Photo session

We finally had our session with a very talented young photographer who's just getting her business off the ground. It was a beautiful day and I'm so happy with how the photos turned out. Take a look, if you'd like!

Emma photos

I took a couple of photos while we were waiting for the photographer. Just so you can see the contrast between a hack amateur like me and a really talented photographer like Rachael!

Xmas preview

Woke up this morning to BUCKETS of rain...it has been pouring for hours, which is just what you want on a Saturday with a young child to entertain. At least I've been able to get some housecleaning done. But I think we'll both go nuts if we're stuck inside all day.

We were supposed to get Emma's pictures taken outside today. I was going to have them take some of her in one of her favorite outfits and some in her holiday garb. I had a lot of trouble finding her a Christmas outfit this year. I usually go with something from Gymboree, but I'm not a fan of their holiday line this year. There's so much plaid out there this year, but Emma now wears a plaid uniform to school, so I'm not going to subject her to plaid for the holidays as well. We went to the Children's Place the other night and Emma absolutely went gaga over this outfit...


I'm actually not that crazy about the sweater, but she loved it and I like the skirt a lot. It certainly is the most grownup-looking Christmas outfits she's ever had.

The yearly trek to the pumpkin patch

Today we made our annual visit to a local pumpkin patch. To be honest, I really wasn't in the mood. For one thing, it's 90+ here today. Honestly, I'm beginnng to wonder if we'll even have an autumn this year. Usually Emma has on some nice new fall togs on for our trip to the PP. But once again, I had to drag out some of her summer clothes so she wouldn't get too hot. Okay, crabby weather rant over now...

Anyway, we were supposed to go with a friend of mine and her daughter, but her little girl is sick today with the croupy cough thing that half the kids here have now. Emma started hacking a bit last night, so I fear she's next.

So we headed out early to the PP in an effort to beat some of the crowd. There are tons of thing to do there, including...

Pony rides...


Mining for "gold"...


Making a pumpkin sock and running around like it's a kite...


Posing behind one of those silly cutouts so you look like a scarecrow...


Finally making it to the actual pumpkin patch and spending 25 minutes looking for the perfect two pumpkins to take home...


And lastly, taking a nature walk on a nice shady trail...


Needless to say, we were both beat and one of us fell asleep on the way home (it didn't get to be me, unfortunately.)

Extreme Makeover - Emma Edition

When it comes to home decorating, I tend to do things in spurts. I won't touch a thing around the house for a year, and then I become totally obsessed and start tearing everything apart. We are definitely in a "tearing apart" period right now.

I just had new kitchen countertops put in and decided I didn't like the color of the kitchen walls with the new counters. So last night, I started ripping down wallpaper (perhaps my all-time favorite home decorating chore - NOT!) Emma was excited and offered to help...


We got all the wallpaper down, but there are still a lot of spots where the glue is stuck to the walls. So it looks like tomorrow will be a wetting, scoring and scraping kind of day.

In the meantime, I had our bathroom sink hauled away to be refinished. It is an ancient cast iron pedestal sink that I love, but it was definitely in need of a little sprucing up. So we'll be without a bathroom sink for a week, which means brushing our teeth using the bathtub. That was fun for one day, but now we're over it.

Who knows what else I'll decide to tear up or out during this manic decorating phase. If only Ty Pennington would swing by to help out!

Our moony arty weekend

What is it about fall? It seems there is so much going on and everyone (including us) is so busy. I was trying to find a weekend day in the next month that we could go apple-picking, but we honestly don't have any time to do it.

We've been on the go all this weekend as well. Yesterday was our local FCC group's Moon Festival, which is always loads of fun. The weather was sunny and warm and the festival was at a really neat park this year. Emma and her pals had a blast...






After staying to help clean up, we didn't get home until almost 9 p.m. I think I was more tired than Emma, but we both headed straight to bed and fell right asleep.

Today, we skipped church (bad mommy!) to head out early for one of our favorite annual events...a huge local art fair. They have tons of activities for the kids and Emma had so much fun...






We must have run into at least 20 of Emma's friends there...it really is such a great place to take you kids. It was extremely hot out though, and we're pretty pooped. But I still haven't cleaned the house and gone to the grocery store. So somehow, we've got to summon up the energy to get those things done before the day totally slips away. At least I had the foresight to get the laundry done Saturday morning!

Queen of the roller derby

Well, I cheated death (or at least permanent paralysis) today. We were supposed to meet a group of friends this afternoon at the zoo, but it was a cool and rainy day, so we opted for the rollerskating rink instead. This probably was not my number one choice, being that Emma had never rollerskated and I hadn't for a good 20 years. But we went along with the majority and ended up at a super-crowded roller rink for the afternoon.

The one thing I remember about rollerskating is...you ARE going to fall down. If you don't hit the floor because of your own clutziness, some flailing child is going to grab onto you and take you down with them. And let's be honest here...at my age, taking a fall on a hard roller rink floor...let's just say that it's not out of the realm of possiblity that a DNR order will be needed at some point. When you're a kid and you fall on your bum, you pop right back up. When you're closer to fifty than forty (as I am now), when you fall on your bum, traction is almost always the result.

But my girl and I bravely laced on the skates and began to tentatively make our way around the rink, clinging to the wall for dear life. I think it took us like 45 minutes to make it all the way around, while fearless little kids zipped by us at lightning speed. But we made it and we didn't fall down once (I'm sure I would be writing this from a hospital bed if we had.)

Anyway, I wouldn't say I had a great time, but it was a small victory to try something I hadn't in a long time and live to tell the tale. Emma had a decent time, although she said she would have rather gone bowling (a much safer sport for both of us.)

Unfortunately, I didn't bring my camera to capture any of this thrill-seeking for posterity. But here's a pic of Emma at bathtime tonight. I think we'll both sleep well tonight!

My little Daisy

Emma had her first Girl Scout meeting this afternoon after school. In Kindergarten, Girl Scouts are called "Daisies." Then they move up to Brownies next year. Here's Emma in her little Daisy tunic...


At their first meeting, the Daisy Scouts colored a picture, had a snack, painted flower pots and planted some daisies. Quite a bit to cram into an hour! Here is Emma with her friends Raina and Sydney...


The meeting ended with the traditional Daisy Scout circle (or at least I think it's traditional!)


The troop has all kinds of field trips planned this year, including an outing to a pizza parlor to make pizza (cool!) and a trip to the Build-A-Bear Workshop store (Emma's already looking forward to that!)

I think Girl Scouts will be a great experience for Emma...tragically, it was one I never had. Somehow, I ended being drafted into the far inferior Camp Fire Girls (no offense to any former CFGs out there.) So I guess I will be living vicariously through Emma's Girl Scout adventures!

One sign fall is near...

...we had to start raking leaves today. We have a tree in the backyard that starts losing its leaves in late August, so we spent an hour or so raking leaves this afternoon. Emma loves raking (I know that will change someday!)


After raking, we went to Michael's and bought some Halloween arts and crafts stuff. By arts and crafts stuff, I mean like a all-but-preassembled foam haunted house that we put more foam stickers on. Trust me, it's not like I'm crocheting Emma's trick-or-treat bag or anything.

BTW, the Jane Brown thing went very well...extremely emotional and informative. Last night, Emma and I had our first real discussion about her birth parents. Much to my surprise, she has some definite ideas about them (for example, she thinks they are dead.) But I listened to her and told her anytime she wanted to talk about them, I would be happy to listen. I think it will end up being a very good thing that we went. I'll write more about it later, when I have a chance.

Jane Brown playshop

Our local FCC chapter is sponsoring a Jane Brown playshop this weekend. For those of you who don't know, Jane Brown is a nationally-known adoption social worker who works with young adoptees and their families on better understanding what it feels like to be adopted. She is not without controversy. Some adoptive parents don't subscribe to her theory that ALL adoptive children are going to have issues at some point in their lives and you, as a parent, need to learn to deal with it.

As a parent of an adoptive child who, thus far, hasn't shown a great deal of anxiety about being adopted, or even a whole lot of interest in the subject, I wonder if I'm doing the right thing taking her to this playshop. I've talked to some of our friends who are attending and I think we're all concerned that our children are going to be upset by what's discussed and it might open up a Pandora's box of emotion for our girls. Before I signed us up, I read several accounts of the playshops written by parents and every single one of them had the same concerns. But they all said that they were so happy they attended.

I guess my feeling is, it's unlikely that just attending this event will lead to Emma experiencing full-blown grief for her birth mother or something similar. Unless that was already there hidden inside, in which case, we need to deal with it.

Anyway, keep you fingers crossed that this ends up being a valuable experience for us...I'll let you know what happens.

P.S. You can read more about the Jane Brown playshops here, if you're interested.

A sight you don't often see...

EMMA IN JEANS!

My poor daughter is cursed with the same problem I have...long skinny legs and no butt or tummy (okay, you can quit laughing now.) I have not been able to find a pair of jeans to fit her in like two years. If they fit around the waist, they're too short. If they're the right length, they fall off.

I saw these Disney Princess capri jeans at Macy's yesterday. They're 3Ts and I thought they might fit her and it wouldn't really matter if they were a bit short. I wasn't sure if Emma would go for them because she's worn knit pants for so long, I thought she might not like the stiffer feel of denim. But she was so excited and insisted on wearing them right away.

I think she looks pretty cute in them. Plus, I got the pants and shirt for $7.00!

P.S. just to reassure you, Emma did not fall right after this picture was taken! It looks like she's about ready to tip over!

Summer must really be coming to an end...

...because we had our last outing to the pool yesterday. Although the water was a little brisk, we had a great time.


We always seem to run into someone we know at the pool and yesterday was no exception. Emma got to hang out with her pals Jia and Ella...


Even though autumn is my favorite season, I'm always a little sad when summer is over. Work and school suddenly take on a more serious tone. But we've had a pretty good summer and I am looking forward to fall and cooler temperatures. Emma's already excited about Halloween and, heaven help me, Christmas.

A mommy and me day

Well, I guess I've somewhat recovered from my lousy Friday (or more likely, I've just decided not to dwell on it this long weekend). Since we've been majorly busy the past couple of weekends, Emma and I spent the day together, just the two of us, on Saturday.

She had been pestering me to take her to one of those "edu-tainment" kids places that we hadn't been to in awhile. So we hung out there for like four hours. Here's Emma having some fun in the ball pit...


We came home and rested up a bit and then headed to a popular outdoor shopping area. We managed to hit both Gymboree and Children's Place, which were both having sales. I'm starting to buy fall and winter clothes for Emma...it's always kind of fun to start buying stuff for the new season. What's I need to do in the next few weeks is start weeding out Emma's old summer clothes. It's hard, because it's still warm and probably will be for the next few weeks, so I can't toss all her summer stuff. But both her closet and dresser are bulging with old summer and new fall clothes. So something's got to go pretty quick.

Anyway, church this morning and we may try to hit the pool one last time today. The water is probably freezing, but it's supposed to be close to 90 today, so we'll see.

Enjoy your weekend, especially those of you that have Monday off too!

Crummy day...

Okay, yesterday was really not a very good day for me...

First, my car, which has been giving me loads of trouble lately, broke down on the way home from work. Fortunately, it stopped working right in front of Emma's friend's house, when I picked her up after school. But I had to have it towed to the shop and then deal with the hassle of getting a rental this morning. The car guys just called and said they think the transmission's bad. Gee, what will that run me...like $2,000?! I don't know what to do...I just paid off this car last month. It's like Daimler-Chrysler got the last payment and pressed a button on some remote control computer and fried my car so I'd have to get a new one. Dang!

Second, I got a letter from my former health insurer that they weren't going to cover a recent health test I had to have because they claim I was no longer being covered by their insurance, even though I was still under their plan. So now I have to go through the hassle of somehow proving to them that they were covering me, while trying to fend off the hospital, which is pressuring me to cough up $1,200. I despise the insurance industry so much...don't even get me started.

Them last night, Emma's kindergarten teacher called to tell me that he's having major problems with Emma talking in class all the time. I was so shocked, mainly because Emma is usually very quiet and shy. Apparently she's coming out of her shell, because he says she won't stop talking with her classmates, even after he has told her to. She apparently spent some time out in the hallway yesterday because she wouldn't pipe down. He was really nice and said Emma's a very sweet and intelligent child, but it's something she needs to work on. He just didn't want me to get freaked out if Emma came home saying she had to stand out in the hallway. So I tried to talk to her about it after I got off the phone. She just started crying and said she wanted to go back to her other school. I know that's not true, but she was upset. I just told her she needed to concentrate on not talking while Mr. Thomas or one of the other children are talking. We'll see...

Somehow, this then morphed into a tearful conversation about how she doesn't like being the smallest one all the time. She's really at that age where kids are excited about being the biggest and weighing the most (that will end soon enough!) But for right now, it really bothers her being so tiny. Her friend Emme was over yesterday and both girls got on the scale. Emme weighed 52 and Emma just 30. She was not happy that 52 was more than 30. I kept telling her that she was growing and would catch up with her friends. At one point, she said "I wish I wasn't Chinese...then I'd be bigger" which made me sad.

Anyway, a very emotional day for both of us. I mean, compared to say, refugees facing genocide in Dafur or something, it wasn't really a horrible day. But for me, not my best...

Crazy Saturday

I think I've mentioned before that, when it comes to our social life, it always seems to be feast or famine. We either have a long weekend ahead of us with absolutely nothing to do, or we're booked from sun up to sun down. Well, yesterday was definitely one of our feast days. We left the house at 10 am and didn't get back until almost 8 pm.

First we went over to Emma's friend Helen's house because we hadn't seen them in awhile. The girls played out in the back yard for a little over an hour. Then we went shopping at Macy's for about an hour because they were having a big sale and I had a coupon burning a hole in my pocket. I bought a few things for myself, including one of those baby doll tops that are suddenly all the rage. It really is kind of stupid that I lose a lot of weight and then go out and buy a shirt that makes me look six months pregnant. Oh well. And I bought Emma a couple of new dresses, one of which she insisted on wearing out of the store.

From Macy's, we headed over to Macie's...Emma's friend Macie, that is, who was having her 5th birthday party. I have to say, it was one of the nicest birthday parties we've been to. For one thing, there were just three little girls invited, which was lovely. I don't know if I can take another party where there are 25 screaming kids running around like maniacs. This was perfect because all four girls are great friends and know and love each other. Here are Pacey, Emma and Macie...


And here are the girls, along with Logan, clowning around with their ice cream cones...


After the party, and a quick clothes change for Emma, we raced across town to a park and met our friends Kay and Jenna. We haven't seen them in awhile and Kay had recently had some surgery, so I wanted to see how she was doing (fine). The girls ran around the park for about 90 minutes while Kay and I caught up on things.

By now, it was 7 o'clock and Emma and I hadn't even had dinner. On the way home, we stopped at McDonald's (YUM!!! Mommy's favorite place!) Snapped this picture of Emma chowing down...


Then it was back home for a quick bath and I put a very tired girl to bed. Even though I was pooped, I stayed up late to watch my Netflix movie "Hot Fuzz" which I have to say was pretty hilarious.

We have a much less hectic day on tap today...Sunday school and church and then some grocery shopping and house cleaning (or chores, as Emma calls them.) Less fun, but we definitely could use a more laid back day.

I am the mom of a kindergartener

Today was Emma's first day of kindergarten. We were so thrilled when we found out at the open house yesterday that Emma would have her summer school teacher, Mr. Thomas, for kindergarten. And a lot of her friends are in her class, so that's great too.

Although Emma had been talking about how nervous she was about going to kindergarten, she was all smiles this morning before we headed out.




When I dropped her off at school, I gave her a quick kiss and hug at the classroom door (as we were advised to do by the principal) and that was that.

I was totally shocked when I started crying out in the parking lot and bawled all the way to work. I had been telling myself the past week or so that going off to kindergarten just isn't the milestone it used to be, because most kids are in daycare and preschool these days. But it was obviously a bigger deal than I thought! The sight of Emma in her little plaid jumper and brand new mary janes was very emotional for me.

Emma didn't have a whole lot to say about her first day when I picked her up. This was her first day of total French immersion, so maybe she didn't understand much of what was going on. But she mentioned how much she loves her new school, so that's wonderful. We'll just have to wait and see how the year progresses...

I have no idea what's going on here...

Bowl-a-rama extravaganza

One of Emma's little friends from school had a birthday party this afternoon. Thankfully, it WASN'T at Chuck E. Cheese...it was at a local bowling alley. So Emma got her first bowling experience. Here she is all decked out in her multi-colored clown bowling shoes, ready to hit the lanes.


Considering it was her first time, she did pretty well and really loved it. Of course, I held my breath everytime she lifted up her 8-pound bowling ball (bright pink). I was so sure she was going to drop it on her foot or some other kid's head. But that never happened. Here's my pint-sized Dick Weber and her friend Pacey watching their bowling ball S-L-O-W-L-Y make its way down the lane...


The most pins Emma knocked down on one throw was seven. I think that's pretty good. But then, I once bowled an eight...and I'm not talking about when I was a child. Another time, when I was an adult, I went bowling with my eight-year-old nephew and he creamed me. And, oh yeah, he had a broken leg at the time.

But I digress...here's Emma with her friends Logan, Macie and Pacey, and one of her with the birthday boy, Christopher...




We had such a good time that I think we can safely add bowling to our list of things to do when the weather isn't ideal for outside activities. Of course, it will be a little embarrassing if my five-year-old beats me at bowling! A real possibility, trust me!

Our wild weekend

We were very excited because we were supposed to meet my sister from Boston, her husband and their two kids in St. Louis this past weekend. After work on Friday, I rushed to pick up Emma from school and hit the road for the four hour-plus trip. About 10 miles out of town, our car's electrical system suddenly failed! That means no radio or DVD, no opening the windows and locks and, most critically, no air conditioning. I was in a total panic. I pulled over and restarted the car and the system came back on, but kept fritzing out. I knew there was no way we could go so I turned around and headed back home.

Emma started crying and wailing "But I want to see my cousins." And I did too, of course. So on the way back home, I called the car rental place near my house (unfortunately, I have them on speed dial.) They had one car left. So we raced over there, drove our car home, with the car rental guy right behind us. Dumped all of our stuff into the rental car and took off again for St. Louis. The trip was fairly uneventful until we hit a blinding rain storm about 30 minutes from our hotel. I mean, a traveling-20-miles-an-hour-on-the-interstate rain storm. And, of course, with a rental car, it was fun to try to figure out how to work the windshield wipers and all that stuff in a torrential downpour. It was past 9 pm when we finally got to the hotel...we were so happy to get there!

After a good night's rest, we revved up for a day of fun with Emma's cousins. Since it was 100 degrees over the weekend in St. L, we decided to forego the zoo and other outdoor activities. We spent a good part of the day at the Science Center, which the kids loved. Here are D.J., Emma and Brennan goofing around...


The next morning, we checked out of the hotel and decided to brave the hot and humid conditions and go to Grant's Farm, which is always fun. Emma was excited because she got to pet one of the Clydesdale horses...


I think what excited Emma more than anything was eating her first snow cone!


Anyway, after a long morning at Grant's Farm, we had to head back home. We hadn't gotten very far at all when Emma started wailing that she didn't have her khaki (blanket). I pulled the car over and tore through the car looking for it. I just KNEW I had put it in the car when I packed up everything that morning. By now, Emma was crying and I was pretty close. I'm sure all of you with kids have had that moment of panic when your child's most prized blanket/stuffed animal, etc. goes missing. So I called the hotel and asked them if they had found a child's blanket in our room. After an interminable wait, the girl gets back on the line and tells me housekeeping had the blanket and they would hold it for us. So I turned back to St. Louis to get the blanket. I don't know who was more relieved...me or Emma!

So we're back after a nice weekend, despite all the little bumps. Now I'm dealing with car repairs and rental cars, school and work...back to reality!

Random photo

Yesterday, I had a photo shoot rescheduled at the last minute and I had to run and get Emma before I headed out to the shoot (yes, it's fun being a single working mom at times!) Anyway, we were working with this really great photographer Kenny on this shoot. While they were setting up the lighting, Kenny turned a took one quick snap of Emma. He sent it to me this morning...I think it's such a nice picture...


I'm amazed at how talented professional photographers can be...the guys I've been working with the past couple of weeks have taken some fantastic photos. They really are in a different league than us amateurs.

Things I've decided to be crabby about

Here are a couple of things that are making me cranky this week:

#1

After starting and sticking with a diet for more than six months, I've lost like 35 pounds. However, I haven't lost any weight in more than three weeks...nothing, zip, not even an ounce. Sure, it could be that I've hit that dreadful dieting plateau where you can't seem to lose anything, no matter how hard you try. But I think it's more likely that I've gotten a bit fast and loose with what I'm eating. I came to this epiphany while eating some of Emma's nachos grande at Taco Bell the other night (something I normally wouldn't touch - I don't even like them that much!) So I need to re-commit myself so I can lose this last ten pounds.

#2

I have come to the conclusion that Emma has developed a case of the "gimme gimmes." I should preface this by saying that in the past, Emma seldom, if ever, has demanded anything. On the rare occasion when we were at the store and she asked for something, if I said no, that would be the end of it. But lately, I'm noticed little signs that this is starting to change. A couple times when I've picked her up from school, she has asked "did you buy me anything today?" And she's starting to see commercials on tv and asking if she can have this or that. I really think this is more of a mommy problem than an Emma problem. I have probably been buying her too much stuff lately and I need to stop. I just love getting her toys and clothes. But I'm going to cool it before it gets out of hand and I end up with a spoiled, demanding child.

#3

I feel like one of my best friends and I are drifting apart and I'm not sure why. Maybe we're taking our friendship for granted and neither of us is putting any effort into it. But I'm going to try to be better about emailing and calling her and getting together with her and her daughter.

Things I am actually happy about this week:

#1

After sort of feeling lost the first couple of weeks, I'm finally settling into a groove with the new job. I've been insanely busy the last two weeks trying to get a magazine out, but it's been kind of cool running all around for photo shoots and working with the writers. I really think it's going to end up being a great job for me!

#2

We're meeting my sister, her husband and their two kids this weekend in St. Louis. Emma adores her cousins, who she only seems to get to see 2-3 times a year. So we're looking forward to this. Hopefully we'll have a wonderful time, despite the predicted 90+ temps.

So, like most people, some good and some not-so-good going on in our lives. But I guess all things considered, we're doing pretty well and I shouldn't complain.