug. Generally I think I'm doing reasonably well as a mom, but all it takes is one drive-by mommy comment and I'm reduced to a quivering mass of neuroses. Just this past week, Theron and I took Sylvie to a playground in the Commons and he was taking Sylvie to the top of a slide while I stood at the bottom to catch her. She'd gone down twice and was gleefully signing/asking for more. I gave a big smile to another mom I passed as I was taking Sylvie back to Theron to go down the slide again. She smiled back at me and said, "You really should go down the slide with her." I was crushed! Here we'd been having such a good time and then this "concerned mother" had to go and yank the rug out from under me. I managed to stammer back something along the lines of, "I think she's doing just fine," but I still got Theron to go to the other side of the play ground so I didn't have to feel this bee-otche's critical eyes burning a hole in my back.

It's funny how I have a hard time taking credit for any compliments we've received about how good or smart Sylvie is because I feel like it's mostly just how she is and not anything Theron or I have especially done. But if someone has something critical to say I take it all too much to heart. Ack.

Welcome to the world baby Bryce!

2006-12-09T23:12:00.000-05:00

Mucho congrats!!! and felicitations!!! to our dear friends Amanda and Sean whose son, Bryce Maynard, was born this morning, (4:36 am!) weighing in at 7lbs 6 ozs.

October Sylvie photos

2006-11-06T23:17:00.000-05:00

Ha, betcha thought I was gonna post last months photos super late again didn't ya? Well I certainly proved you wrong because heeeeeere they are!

(I'll post more here later but I thought I'd go ahead and get the pics up now)

I like to watch...

2006-11-06T14:17:00.000-05:00

I found this on myspace.
SUPPOSEDLY if you've seen over 80 movies, you have no life. Mark the ones you've seen. There are 169 movies on this list.

( ) Nacho Libre
(x) Grease
(x) Pirates of the Caribbean
( ) Pirates of the caribbean 2
(x) Orange County
(x) The Green Mile
(xx) Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (both versions)
(x) Neverending Story
(x) Blazing Saddles
(x) Airplane!
(x) Red Eye
( ) Stick It
( ) Shes the Man
( ) 8 Mile

Total so far: 9

(x)The Princess Bride
(x) SNL's The Best of Will Ferrell (Does this really count as a movie?)
( ) Napoleon Dynamite
( ) Fun With Dick and Jane
(x) Saw
( ) Saw II (Thanks Geoff)
( ) White Noise
(x) White Oleander
( ) Anger Management
(x) 50 First Dates
( ) The Princess Diaries
( ) The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement

Total so far: 14

(x) Scream
(x) Scream 2
(x) Scream 3
(x) Scary Movie
(x) Scary Movie 2
( ) Scary Movie 3
( ) Scary Movie 4
(x) American Pie
(x) American Pie 2
( ) American Wedding
( ) American Pie Band Camp

Total so far: 21

(x) Harry Potter
(x) Harry Potter 2
(x) Harry Potter 3
(x) Harry Potter 4
(x) Resident Evil 1
( ) Resident Evil 2
(x) The Wedding Singer
( ) Cinderella Man
(x) The Village
( ) Lilo & Stitch

Total so far: 28

(x) Finding Nemo
( ) Finding Neverland
(x) Signs
(x) The Grinch
(x) Texas Chainsaw Massacre
( ) White Chicks
(x) Butterfly Effect
( ) 13 Going on 30
(x) I, Robot
( ) Robots

Total so far: 34

(x) Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story
( ) Universal Soldier
(x) Lemony Snicket: A Series Of Unfortunate Events
( ) Along Came Polly
( ) Deep Impact
( ) KingPin
(x) Meet The Parents
(x) Meet the Fockers
( ) Eight Crazy Nights
(x) Joe Dirt
( ) King Kong (2005)

Total so far: 39

( ) A Cinderella Story
( ) The Terminal
( ) The Lizzie McGuire Movie
( ) Passport to Paris
(x) Dumb & Dumber
( ) Dumber & Dumberer
(x) Final Destination
(x) Final Destination 2
( ) Final Destination 3
(x) Halloween
(x) The Ring
( ) The Ring 2
( ) Surviving X-MAS
( ) Flubber
(x) Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle
(x) Practical Magic
(x) Chicago
(x) Ghost Ship
(x) From Hell
(x) Hellboy
( ) Secret Window
( ) I Am Sam
( ) The Whole Nine Yards

Total so far: 50

(x) The Day After Tomorrow
(x) Child's Play
( ) Seed of Chucky
( ) Bride of Chucky
(x) 10 Things I Hate About You
( ) Just Married
(x) Gothika
(x) Nightmare on Elm Street
(x) Sixteen Candles
( ) Remember the Titans
( ) Coach Carter
(x) The Grudge
(x) The Mask
( ) Son Of The Mask

Total so far: 58

( ) Bad Boys 2
(x) Joy Ride
( ) Lucky Number Slevin
(x) Ocean's Eleven
(x) Ocean's Twelve
(x) Identity
( ) Lone Star
(x) Bedazzled
(x) Predator I
(x) Predator II
(x) Superstar
( ) Ice Age
( ) Ice age 2 The Meltdown

Total so far: 66

(x) Independence Day
( ) Cujo
( ) A Bronx Tale
(x) Darkness Falls
( ) Christine
(x) ET
(x) Children of the Corn
( ) My Boss' Daughter
( ) Maid in Manhattan
(x) Monsters Inc.
(x) War of the Worlds
(x) Rush Hour
( ) Rush Hour 2

Total so far: 73

( ) Best Bet
(x) How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days
( ) She's All That
( ) Calendar Girls
(x) Sideways
(x) Mars Attacks
(x) Event Horizon
(x) Ever After
(x) Forrest Gump
(x) Big Trouble in Little China
(x) The Terminator
(x) The Terminator 2
(x) The Terminator 3

Total so far: 83

(x) X-Men
(x) X-Men 2
(x) X-Men 3
(x) Spider-Man
(x) Spider-Man 2
( ) Sky High
(x) Jeepers Creepers
( ) Jeepers Creepers 2
(x) Catch Me If You Can
(x) The Others
(x) Freaky Friday (the saw the original)
( ) Reign of fire
(x) Cruel Intentions
( ) Cruel Intentions 2
( ) The Hot Chick
(x) Shrek
(x) Shrek 2

Total so far: 95

( ) Swimfan
( ) Miracle
( ) Old School
( ) K-Pax
(x) Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
(x) Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
(x) Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
( ) A Walk to Remember
( ) Boogeyman
(x) The 40-year-old-virgin
( ) The Hills Have Eyes

Total: 99

Sadly, this list just barely scratches the surface of alllll the movies I've seen. If I tried to list all the books I've read, it would appear as if I never did anything but read and watch movies!

Woot Contest #97

2006-11-03T01:00:00.000-05:00

Take a screenshot from a movie or TV show and change the entire cast into children and/or animals.
entries
results

Travis racked up another 3rd place and Theron garnered another HM. I thought I had some solid entries this week, but apparently not. Oh why do I even bother? {begin self pity party...sniff, sniff...sigh.../end of self pity party}

Woot Contest #96

2006-10-27T00:00:00.000-04:00

Design an outfit that coordinates well with the hideously ugly Casio Pathfinder Tough Solar Triple Sensor Watch.
Entries
Results

Woot Contest #95

2006-10-20T01:00:00.000-04:00

Show us a brand name, logo, and package design for a caffeinated breakfast food.
Entries
Results

Woot Contest #94

2006-10-14T22:41:00.000-04:00

Illustrate a ridiculous image or idea from one of the product writeups from this week's Woot-Off.
Entries
I think I actually have a shot at placing this week...keep your fingers/toes/eyes (except when driving of course) crossed for me!
Results
I finally placed! AND I got the CCC too! Yahoo! All three of us wound up on the board again; Travis was in a tie for 3rd and Theron got an HM.

Look out Woot...one of these days this power trio is gonna sweep the top spots!

Woot Contest #93

2006-10-08T14:49:00.000-04:00

Show us how Apple would re-brand an existing company.
Entries
Results
Another nod for both Travis and yours truly...plus Theron's #1! Woohoo!

*UPDATE*

The Unofficial Apple Weblog posted a blurb about this contest and the results...with Theron's winning entry as the accompanying image! Does this make him...webfamous? Plus, I got a nod in the comments section for my HM winning entry from an avowed designer. Nifty, huh?

Looong overdue (and from what I hear, much anticipated)...Sylvie photos! Plus bonus material!

2006-10-04T16:39:00.000-04:00

August
September/Seattle Trip

(Username: quackattack. Same password.)

19 months old today!
Today Sylvie is 19 months old and to celebrate, we took her to have a renal ultrasound...ok, the truth is she was due for a follow-up with her urologist and we just happened to get an appointment for today. She held quite still and didn't fuss once throughout the procedure. Even better, the ultrasound showed everything to be a-ok so we don't have to follow-up again for 2-3 years. Yay!

She was weighed and measured as per usual and her stats were:
weight 18lbs 10oz
(she was clothed and wearing a possibly wet diaper, so she's probably more like 18lbs 5oz)
length 28.5"
(which is 1.5" less than we were told at her 18 month appointment so let's just say she's 29"+/- 1")

Walkin' anduh talkin'
She took her sweet time but at long last our wee one is walking! She's still pretty unsteady on her feet but she's taking more and more independent steps everyday. Sometimes she insists on wearing her little black mary janes before she'll walk...pointing at them insistently and saying "sooz! sooz!" She then very helpfully sticks a foot in the air to indicate where the shoe is to be placed. She is very particular to her black shoes which might be a problem soon because I don't think she'll fit into them much longer. Just another bridge to cross...

Chompers
Sylvie's teeth are also finally starting to fill out (fill in?) and we are now up to SIX with a couple more clearly on the way. we're doing our best to include more and more 'grown-up' food in her diet now that she can actually chew and she's eaten almost one whole chicken nugget cut up into small pieces! Other foods she likes include: spinach with cream cheese, corn, green beans, apple, pear, peach, banana, grapes, assorted cheeses, goldfish crackers, cheesy poofs (the organic 'healthy' kind...hey she needs the fat!), bits o' veggie burger, refried beans, ramen noodles and she just loooves guacamole. Oddly though she is only mildly interested in icecream and pudding! Go figure.

Rainbow bright
Since Sylvie sometimes eats better when she's distracted, we've done various things in the past to keep her entertained enough to keep on eating; blow bubbles or read stories, etc. We recently made some color flash cards (ie. squares of colored paper "laminated" with packing tape) to show her at mealtimes, along with signing and saying the colors. We'll ask her to identify the colors one by one and she gets 'em right about 80% of the time. (She seems to have the most trouble with orange and green.) Do we have another artist on our hands? Man, I hope not...hey kid, PLEASE don't follow in our footsteps! Be a lawyer or a doctor or...President!

Uh...no pressure, Sylvie.

Woot Contest #92

2006-09-29T10:37:00.000-04:00

Create an ad to sell the Vector Jump Start System to people who don't own cars.
Entries
Results
Let's hear it for the boys...yet again!

Independence Day

2006-09-25T19:28:00.000-04:00

For several months now, Sylvie and I had been attending a local infant/parent playgroup coordinated with her Early Intervention therapy. Once a week, we'd ride the bus to meet with other parents and their babies and a "teacher" for an hour and a half. We'd sing songs and play little games during "circle time" and then the children would have lots of free time with toys, instruments, books and play equipment. A child attended this group up until 18months and the progressed to the toddler group which they attend sans parent. So today we put our darling girl on the bus to her toddler playgroup...ALONE. We were both excited and quite scared the whole time she was gone; afraid she'd act up/get hurt/get kidnapped...you know, the usual concerns of parents learning to let go.

All went well apparently as we never received a call demanding we remove her from the premises with strong urges to seek an exorcist immediately and when the bus driver dropped her off, she claimed that Sylvie had chatted happily both there and back. Parents? She don't need no steenkin' parents to go with her to playgroup!

I did attend her very first toddler group last week so as to be familiar with what Sylvie would be doing while there. It was very similar to the infant group but with more structure and more 'mature' (in a toddler sense of course) activities, like coloring. There is even a computer in the room with toddler appropriate games...which probably means that soon we'll have THREE people jockeying to use the computer at home. They do free play, then circle time, followed by gross motor skills play (in the same room where we had our infant group) and finally a snack of juice and kix/goldfish/ritz crackers. There are three teacher/therapists in the group of 8 children and at the end of the day a list of the days activities is sent home with each child so us parents can get an idea of what they did that day. And once she's done some, we'll also be getting Sylvie's art pieces! Pretty neat, huh?

Woot Contest #91

2006-09-22T22:57:00.000-04:00

Take a famous painting, drawing, or photograph and make it "wide-screen" by adding more imagery to the left and right of the original work.
Entries
Results
All three of us received nods again this time..though clearly we deserved more. Anybody wanna share my grapes? They're only a bit sour...

Coast to coast boast

2006-09-16T11:24:00.000-04:00

Is it overly boastful to say that my sister and I have the cutest kids of the west and east coast respectively? Yes it is...but to us at least it's true! Sylvie and I had a fabulous time visiting with the Gentrys and we're very much looking forward to seeing them again at Xmas in Toronto. I think mom and dad will go into coniptions of glee at having both grandkids together at the same time. (Meanwhile us daughters and son-in-laws might as well be chopped liver. Imagined future conversation: "Who are you again? Oh that's right..uh,Paige is it?...can you move to the left a bit? You're blocking my view of my darling grandchildren.")

Just Ducky
While in Seattle, Sylvie learned a few new skills:
quacking like a duck
This happened when we went to pick up Travis from his now ex-job (more on that later). There was a duck pond in the office park so we'd bring some old bread and the ducks, who were quite tame, would eat right out of your hand. Sylvie loved this and giggled whenever a duck came up close. The birds were making soft quacking noises almost non-stop and we adults were quacking back at them. Up 'til this moment, Sylvie hadn't really made any animals sounds other than 'baa' and an occasional 'moo' but once she made the connection that, 'hey! ducks QUACK!', she started doing it too and for a little while there we were concerned that she'd forgotten how to make any other sound.

kissing
Theron and I have been encouraging Sylvie to give us kisses for months now without success. However, upon being urged to give her baby cousin a kiss, she readily complied, puckering up, making a 'mmm' noise and planting her lips on his head! She did it repeatedly while we were visiting, sometimes without any prompting at all. Sadly, once we returned home there's been nary a kiss from her. Guess for now she's just a kissin' cousin.

Something Fishy
We spent the majority of one day of our trip hanging out at the Seattle Aquarium. Sylvie got a huge kick out of the otters and would have dearly loved to jump into the tank with them. Travis took some excellent photos of her rapt expression reflected in the glass which I'll hopefully have up soon. We also saw seals, human divers, lots o fish of course, some jellies, octopus, cuttlefish etc etc. Pretty neat place and I suggest a visit if ever you are in that neck of the woods.

Bad luck, worse timing
As most of you know already, Travis got the news that the company he'd worked for for only a few short months was shutting down and leaving all the employees high and dry...and the day he got the news happened to be on Manda's birthday! (Poor Manda is beginning to think there may be a jinx on her birthday now considering other events that have a occured on Sept. 11th.) We still managed to have a pretty good time out at Manda's bday dinner that evening, where we consumed mass quantities of food and got some fun pictures of Manda in a celebratory sombrero.

In the end the layoff has turned out for the best. Travis managed to get an all around better job just down the street from his old one, plus he got a nice little 2 week vacation to spend time with his wife and son. Not to mention he won the Woot contest 2 weeks in a row. If this is Travis with bad luck...then I'm gonna make sure I buy some lottery tickets for him to scratch off next time I see him!

Woot Contest #90

2006-09-15T10:20:00.000-04:00

Alter an existing television show to reflect one or more qualities of the RCA Lyra 20GB MP3 Video Jukebox (smaller, lower-budget, more mobile, refurbished, etc.)
Entries
Results
Looks like Travis pulled a Theron; scoring a money prize and the CCC. Not to mention that he won 1st prize two weeks in a row! (Too bad only a handful of people know he was also 75% of sackattack.) I think Theron's versions of a Lyra-ized BBC's The Office and Les Headroom were vastly superior to the entry that garnered him an HM nod, but there's just no telling how the judges think sometimes.

Nothing for me though...sob! Enh, none of my entries were worth more than an HM anyway.

Happy 27th Birthday Auntie Manda!

2006-09-11T14:59:00.000-04:00

18 months and counting

2006-09-08T14:26:00.000-04:00

Has it REALLY been 18 months already?
Sylvie had her 18 month appointment earlier ths week and her currents stats are as follows:

weight 18lbs
length 30"
teeth 4

She's still a wee thing, (no surprise there), but she's following the growth curve and developmentally she's ahead of her age group in everything but gross motor skills. She has finally started to take a step or two every now and then though, so hopefully she'll catch up in the regard soon.

5 and a half hours with a toddler on one's lap is no easy thing

So Sylvie and I are currently hanging out with Auntie Manda, Uncle Travis and cousin Jack in sunny Seattle, WA. Yes, I said sunny. (Contrary to popular opinion, it doesn't actually rain every day here, ya know.) We flew in late Wednesday night/early Thursday morning and boy, were my arms tired. It is not a picnic trying to contain a bouncing ball of toddlerness in one's lap for several hours and then when she finally zonked out, it was almost impossible for me to get into a comfortable position wihtout disturbing her. I spent almost the entire flight assuming various pretzel-like contortions at sloth-like speed, hoping in vain to find a position that wasn't going to give me back spasms. At loooooooong last, we finally made it back to terra firma without any whiny child induced air rage or permanent damage to me.

The Chubaliciousness of baby Jack

Let me just say right now that baby Jack is the cutest boy in the whole wide world. All big eyes and chubalicious thighs. It's funny how while he isn't really a chubby baby per se, he has Michelin Man-like thighs. His thighs are pure squishtastic, chewy, nummy goodness!

Sylvie just loves her cousin Jack and we've already gotten some adorable photos of the two of them together. Look for tehm when I post September's photos!

Woot contest #89

2006-09-07T22:00:00.000-04:00

Design a series of currency for the Republic of Woot, with each bill or coin honoring a different Woot product, past or present.

Entries

I'll be siting this one out as I can't make heads or tales out of Photoshop on a PC...but keep an eye out for entries by twallis and tgentry!

UPDATE: I didn't exactly sit this one out after all...Travis and I formed the 'superduo' known as sackattack (no perverted meaning there btw, it's a combo of our kids names) and our entry took first place! Theron also did quite well, receiving a doublenod with 3rd place and the CCC award. Check it all out here:
Results

Woot contest #88

2006-08-31T22:00:00.000-04:00

Take a boring woot, past or present, and design a representative mascot saying a snappy catchphrase.
Entries
Results

Woot is happening to me?!

2006-08-28T01:16:00.000-04:00

The day finally arrived where I took a puff on the big crack pipe that is the woot.com weekly photoshop contest and I am not only hooked...I'm HELLA hooked. Crikey, it sure is fun! And evil, evil Theron has not only been my pusher but he's also peddled some of the rock to Travis and now he's getting in on the action too! It doesn't help that this week's woot contest is the sort deviously calculated to makes one's brain overflow with fantastically funny image ideas:

Create a new album cover combining aspects of two or more otherwise widely different album covers.

So far I've entered 6 and I'm working on one more.
Then I'm done.
No really, I swear.
I can quit any time, honest!

Results

MEL-MO x 2

2006-08-24T21:39:00.000-04:00

We found a giant, stuffed MEL-MO today for Sylvie at a Savers thrift store for only $2.99...and it didn't smell funky or have any strange stains or sticky spots on it! She was quite thrilled and shrieked happily every time she caught a glimpse of it riding behind her in the shopping cart. Considering she'll be getting a TMX Elmo (Tickle Me Elmo...to the XTREME!) for Xmas, I think we will have reached our full quota for Elmo dolls. Two is plenty, doncha think?

Update plus July Sylvie photos!

2006-08-23T13:30:00.000-04:00

I would have published the July photos sooner but the method I was using to do so has been 'upgraded out of existence' so I had to go back to the more laborious way of doing it. Anyway, the July pictures are finally up for your viewing pleasure.

Signs, signs, everywhere signs

Sylvie has added several more signs to her repetoire including:

grapes
potato
grass
laugh
pear
peach
car
strawberry
walk
carrot

One morning recently she woke up around 6am, which is quite early for her (and us!) so I brought her to our bed and tried to coax her to go back to sleep for a little longer. I signed, sleep more please to which she responded, also in sign, milk please thirsty. How could I say no to that?

In sickness and in health

A little over 2 weeks ago, our girl woke up in the morning crying for no apparent reason and it took quite a while to console her. She felt hot but when I tried to get her temp, she was too fussy and wiggly for me to get an accurate reading and since she seemed to rally later that day, we put it off to teething. But that night she had a great deal of trouble sleeping, only nodding off for short periods of time before waking to cry fitfully for longer periods. I brought her to bed with us in hopes that she would be soothed to sleep more readily but it didn't help. Theron tried to help out with soothing her but she preferred to be glommed onto mommy 99% of time...which continued for the next few days. As did the whining, crying and fever. I managed to get a temp on Thursday morning and since it came up as 102.2F we called up her pediatrician who had us come in immediately.

We'd given Sylvie baby Tylenol so by the time we got to the doctor it had kicked in and while she was still quite miserable, her temp was much lower. The doc checked her ears and throat which (at the time) looked fine and asked us to try and get a urine sample...no easy feat with a 17 month old girl. There we were in the examination room; me holding our miserable, crying naked child on my lap, atop a puppy pad to soak up any urine which might miss the specimen cup that Theron held to try and catch the flow...which didn't come and didn't come...
About 40 minutes into this excruciating activity, the doctor told us that she wanted to get a blood sample (joy) from Sylvie and that we could try to get the urine sample again back at home.

During our second attempt at pee-catching, we received a call from the doctor around 5:30pm saying that the test results were enough of a concern that (double-extra-super-happy-joy) we should take her to the ER for further tests. It wasn't an emergency per se, but we needed to get there sooner rather than later.

To sum up our most recent oh-so-enjoyable- visit to the ER: It was almost a carbon copy of the first time we were there. Once again, they used a catheter to get a urine sample (during this lovely procedure, Sylvie's eyes got very big and she frantically signed ALL DONE , which was somehow, both horrifying and funny at the same time) and more blood drawn had to be drawn and she received, that's right folks, ANOTHER IV FOR DEHYDRATION. I'd been doing my best to get her to drink and I thought we were doing pretty well but I guess because of her fever she'd been sweating it out almost as soon as she took it in. She was only slightly dehydrated but since she's so small, it was judged best to get her fluids back up asap. The worst of it is that she'd been rallying up to the point when they came to do the needle pokes, and was acting quite like her usual self...but we were soon both bawling our eyes out as the needles were put in her tiny arm. HOW I HATE THAT!

None of us had been getting much sleep for the past several days and Sylvie was doubly depleted of energy having just shrieked her lungs out so all three of us pretty much zonked out in the little room they'd put us in for her treatment; Sylvie and I on the bed and poor Theron in a less-than-comfy chair. The nurses came in to check on us periodically and finally after a few hours the doctor came in to say that all of the test results looked normal so far but that they would need to 'cook' for several more hours to be sure they were all clear. Since Sylvie was now rehydrated to the max and her fever was responding well to the Tylenol, we were finally sent home around 12:30 am with instructions to keep Sylvie hydrated and her fever down (well, duh), and to follow up with our pediatrician the next day.

Upon examining Sylvie for the second time, the doc saw inflamation in her left ear and deduced that all of this grief and agony had been the result of a developing ear infection. I know it sounds as if she was a bit extreme in checking Sylvie for more serious problems but she told us that because of Sylvie's heart defects, she wanted to rule out an infection in her heart. I never thought I'd type this but, Hooray it was only an EAR infection! We were given a prescription for amoxicyllin and told to come back in a week to follow-up.

But WAIT...there's MORE!

Sylvie started acting more like herself after having been on the meds for a day and a half but we noticed that her skin seemed to be turning a blotchy, red color. It wasn't raised and didn't make her itch but we called the nurse help line and were told it was a fairly common non-allergic reaction to the medication and nothing to worry about. However, the next day I noticed Sylvie scratching at her thigh where a lovely, welty, hive had reared it's ugly head...and like magic several more popped up on her body. Once again I called the nurse help line and this time I was advised to stop the meds, give her some children's Benadryl and check in with her pediatrician when she was back in the office on Monday. Long story short (ha), the doc called in a new 'scrip to our local pharmacy, we dosed the kid up as per directions and today she appears to be fully recovered. Hurray! All's well that ends well, indeed.

M is for MEL-MO

During this time of illness, Sylvie was sorely lacking a 'wooby' or comfort object to cling to in her misery (well, other than me). This is not because we have no dolls or toys (ha!) but none that she has any particualar attachment to. BUT...she did request the presence of a certain red-furred, high-pitched-voiced monster who goes by the name of "MEL-MO" who you probably know as Elmo, a popular Sesame Street character, and yes they are one and the same. In fact, Sylvie met Elmo early in her life while visiting Sesame Street and stumbling into a fantastical place called, "Elmo's World," a place so amazing that it has it's very own theme song! That gets caught in your head and buzzes around and around inside ones noggin like a psychotic bee! Yes, Sylvie had fallen hard for MEL-MO and it was his sweet furry countenance gazing at her through the TV that helped to sooth her in her time of need. And when MEL-MO was not to be found on the TV, why, he was easily discovered on the internet! Sylvie would lean into the comfort of the chest of her father or I while happily murmuring, "Mel-mo...Mel-mo..." over and over again.

Now that she is all better, her MEL-MO fixation continues. She has noticed that MEL-MO appears on her diapers and tells us so each time we change her. She asks for her MEL-MO bath toy when bathing and upon wakening each morning, points out her bedroom door towards the livingroom and the TV and says...what else?..."MEL-MO".

I have it on pretty good authority that Santa is bringing her a MEL-MO doll for Xmas this year.

Happy 28th Birthday Uncle Travis!

2006-08-01T11:53:00.000-04:00

And congrats again on your new job!

mmm...bacon

2006-07-30T13:27:00.000-04:00

Things you may not have known about me

2006-07-24T14:22:00.000-04:00

One of those e-mail thingies (from my pal Jay) that I've decided to do on the blog instead of forwarding.

A) Four jobs I have had in my life:

1- Waitress, Papa's BBQ, (now closed), Semolinas (also closed), Six Pence Pub (still there I think) and Olympia Cafe (also still there so I'm not a jinx if that's what you were thinking), all in Savannah, GA

2- Bookseller, B. Dalton/Barnes Noble. Savannah, GA

3- Production Coordinator of Campus Printing at Savannah College of Art and Design, which I also attended. As you already figured out, it was also in Savannah, GA. (Well I did live in there for 8 years, ya know)

4- Graphic Production Specialist, State Street Research/BlackRock in Boston, MA.

B) Four movies I would watch over and over:

1 - Shirley Valentine, one of my all time faves. Contains such classic one-liners as, "Boat is boat. Fuck is Fuck," and "Well tickle me tits til Friday!" My high school buddies and I used to quote these and other awesome lines to each other on a regular basis. And it's FINALLY available on DVD, woohoo!!!

2 - Ocean's 11 It's just fun!

3- Silverado. Great cast, great movie. Runner up in the western genre: Two Mules for Sister Sara

4- Pride & Prejudice, the BBC miniseries which is not technically a movie but I could still watch it over and over despite its being 6 hours long.

C) Four places I have lived:

1) Huntsville, AL
2) Toronto, ON
3) Savannah, GA
4) Boston, MA

D) Four TV shows I love to watch (part 1-currently airing shows):

1 - Gilmore Girls What can I say, I happen to like the fast talking and obscure pop-cultural references. So there.
2 - America's Next Top Model. Reality show runner up: Hell's Kitchen.
3 - House
4 - The Office US version.

Four TV shows I love to watch (part 2-off-air shows):

1 - MASH
2 - The Office BBC version.
3 - Six Feet Under
4 - Any Joss Whedon show: Buffy, Angel and Firefly

Four TV shows I love to watch (part 3-shows I miss because we no longer have cable):

1 - What Not to Wear Can I please have $5000 to go shopping in New York? PLEASE? I don't care if you have to trash my current wardrobe first. However, I refuse to buy any of those ugly pointy toe witch shoes. And I'm not cutting all my hair off either.
2 - The Daily Show I miss my daily dose of political snark. sigh!
3 - The Sci-Fi channel. Ok, I know it's not a show...but I really miss my cheesy sci-fi flicks!
4 - Also TLC, The Weather Channel, Comedy Central, The Food Network etc, etc...

E) Four places I have been on vacation:

1 - North Conway, NH (for our first anniversary. I'm hoping for something a bit more exotic for our upcoming 5th. Like say, somewhere we'd have to cross an ocean to get to.)
2 - Cozumel, Mexico (during a cruise with my folks)
3 - Disney World, Orlando, FL
4 - Des Moines, IA (With Theron's family. Among other things, we went to the state fair and I saw a motorcycle carved out of butter and a 2,ooolb hog named Pepperoni)

F) Web sites I visit daily:
(I don't get to web surf as much as I used to so I really only visit #1 on a daily basis but I do check 2-4 frequently)

1 - Salon
2 - Manda's blog (which is on hiatus until they get their internet connection hooked up)
3 - Netflix Thank goodness for Netflix which partially makes up for not having cable. It is with the power of Netflix that we came to find such awesome shows as Six Feet Under and Deadwood.
4 - Pandora

G) Four of my favorite foods:

1 - The original Schlotsky's, which sadly has no locations anywhere near Boston. Fast food runner up: Foot long coney dog with everything, ched'r peppers with ranch dipping sauce and cherry limeade from Sonic.
2 - pizza (cuz even when it's bad, it's still pretty good!)
3 - pho
4 - sushi (I was a late bloomer as a sushi lover...but now I LOVELOVELOVE it!)

H) Four places I would rather be right now:

1 - I've always wanted to go on one of those weekend-long spa vacations. You know, the kind wear you spend most of your time in a comfy robe or naked but for mud and seaweed while various people massage and exfoliate you while bringing you fresh fruit juices or champagne and delectable nibblies...what were we talking about?
2 - Swimming in a lagoon teeming with beautiful fish. And maybe some dolphins.
3 - Visiting my sis and meeting my new nephew in Seattle. Even if it would mean seeing that Travis guy too.
4 - At a black tie banquet accepting the Newbury Medal. Or the Nobel Peace Prize. For stuff I've yet to do and probably won't ever get to. Because I am a lazy git.

I) Four friends I think will respond:

1 - Mom
2 - Manda
3 - dunno..surprise me
4 - ditto

As promised...a nice, looooong update!

2006-07-22T11:20:00.000-04:00

I apologize for my long absence. I know that I have let some of you down by not keeping you up to date with Miss Sylvie's progress and for that I am truly sorry. Now you can quit your yammering (mom) cuz here it is.

Signing Time

Sylvie's vocabulary continues to expand both in sign and in spoken word. As you may have seen from the June photos we are the type of parents who allow our child's brain to be corrupted and shriveled by regular tv watching. Well, regular dvd watching anyway. We are big fans of the Signing Time series and watch an episode almost daily. I'll ask Sylvie "What time is it?" and she gets very excited and signs time repeatedly then speed crawls to the tv where she signs time continuously until I start the show. As the signs are introduced, they are demonstrated very clearly by the host Rachel and then we're shown them being used by other adults, kids, toddlers and even infants. After a series of signs have been shown, there is usually a catchy song about using them. Theron and I watch it along with her and as a result we've all learned quite a few signs which we use with her throughout the day. I've been trying to jot down a list of signs she uses on a regular basis so that I can relate them all to you folks. The words that she also speaks, I'll put in parentheses her current spoken pronunciation. Here they are in no particular order:

baby (baybee)
time
cracker (da-dur)
cookie
diaper (bi-pur)
mom (mom/momma)
dad (dah, dah-dah)
more (mo)
milk (mih)
thirsty (tee)
eat/food
dog (dah-gee)
cat (kih-tee)
bird (bir)--funny story about this one. One day a few weeks ago, we were looking out the window during a torrential downpour when Sylvie started to sign bird. I looked and looked but didn't see any birds and thought it strange that one might have flown by in such heavy rain. Sylvie kept signing bird though and then I noticed that the postal truck was parked in view. Could it be that Sylvie recognized the highly abstracted eagle logo on the truck as a bird? There's no way I can know for sure but I'm just gonna say yes; our kid is a frickin' genius.
bath (ba)
ball (bah)
cheese (teeze)
apple (ba)
banana (nanna)
clean (kee)
bear (buh)
day
sleep
friend (Airwah)--well, Sara IS her best friend after all
book (buh or booh)--Sylvie LOVES to be read to. Over and over and over again. Sometimes we even get to the end of the book but usually she'll bring us a book and we'll start to read it, but she'll crawl away to get another book for us to read. Rinse, repeat.
hat
cold
strong--she only does this in response to us asking her "How strong is Sylvie?" Our follow up to "How big is Sylvie?"
hot
train
all done/finished (done, done?)
no (nonononono)--she is already showing signs of being a bit bossy (yeah, mom, just like I was) and will reprimand the dogs when she sees them doing something we've told them (or her) not to.
shoes
please (pee or eeze)
thank you (chank chew, tank koo)
boy--Once when Theron was playing with Sylvie, he said "oh boy!" trying to get her excited about a particular toy. She then signed boy for the first time.
wash hands
potty
*poop--small confession...this one we actually learned from Meet the Fockers

She's actually begun to string signs together in 2-4 word sentences like:

more milk
banana please

and just this morning we got:

more time banana thank you

Koko the gorilla would be so proud!

Click here for an excellent site that has short video clips demonstrating all of the above signs plus a gazillion more. I highly recommend signing with your babies. And why stop when they can talk? I think it would by nice to keep it up...it never hurts to be bilingual! Although technically since sign is not spoken maybe it should be biling/manual?

G-tube? We don't need no steenkin' g-tube!

When we last saw Sylvie's GI, we were given the great and glorious news that she no longer thought it necessary for Sylvie to get a g-tube--insert bells, whistles, air horns, trumpeting elephants of joy, etc here. The doctor had gotten a hold of a growth chart specific to Noonan Syndrome and while Sylvie is only in the 3rd percentile for weight on the general chart, she's actually 50th percentile on the more appropriate chart. I think this helped drive home the fact to the GI that kids with this syndrome are just smaller, but not necessarily in a bad way. Since Sylvie is length/weight proportionate and developmentally on track in everything except for gross motor skills (which she is quickly closing the gap on; more on that later), the doctor saw no need to resort to surgery to try and increase her caloric intake. Another thing that I've noticed, along with my friend Marla (Sara's mom) and many other parents of Noonies is that they are ALL small, no matter how good or bad their appetite or whether or not they have feeding issues. Case in point: Sylvie and Sara are a month apart in age, with Sylvie being the elder. Despite the fact that Sylvie has consistently taken in many more calories on a regular basis than Sara, they are only about 1lb. apart in weight with Sara being the scale tipper! I've said it before and I'll probably say it again (because I suck at coming up with new material) but I think that a lot of the calories Sylvie takes in goes to her hair. Well, it's the only explanation I can come up with as to how she stays such a skinny minnie when she eats like a horse most of the time.

Bleedin' good news

On advice from our pediatrician, we'd had a series of blood tests done to check Sylvie for bleeding disorders which are commonly associated with Noonan Syndrome. Our most recent trip to a doctor's office ( I say 'a' instead of 'the' since she's has so many different ones) was with the Hematology department at Children's Hospital for follow up blood work because of an abnormal result in a platelet aggregation test, (not excess platelets as I had originally thought). The doctor was very nice and explained that all of the other tests had looked fine but they wanted to recheck this one thing to be on the safe side. Long story short, (yeah I know, too late) the follow up test was a-ok! Woo hoo! We'll still have to have her rechecked before any surgery, but we don't have to worry about adding a hematologist to her list of regular specialists for the time being, thank goodness.

Sylvie's most recent measurements were taken at this appointment and she weighed in at 17# 2oz and was 28" long. (Either she shrunk an inch and a half since her 15 month appointment with her pediatrician or the nurse who measured her then was just reeeeaaly sloppy when she did it.)

Poop, here it is

On three separate occasions now I've gone in to Sylvie's room, hearing she's awoken from her nap, to find that she's decided to do a little exploring. In her diaper. Which was FULL OF POOP. She'd be sitting in her crib, proud as can be, murmuring in her sweetest voice and holding out a stinky little butt nugget for me to see. I guess I'm lucky that each time she's done it the poops have been nuggety and not squishy since that would have made the experiences all the more disgusting. Hopefully there will be no more visits from Mr. Hanky.

Fun and Games

Sylvie has learned a new game from her Thursday playgroup called Where oh where has gone? (basically, it's Peekaboo!) At playgroup, this game involves sitting in a circle and taking turns putting part of a mini parachute over one of the kid's heads while saying the "Where oh where?" chant, followed by the chosen kid pulling the material down to reveal him/herself while everyone else (read: playgroup leader and parents) exclaims, "Peekaboo!" Sylvie will play the "standard" way at home, hiding behind her bib/shirt/skirt while saying "way oo way" and then grinning hugely when she reveals herself to our peekaboo! chorus, but she has also extended the game to objects, handing us a ball or toy while saying "way oo way", indicating that we are to hide it so she can find it. Last week, I heard her saying her "way oo way" to her EI therapist during a session and when they were looking at a book with characters hidden behind panels that opened up on each page.

Standing up, falling down

She's VERY close to walking and is standing independently of longer and longer lengths of time. Ok, so those 'lengths of time' are less than a minute...but she IS getting better at it. She's finally gotten big enough to ride her little car from G'ma & G'pa Johnson, although she has yet to master turning corners with it. She loves to climb up slides and stairs. She also thinks she can go down stairs head first...as I found out about a week ago much to my horror.

Theron volunteered to look after our friend's Sean & Amanda's pets while they are away on their honeymoon. We've got Sadie the dog at our place but stop by S& A's house every other day to check on their cats and fish tanks. Sylvie started off after one of the cats who decided to flee up stairs. I allowed Sylvie to follow with me close behind, making sure she was safe. Ha. We'd reached the top and the cat had disappeared into a room and Sylvie was gesturing after it and signing/ saying kitty over and over. Thinking she wanted to continue the chase, I started after the cat saying the "Where oh where is the kitty?" chant...thus committing the ultimate act of stupidity by NO LONGER BEING BETWEEN SYLVIE AND THE STAIRS. Of course, Sylvie decided it would be much more fun to go back downstairs and I wasn't able to catch her before she fell. I cannot even begin to say how horrifying it is to see your tiny baby fall end over end down stairs. I shrieked something like, "SYLVIE! OHMYGOD!" and Sylvie just shrieked. I ran down to Sylvie and scooped her up in my arms and I just held her...too frozen with shock and terror and guilt to check her for injury. Theron had come running having heard the thuds and the shrieking seeing us rocking halfway down the stairs immediately knew what had happened and very gently took our crying baby from me to see if she was hurt since I was clearly not in the any state to do so. Nothing appeared to be broken. In fact, she had not one bump, bruise or scrape from the fall.

She was fine.
She was fine.
She was fine.

My self confidence as a parent, however, will probably be in a full body cast for quite some time. I know it's one of those things that can happen on occasion, even to good parents, but that doesn't make it ok that I was careless. Thank-any-and-all-deities she wasn't hurt.

So there you have it folks

I came, I blogged, I confessed. Hopefully you will have seen that aside from the horrible-falling-down-stairs incident, things have been going exceedingly well with our wee girl in every respect. She continues to be of angelic demeanor about 99% of the time with only rare and brief flare-ups of temper, mostly due to frustration. She does get a little grumpy when we tell her no sometimes but so far we've not had any real tantrums. I am under no delusions that we'll be able to avoid them completely...I'm sure Tantrum Sylvie is there, lurking in the shadows, waiting to go all Vesuvius on us in the middle of a restaurant or mall or--heaven forbid--an airplane.

But I'm getting ahead of things.
Right now she is our little curly-headed-sweetheart-genius-baby. July pictures coming soon!

Three Uh-Oh

2006-07-18T21:53:00.000-04:00

I'm 30! 30! 30 YEARS OLD!

I promise a for real, super-dee-duper long--and I'm taking frickin' EPIC--post VERY soon. Possibly even tomorrow. Or not. You know how things are. Especially you fellow parents. And oh yeah, it's frickin HOT here and we don't have AC so going to the attic to use the computer is a trifle uncomfortable right now.

But soon...and I really mean it this time, honest.

60 minus 1

2006-07-03T12:10:00.000-04:00

That's right folks, it was 59 years ago today that Sylvie's grandpa Dave was born! Wishing you a very merry mustachioed birthday dearest (grand)dad...and many, many, many, many MANY more!

p.s. Maybe you can find out if there is a Canadian beard team, eh dad?

er...JUNE Sylvie photos

2006-07-01T19:56:00.000-04:00

See them here! (I promise a much more long and involved post soon.)

Kitty got (hot pink!) claws

2006-06-15T15:37:00.000-04:00

My hubby's a real prize winner II

2006-06-14T10:02:00.000-04:00

That's right folks, Theron has done it again. This time he didn't win a call in radio contest, but finally got his just desserts in Woot's weekly Photoshop contest. Perhaps you will recall how he wuz robbed in a previous Woot contest...well, this time, he placed FIRST. Yes sir, that's my baby...daddy!

15 Month check-up

2006-06-06T16:58:00.000-04:00

Sylvie had her 15 month pediatric appointment today and --Huzzah!-- all we heard was good news. Her currents measurements are 29.5" long and 16#10oz. which puts her in the 15th and 3rd percentiles for height and weight respectively. Dr. G was very pleased with her growth and also with her language skills which, according to her, are rather above average. Dr. G was then moved almost to tears (I kid you not) when after having apologized in advance for having to give Sylvie two shots, Sylvie hugged her and gave her a comforting pat on the back. (We didn't tell her that Sylvie almost always pats a person on the back when they hold her). Of course, poor Sylvie still screamed her head off when she got the shots, but she recovered quickly. The doctor said that based on Sylvie's current rate of growth length-wise, she would quite likely reach a final height of between 5'-5'5". If this proves to be the case, then I guess she won't be so "wee" after all!

May Sylvie photos

2006-05-30T22:04:00.000-04:00

I may be getting paranoid in my old age but I'd prefer to think that I am just being cautious; I've password protected Sylvie's photos.
Obviously, I can't post the password here or it would kinda defeat the purpose of having one, so those of you who would like to continue to see Sylvie's monthly photos, send me an e-mail and once I have verified that you are not one of those creepy guys from Dateline's "To Catch a Predator", then I'll send you the password.

Our gal is doing very well, in every way these days. She's crawling like a pro now and almost ready to start walking. She conitnues to add new words to her vocabulary, both vocal and sign, and has developed some very cute habits, such as:

"talking on the phone"-- said phone being her playphone, a spoon, a toy, a doll or even her own fist. She will jabber away, quite aggressively, in a language that sounds like a cross between Russian and Klingon until she very sweetly says, "bye!" Trying to get her to talk on an actual phone when someone is on the other end is another story however as she would rather just push the buttons.

"ticky,ticky"-- whenever we tickle Sylvie we have taken to saying "ticky, ticky" while doing it. She has adopted our habit and loves to poke us in the ribs or belly while saying "ticky, ticky!"

"good doggy...I mean daddy"--sometimes Sylvie decided that we have been especially good parents and favors us with head pats. She'll gesture for Theron to bend his head toward her and she will pat it. Then she will do the same to me, and the cycle repeats numerous times. All the while she murmurs approvingly because we are such good doggies...I mean parents.

"feed the parents"-- this actually started a few months back but I don't believe I've written about it yet. Sylvie likes to pretend to pinch off our moles (and in Theron's case chest hair) and then pretend to feed them to us. Sometimes she "snacks" on them herself. Disgustingly cute or cutely disgusting? You decide.

Speaking of feeding, Sylvie has begun to catch up some on her weight gain. At her last appointment with her nutritionist, we learned that she had gained 2lbs in two months (yay!) and is now back on a growth curve, if still below the 5th percentile. We also saw her cardiologist this past week and he said that things looked the same as before so no immediate steps needed to be taken to address her heart defects. We go back to see him in a year for another checkup and to discuss plans for her surgery, which will probably be done sometime before she turns 5. He has assured us that the surgery is quite common these days so, while we're not thrilled with the prospect, we know that she needs to have it. Next week, Sylvie sees her pediatrician for her 15 month checkup and a week later, she'll see her GI again. I'm hoping that the GI will no longer see the need fot a gtube once she's seen how well Sylvie's been gaining weight on her own. Keep your fingers, toes, eyes...whatever you can cross, crossed!

I'm an Auntie!!!

2006-05-27T19:53:00.000-04:00

Jack Robert Gentry, (formerly known as "Cousin Blob"), was born this morning at 5:15 am, weighing in a 6lbs 6oz and measuring 19" long. My sister, (aka "Wonder Woman") had baby Jack less than 4hrs after arriving at the hospital and without any pain meds. Can I hear a HOLLAH? (I bet the hospital staff and Travis heard some!) I'll post a link to more pictures as soon as I have one!

*UPDATE*

Click here for pictures of the newest addition to the Gentry family!

Mother's Day and a father's brush with mortality

2006-05-16T12:14:00.000-04:00

First of all, let me start of by saying a belated "Happy Mother's Day!" to all of my fellow moms...most especially to my mom and Mom Wallis and to my about-to-be-a-mom sister, Manda.

Now on to the not so happy part of this year's Mother's day. To make a long story short:

my dad had chest pains
he went to the hospital
after some abnormal but inconclusive test results and another episode of chest pains, dad was transferred to another hospital
doctors there found a 90% blocked artery
dad had an angioplasty yesterday where they placed a stent to clear the blockage
thank-any-and-all-deities, all is now good

Dad was reeased from the hospital today but is supposed to follow up with the cardiologist on Friday. Since dad is should not drive for a little while and my mom is as phobic about driving on highways as I am of driving in the city, (it runs in the family), my wonderful, above-and-beyond-the-call-of-duty husband has offered to be the driver. Sylvie and I are going to tag along too so we can all reward my beloved husband by torturing him with Indigo Girls sing-a-longs...unless he claims a driver's right to control the stereo of course.

On this day, 4 years ago...

2006-05-11T18:00:00.000-04:00

Happy Anniversary my love!

My MEEZER-obble day aka why I REALLY need to get over my driving aversion already.

2006-05-10T10:53:00.000-04:00

I've always loved the rain, even when it's cold and blustery rain. Going for short walks on such a day can be quite invigorating, don't you think? Even better is to spend all day inside, drinking tea and having a rainy day meal of tomato soup and a grilled cheese sandwich.

But.

Seeing as how I am possibly one of the most foolhardy people on the planet, I decided that I simply had to go shopping for art supplies yesterday. In case you haven't already figured out the punchline, it was a VERY cold, blustery, rainy day yesterday. What's the big deal? I hear you thinking...well, ya see...despite the fact that I do have a driver's license, I also have an almost pathological aversion to using it. So Sylvie and I, as we usually do, took public transit. I went online to the mbta website to get directions and bus info...and here's where the day started to go wrong:

1) The first bus was late
2) The bus I was supposed to transfer to was VERY late.
(small bit of luck here...the rain held off until we were on the second bus)
3) After much twisty, wind-y backroads, we arrive at supposed destination only to find that IT IS NOT WHERE I MEANT TO GO AT ALL. Turns out I was wrong about the name of the final destination, which I found out after having gone way out of my way. I explained my dilemma to the nice bus driver and he told me to stay on the bus and he'd take me back to where I could catch a bus that did go by the store I needed to visit. He tells me to tell the next driver to let me "off as close as possible to Michael's." which did not sound good.
4) Got on 3rd bus and after more twisty, wind-y (did I mention I have a slight problem with motion sickness?) roads, am dropped off within site of the shopping center where the art supply store is. My concern is realized as It immediately becomes apparent that I must navigate through a NO PEDESTRIAN ZONE, crossing SEVERAL LANES OF TRAFFIC with a BABY IN A STROLLER in the WIND AND RAIN...in order to actually GET there. Why on earth was there a bus stop there and why the hell did the busdriver let me off there??? So after much hemming and hawing, cursing and verge-of-hysteria-laughter, I very cautiously made my way with Sylvie out of the lion's den and into the shopping center parking lot, all limbs intact. All told, it took a little over 2 HOURS to make what should have been a 30 minute trip. I had had to pee, quite badly, for most of the trip; and when I say 'quite badly' I mean I felt like the just the insignificant pressure generated by breathing in and out was gonna make me start to leak urine. I made an immediate beeline for the Babies R Us store in the shopping center as I knew them to have a public restroom. Sylvie, who had slept through almost the entire ordeal, awoke as I was finishing and I took the opportunity to change her diaper before heading out to complete the intended purpose of the trip.

I had been itching to paint again lately so I bought myself a couple of canvases and replenished my acrylic paints along with getting some odds and ends for my more crafty stuff. (I've pretty much given up on the book purses after being disappointed with the way the two I finished turned out so I'm putting the covers to another use. I'll have a whole slew of new art/craft/design projects to post online soon, so keep an eye out!) Afterwards, I hit a couple of the other stores--figuring that after such a hellish journey I should make the trip worth my while--and picked up some new clothes (all on sale!) for Sylvie and I. Just so you know, this shopping center is the kind where you can only access the stores from outside...and the sheltering overhangs did not extend far past each stores entrance. We ended our shopping trip at Target, (which is in it's own separate building so we had to cross the semi-flooded parking lot yet again to reach it), where Sylvie and I had a bite to eat. I asked a security guard if he could tell me where the bus that actually came into the shopping center--as opposed to the one that drops you off in the frickin' no pedestrian zone--and he kindly told me that it was just down the walk way and around the corner from the entrance to Target and that while there was no posted bus stop sign, there was a bench where the bus dropped off/picked up. I was worried that I wouldn't get enough warning when the bus came to catch it at the stop of I stayed inside the store, so with much regret, I wheeled the stroller back out into the howling gale and pelting rain. The paved walkway ended right at the corner and turned into rocks briefly before becoming grass and mud. It was in the grass and mud area where the bus stop bench was located. For several minutes I was literally trapped at the corner because, continuing in my vein of ill-luck that day, that spot was apparently a nexus for hurricane force winds and it was all I could do to keep the stroller from blowing out into the parking lot while simultaneously holding onto my ridiculous (now inverted) umbrella. I somehow eventually managed to push the stroller over the rainslicked rocks, onto the grassy patch around the corner where the bench was and out of (thank any and all deities!) the main force of the wind.

The bus arrived about 15 minutes later, took us to a station close to home where we hopped one last bus (bringing the total to 5 if you're counting). The stop closest to our house was a 2 minute walk so I plodded along home, close to thoroughly exhausted by this point while Sylvie happily jabbered away in her cozy stroller tent, attempting to touch the raindrops that rolled down its sides.

Sylvie, despite being mostly strapped in her stroller under a plastic tent for several hours, was a complete and total angel for the entire time. What did I do to deserve such a great kid?

Today, I feel like I was out shoveling snow all day yesterday and I think I even mildly pulled a left tricep (probably while trying to keep the stroller from being wrenched from my grasp while trapped in the hurricane nexus). I cancelled a lunch date downtown with my friend Caryl because I couldn't face wrestling the winds for control of the stroller because the weather today is about as bad as yesterday. Given my druthers I wouldn't step outside at all today except I have to go get groceries. But this time, I'm taking the car.

Baby got a new pair o' shoes

2006-05-03T16:27:00.000-04:00

April Sylvie photos

2006-04-30T13:51:00.000-04:00

Yes folks, believe it or not, for once I am actually on time with posting the monthly photos . Sylvie has experienced two breakthroughs this month: 1) she can pull herself into a standing position and 2) her lower left central incisor! Ladies and gentlemen...she FINALLY HAS A TOOTH! And it looks as the the lower right central incisor will be popping through the gum any day now as well. Luckily, she's had no obvious discomfort while teething and I'm hoping that holds true for all the rest of the pearly-whites-to-be. As for the weaning, it has gone extremely smoothly for both of us. I had the one bad day early on and I finally went ahead and boobed Sylvie to ease the pressure. Then we went another couple of days without and I developed a sore spot on one side, (presumably a blocked duct), that I again relieved with nursing Sylvie. I coud tell though that my milk was just about gone. At this point, I'm pretty sure that the dairy has closed down until future child(ren). Bye bye, boobs....Thaaaaanks foooor the maaaamarieeees...hyuck, hyuck.

6 things about me

2006-04-19T11:16:00.000-04:00

I've been tagged by Katie to list 6 random things about myself and then choose 6 more people to tag to do the same thing.

1) I received an honorable mention in the Society of Illustrators Student competition in my senior year at SCAD (...these laurels sure are comfortable to rest on...)
2) I was INSANELY excited to get the complete Captain & Tenille collection 6 CD set, and for only $15 counting s&h! (I blame my parents for my love of 70's pop)
3) I always used to want to be a red-head but now I am too lazy/cheap to be bothered with dying my hair (and I rather dig the silvery strands that have begun to permeate my naturally dark brown tresses)
4) I have 5 piercings (...all in my ears you perv)
5) I've moved alot; spent about 10 years (total) in Alabama, 3 years in Wisconsin, 6 years in Ontario, 8 years in Georgia and I'm going on 4 years in Massachuetts
6) At one point in college I had 7 cats: Tribble, Kittery, George, Luna and Luna's 3 kittens (who I later found homes for)

So, now that I have completed this post, I get to tag someone else. Here are the rules:
1--If you are tagged, you have to post six things about yourself on your site.
2--Then you should leave a comment on my site to let me know that you have posted.
3--You can then tag at least 6 more people. To tag, just leave them a comment to let them know they are IT!

Six people that I choose:
1) Manda
2) Doah
3) Chloe
4) Robyn
5) Brian and/or Liz
6) Bev

Oh my aching ta-tas!

2006-04-09T11:51:00.000-04:00

Today is Day 3 of The Weaning of Wee Wallis. I had hoped that as she'd only been nursing once or twice a day for a while now that going cold turkey would not be overly painful for either of us. As it turns out, I was half right; Sylvie has apparently already forgotten that her chief source of sustenance was once mama juice and instead quite happily downs several ounces of whole milk with Instant Breakfast (more calories! more I say!) first thing in the morning.

Thankfully, the emotional pain that I thought would accompany my decision to wean has been much less than I had originally expected. I do miss the closeness and when I'm holding her and my boobs are feeling like they're about to 'splode, I am sorely (ha, ha) tempted to offer her a nipple not made from silicone. BUT, I have decided upon this course of action and I know that giving in to that feeling will only prolong the agony.

Did I say agony? It's not really that bad...except when any pressure other than the clothes I'm wearing is applied to my chest...then it comes kinda close. Mostly it's like the post header says; a constant ache. I was figuring it would probably take a week or so for the milk to dry up but then I looked it up online and saw that it can take SEVERAL weeks. YIKES!. Time to buy a jumbo bottle of ibuprofen and start stuffing my bra with cabbage leaves I guess.

March Sylvie photos

2006-04-04T17:25:00.000-04:00

A lot happened with Sylvie this past month: She turned one, travelled to Savannah for the first time where she finally got to meet her Uncle Travis, attended her first bridal tea and (extra-utero) baby shower, had her hair cut, started bah-ing when shown pictures of sheep, learned how to sit-up all by herself AND...she's started talking to us in a second language--well third if you count baby jabber--by signing! So far she knows the signs for "more" and "milk". Sylvie and pal Sara also had their first visit to the Children's Museum.

Happy Second Anniversary Amanda & Travis!

2006-04-03T18:40:00.000-04:00

Happy First Birthday Sara!

2006-04-03T18:33:00.000-04:00

Looks can be deceiving, a google game

2006-03-21T10:21:00.000-05:00

I got this game from Chloe on MySpace.com. Google the phrase "(Your name) looks like" and find the best one from the first page of results. DON'T FORGET to put it in QUOTES, otherwise it won't work.

I ended up with a couple of good ones:
Paige looks like a Lab or Hound mix. (yikes!)
Paige looks like she is tied to a table. (double yikes!)
and my favorite result...
Paige looks like she is stuck to the bouncy castle wall!

Sylvie's first haircut!!! (Before and After)

2006-03-19T17:49:00.000-05:00

The peer-pressure became too great so today we jumped on the haircut bandwagon. Here are the results.

Just a quickie...

2006-03-17T10:54:00.000-05:00

Yes, yes, I KNOW I've become less than regular with my blogging but any of you who have or have had small children probably know why. I promise a much longer post about our trip to Savannah for Manda's baby shower and Jessica's bridal tea v. soon but right now all I have time for is a little bit of bragging about our baby girl.

New skills she has aquired recently include:
*spreading arms wide (or sometimes just one) in response to the question, "How big is Sylvie?"
*pointing at herself in response to the question "Where's the baby?"
*self feeding with spoon (see photos in post below)
*having her blood drawn in a much more nonchalant and mature way than her mother was able to do until she was in her late teens. (She had a blood draw yesterday that lasted for a couple of minutes because they needed to take quite a bit of blood. She never cried once but only fussed impatiently at being restrained during the procedure. If I didn't know better I'd wonder if she were really my child since I am and always have been a big whiner about needles.)

She got skillz

2006-03-17T10:31:00.000-05:00

Sylvie's first birthday!!!

2006-03-04T23:23:00.000-05:00

Wow.
Has it really been a whole year already? Has it really been 365 days since our wee one switched from quasi-amphibian to full on oxygen breather?
Wow...just wow.

Amazing to think how different she is now from when she first came into our lives, all blob-like and covered in cream cheese. Amazing to realize that so many of the feelings that I'd felt before her birth, and thought were the deepest most profound emotions one could have, were but ripples on the surface of what I realize I am capable of experiencing now.

A couple of people I'll call "Stinky-Goo-Head" and "Slimy-Muck-Ball" (please know these are actually terms of great affection) have told me that I worry too much about Sylvie's various and sundry health issues. I don't agree; I think I worry about as much as your average new parent. However, I do probably harp on the more negative things health wise with Sylvie on this blog...mostly because I need to vent about them. And I'll admit that I've worried incessantly about Sylvie's growth and weight gain (or lack thereof) and I've filled sheet after sheet of paper with the details of Sylvie's diet, what she's eaten, how many calories she's taken in in a given day. I've worried about how she's yet to crawl or pull up or stand unassisted especially when I've been around other moms whose children, though a month or two younger than Sylvie, are 10 lbs heavier and toddling around like pros. I know that all kids develop differently and at their own rates, yet I've worried. But the other day, I was paging through What to Expect the First Year, something I do only rarely because it has so often fed my fears rather than soothed them and I happened to read the milestones for a kid her age and I gotta tell ya...she's above average on just about everything but the standing up thing. I've been afraid to be "that mom", ya know, the one who goes on and on about how gifted her kid is and such. Well, forget that, because I'm going to take this opportunity to puff up with mommy pride and relate to you all of the things our Sylvie is doing.

She speaks!
momma, daddy, kitty, doggy, Izzy, booby (and yes it means she wants mama juice), hi and bye (with a wave!) and mmm! (which doubles for "I'm hungry" and "that looks tasty can I try some?")

Sylvie the Action Figure!
clapping, pointing, "conducting", "singing" and bouncing to music, can roll a ball back and forth to us, plays peekabo, stacks/unstacks rings, recognizes people in photos AND she's finally started pulling up into a standing position with a little help from Theron and I.

She's just incredible, our girl. Everyday she grows more and more amazing and beautiful and...wow. Just wow.
Happy birthday baby!
Love, mommy and daddy.

February Sylvie photos, our visit to Toronto and two visits from Pepe Le Pew

2006-02-26T11:21:00.000-05:00

Recently, we spent a week in the company of some of our Canadian friends and Sylvie's quasi- ex-pat grandparents. Here is our story.

(THUNKTHUNK!)

No, there are no actual Law & Order elements to this story (thank goodness!), I just couldn't help myself.

Our pal Sean, soon to be wed to the lovely Amanda, drove us to the airport bright and early for our 9:30am flight...which morphed into our 11:55am flight. As a result, we were stuck at the airport for about 4 hours having arrived 2 hrs early for the international flight as recommended. Sigh. The flight itself was uneventful and Sylvie was a perfect angel the whole time. Upon preparing to deboard the plane, a guy sitting behind us noticed our girl and said in a slightly shocked voice, "I had no idea there was a baby there! I've never had that happen before!"

We took a cab to mom and dad's new home. Dad had taken off of work early in order to meet us as mom was herself flying back from a florist gig in DC the same day. It was our first time seeing their place and it's really, REALLY nice; spacious and airy, with plenty of wall space for their extensive art collection. They also have some great neighbors, several of whom we met while attending their weekly card night.

Theron, Sylvie and I had the bad luck to all come down with some variation of cold/flu/infection which wasn't fun. Sylvie especially was wheezy and coughing and her nose was running like a faucet. (I bore many a shiny snail-trail across my chest from being a convenient nose wiping device while holding her.) We bought her some infant cough and decongestant drops which a) did little good and b) kept her awake allll night which did us little good. We took her in to see mom and dad's GP who kindly agreed to see her the next day and he diagnosed her with her very first bronchial and ear infection. (Not only does our kid like to get sick at less than opportune of times...she also does a very thorough job of it!) We got a prescription for amoxicillin aka that "yummy" pink goo as well as not one, but TWO inhalers. Sylvie was much more amenable to taking the pink goo although she was apt to let it ooze out of the side of her mouth if we don't keep an eye on her but she was not a fan of the breathing treatments which had to be administered through an Aerochamber MAX (with mask). Luckily with a little encouragmetn (read, lots of cheering and hand-clapping afterwards) Sylvie began to take her breathing treatments like a pro and now claps cheerfully for herself after completing them. Only a few more days to go and she's done with 'em. Despite her illness, Sylvie had great fun beating up on G'pa Dave and learning a new fave song from G'ma Judy: the Banana Splits theme song. She also made out like a bandit gift wise. Some of the things she received include: a stuffed cat, stacking/nesting boxes, a set of instruments (most of which stayed with the g'parents for future visits), a prism to hang in her window back home and even two dolls from a friendly neighbor lady.

During our visit we also went into Toronto proper for an overnight stay with the always awesome Wilson-Cox family, aka Doah, Al and Owain. Doah and I have known each other since we were angst-ridden (is there any other kind?) teenagers and it was kinda neat watching our two offspring playing together...or at least playing near each other. I guess we'll have to wait a few years before we'll get to hear such cries as, "Mooom! s/he took my toy! Moooooom! I don't want to play with a (snear of disgust) girl/boy!" Doah took us a for a walk around a near by honest-to-god working farm where Sylvie got to see her first real live farm animals.

Another old highschool buddy of mine, Dorie, lives in the same building as Doah and was able to join us all for dinner at a little pub around the corner later that evening. By keeping the kids placated with tastes of our food (esp. Sylvie who loved bits of my steak and mushroom pie as well as Theron's liver and mashed potatoes), we five adults managed to carry on quite a lively conversation although I know Theron and Al had a few (ok, several) eye-rolling-there-they-go-again moments when us three gals reminisced about our school days.

The next day, Doah, Al and Owain took us for a long stroll through some of the local places of interest including Kensington Market where they treated us to some fantastically tasty portuguese custard tarts from a neighborhood bakery. Their generosity did not stop there as later Doah purchased two gifts for Sylvie: an Ugly doll and a beautiful tutu made out of sheer red ribbon tipped with tiny red ribbon roses, which I can hardly wait for Sylvie to be dancing around in. Thanks again Doah!

Alas, our time together had to come to an end and so we said our goodbyes, grabbed our overnight bag and hopped a streetcar-subway-GO train back to Ajax to spend one last night with the g'parents before our return to the States.

Meanwhile, back in good ol' MA...

Cousin Chloe, who was kind enough to dog/cat sit for us while we were out of the country, was having quite a run of bad luck. First, Izzy got into a box of chocolates, which as any dog owner knows is not a good thing. Luckily Izzy puked up most of what she'd eaten and and while under careful observation by Chloe exhibited no further symptoms of chocolate poisoning. Then poor Chloe had a bout of food poisoning herself and while still recovering from it had to deal with Izzy who had a run in with the business end of a SKUNK. Yikes! After a couple of dousings with tomato juice and Pantene Pro V, Izzy smelled less skunk-like and more as if she'd just had a perm by the time we got back home.

You'd think that Izzy would have learned her lesson from the first skunk incident,,,but no. We'd been home only a few days when she came in from being in the backyard drooling, pawing at her snout and reeking of skunk musk. Theron bravely took it upon himself to bathe our pungent pooch, using another recipe (as seen on episode 16 of Mythbusters) of peroxide, baking soda and dog shampoo. Then thanks to Oust, scented candles and occasionally cracking the wondows despite the freezing temps, our home no longer stinks of parfum de pepe le pew.

P.S. Here are the February photos. I figured I had to put them at the end to make you read the whole posting.

Why I'm eating my heart out...

2006-02-14T22:40:00.000-05:00

...because it's full of Reese's Peanut Butter cups silly! The most wonderful hubby of all time brought it home for me along with a bouquet of flowers. Not only that but our incredibly gifted daughter apparently snuck over to his workplace, made a V-day card for me for him to present along with the flowers and candy, and then snuck back home with me none the wiser. (I really need to keep a better eye in that girl.)

Happy Valentine's Day everybody!

Doctor, doctor, gimme the news...over the phone next time, will ya?

2006-02-14T19:09:00.000-05:00

Roundtrip bus fare: $3.60
Roundtrip subway fare: $2.50
Office visit co-pay: $15.00
Roundtrip travel time: about 2 hours

Taking a trip into town to see our Genetics doctor who told us that the blood test came back negative for the known gene mutation associated with noonan syndrome but that only about half of the cases with a clinical diagnosis do have the mutation (which I already knew)...

POINTLESS.

I mean, seriously, couldn't he have just called me and saved me the time and money???? He really had nothing else to add but to tell me things I already knew---such as, "did you know that there is a doctor here who is running a study on noonan syndrome?" (Uh, yeah, I mentioned it to YOU at our last appointment) and would we like Sylvie to be involved in the study? (YES....again, something I had brought up at our previous appointment). The doctor who is heading the study happened to be in an adjacent office so our genetics doc asked her to come in and talk to us. She told us that her assistant would be calling us shortly to arrange for us to bring Sylvie in to be enrolled in the study which would entail an exam and yet more bloodwork. While I hate subjecting my baby to needles as much as any mom, I think in this case it's worth it if Sylvie's participation in the research can help draw a clearer picture of noonan syndrome.

The dreadful irony of Sylvie wearing a sleeper with the words "if they could just stay little" written all over it

2006-02-08T14:16:00.000-05:00

I haven't been blogging my usual amount because Sylvie hasn't been taking her usual naps. Lately she's only been going down for one long nap in the afternoon and also since Theron's contract ended he's been on the computer most of the time he's home trying to find a full time job. I just don't get as much of a chance to get on myself anymore. But since Sylvie is asleep right now and Theron is out running errands it's alllll mine, bwa-ha-ha!

We FINALLY heard from Early Intervention; in fact our PT is supposed to come by today at 4:30. I'd called her and left a message yesterday morning and when I didn't hear back I called the director and left her a message this morning and our assigned PT either heard from above to contact us or just got around to checking her messages. I guess we'll see how today goes. I'm very much hoping that Sylvie's gross motor skills will get back on target with this therapy. I know al kids develop at their own rate but it's hard seeing babies 2+ months younger than her who are walking around when she's not even crawling.

Sylvie had stomach bug this past Friday night/Saturday morning. I've been more than a little nervous about maintaining her hydration but she seems to be ok. We've been struggling to get her to eat more since she pretty much only had breastmilk for a day and a half, then she'd take yogurt, maybe 2oz at a time and finally she's started back on dinners, but she'll still only take 1.5-2oz at a time of them. So much for increasing her calorie intake. We're supposed to go see the nutritionist again tomorrow. I'm so afraid that she and the GI are going to insist that Sylvie needs a gtube. If she really does, then of course we'll do it but I so hope to avoid having to go that route. At our GI appointment last week, the doctor expressed concern that Sylvie's weight had not appreciably changed since she saw her a month prior and did mention the possibility of needing a gtube. However, she wasn't pushing for it just yet, so there is hope we won't have to use one. But Sylvie having been sick twice now obviously isn't helping her gain weight.

What's really scary is that before Sylvie was sick the first time, she was eating A LOT and still her weight gain was slowing. Now that she's been sick twice and is eating so much less...It just makes me feel so daggum helpless.

Rockin' Out

2006-02-03T22:52:00.000-05:00

Another awesome friday playdate, another awesome photo, (courtesy of Sara's mom, -- thanks Marla!) Here's our Sylvie astride Stanley the Snail, waving her fingers conductor-style in time to "You Are My Sunshine," which plays when one of Stanley's antenna nubs is squeezed.

We also received some fantastic homemade playdough from our lovely hostesses today. If you're interested, you can find the recipe for it, as well as other art material recipes, here.

January Sylvie Pictures

2006-01-31T15:40:00.000-05:00

I apologize for having not posted in such a long time, but it's really not from lack of wanting to post. It's just that our DSL provider is crap and so we had no connection for the past week or so. But here I am, back to the blogging and with new photos of our wee one!

This last month has been really amazing, seeing how Sylvie is growing and changing every day. Although she hasn't added any new words to her vocabulary aside from the ones I've already mentioned, she uses the ones she has ALOT. Especially "kitty" and "daddy". Boy, does she love that kitty. Kih-tee...kit-tee...kitty!...kih...tee...or sometimes just kee! I was dangling one of Sylvie's little combs in front of Smudge the other day and when Smudge went after it Sylvie thought it was THE MOST HYSTERICAL THING EVER. She was laughing almost nonstop! We tried to get some video of it but by the time we got the camera set up she was mostly over it and would only cackle a bit. That's her usual way with humorous things; it's hysterical, then funny, then mildly amusing and then she may smile about it or she may not.

Some her other new skills include:
Putting one of her colored stacking rings back on the pole. She did it a few times so I know it wasn't a fluke. I told her she'll have to show daddy when he gets home and she immediately started looking around and saying, "Daddy? Daddy?"

Flipping through her books and pointing at various pictures. We have a little especially-for-babies photo album that was a gift from one of my cousins (thanks Amy!) and Sylvie loves to look at it and point out her daddy's picture. Right now every picture is daddy to her, even the ones of mommy, so we're still working on that one.

Trying to work the "I'm-too-sleepy-to-eat-right-now" con. She'll start rubbing her eyes very dramatically, much more so than when she really is tired, when she's decided she's had enough solids. But once you take her out of her high chair she's suddenly wide awake!

She's also started to appreciate music and will even wave her hands to the beat sometimes, especially when I sing the ABC song while changing her diaper. (If you can call that music.)

And the cutest new trick of all is that she will try to comb her own hair. Sometimes, she'll even be holding the comb the right way when she does it!

Gotta love "springtime" in January!

2006-01-20T19:59:00.000-05:00

opalise everything

Sylvie is A-OK!

Second---and hopefully FINAL--heart procedure

Oops

NSTAR's Walk for Children's Hospital Boston

Long overdue post part 2: School is IN..and off to a bumpy start

Long overdue post part 1: Sylvie is THREE!!!

Welcome Siobhan Elysées Flora!

Welcome Edward Lowe!

A Sad Goodbye

Why living in Taxachusset is a GOOD thing aka the post with many abbreviations

POTTY TRAINING...Hooray#1!

Welcome to the world, Wee Cousin Wallis!

POTTY TRAINING Day #1

Sylvie's Surgery Care Page. Read the daily updates.

Happy *28th* Auntie Manda!

Long overdue update

Snake Bouquet - my second featured design on shirt.woot!

You wanna piece of me?!

SCARFACE pictures, yay!

Happy *!60th!* Birthday G'pa Dave!

Just call me SCARFACE

Goofiness

May Sylvie photos

Gimme a high 5!

Happy Birthday Cousin Jack!

One more 'Get Rich Quick' scheme (yeah, right)

Help Theron (and Sylvie!) raise money for AIDS research

Five Years and counting

April Sylvie photos

Spring is finally here!!!

March Sylvie Photos

More shameless self promotion

ImageKind Sale!

Holycrap-olageeWOW! Sylvie's done gone and turned TWO!

Buy prints of my art online!

A mother/daughter holiday collaboration

January Sylvie Photos

A new fascination

Bit o' braggin'

Happy Birthday CHF Amy!

Welcome Sophia Leonie!

Happy Birthday G'ma Judy!

I guess it wouldn't be the holidays without a visit to the ER...plus December Sylvie Photos!

Happy New Year!

November Sylvie Photos

Welcome to the world baby Bryce!

October Sylvie photos

I like to watch...

Woot Contest #97

Woot Contest #96

Woot Contest #95

Woot Contest #94

Woot Contest #93

Looong overdue (and from what I hear, much anticipated)...Sylvie photos! Plus bonus material!

Woot Contest #92

Independence Day

Woot Contest #91

Coast to coast boast

Woot Contest #90

Happy 27th Birthday Auntie Manda!

18 months and counting

Woot contest #89

Woot contest #88

Woot is happening to me?!

MEL-MO x 2

Update plus July Sylvie photos!

Happy 28th Birthday Uncle Travis!

mmm...bacon

Things you may not have known about me

As promised...a nice, looooong update!

Three Uh-Oh

60 minus 1

er...JUNE Sylvie photos

Kitty got (hot pink!) claws

My hubby's a real prize winner II

15 Month check-up

May Sylvie photos

I'm an Auntie!!!

Mother's Day and a father's brush with mortality

Happy 28th Auntie Manda!

Happy !60th! Birthday G'pa Dave!