Twirl factor is high!

A while back, I invested in 2 Disney themed dresses as part of a non-profit fundraiser and guessed on Alexandra's size for the spring. Well, she's growing faster than I thought she might! We tried on one dress, over her shirt & it is a snug fit! The funny part - once I got the dress on her, she didn't want to take it off!! She twirled around and around, watching the skirt flare out in the big mirrored doors. With such a gleeful expression, I had to take some pictures. Unfortunately, the background's not very photogenic --- but she sure is!

RAWR!!!

For Halloween, Alexandra was a dragon this year. And a cute one, too, if I do say so myself.

If you ask her to say "dragon," she response with a little roar!

The costume worked out great & kept her nice and toasty on 2 chilly Halloween outings!

more paper adventuring

It looks like the risk for malware from a related site is now down to zero, so I can post & can read my own blog again. (For those of you who didn't have Google sending warnings, I suggest a virus scan. Apparently one of the adoption blogs I mentioned on here about 2-3 years ago had been infected, so I was getting warnings when I would try to look at my own blog. Still can't actually FIND a post where it's mentioned, mind you, so there's that whole conundrum!)

I have been doing some more scrapbooking - trying to catch up on our May 2011 Disney trip & also to do pages related to more current events. I still have 2 vacation albums to do for this year as well. ACK.



















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Short hair, not by choice

Yes, I had Alexandra's hair cut ridiculously short.

I did not do it because I wanted it short. I did it because we deemed it necessary.

Truth be told, Alexandra's had significant amounts of hair since the day she was born. It just got lighter in hue and longer. It was well on its way to developing into thick curly locks - the kind of hair I've always wanted. So, you must be asking yourself why we did it. The answer is simple: she had tugged out about 1/5th of the hair on her head, all on the right side.

Yup. Just slowly kept plucking hairs, out of boredom. She'd be waiting for food ... or be in her car seat after dropping a toy ... or be in her crib after jettisoning all of her toys overboard, and with nothing else to do, she'd absentmindedly (I say this because when we would draw her attention to it, she'd startle a bit & stop immediately) pick hairs & twist them around her fingers.

It could be the start of tricotillomania, or it could be a phase. Either way, having lengths of hair ranging from 1/2" to 4" was really pretty lopsided. We had to start going to great lengths to "get her good side" in photographs. And on windy days, it looked like she either was wearing a poorly attached toupee or she was going through chemo.

So, my stylist tried a couple of things, but in the end, we determined the best course of action was to make it the same length, so the least common denominator reigned supreme and her hair was down to about 1/2" all over.

I miss the curls. And I have had many people comment on the fact they miss them, too. There seems to be some degree of admonishment, that as a parent I have made a horrible decision. It is HAIR people. She is 19 months old. We'll just see what happens as it grows back in, okay?

I think most people are reacting because they have no memory of her being without lots of hair. Many strangers believe she's a boy, and I don't usually correct them. Let them treat her like a boy. Doesn't that expose her to different experiences than she might already have. Most of her wardrobe is hand-me-downs, and among them are boys' clothes. (How does one tell girl-overalls apart from boy-overalls, anyway??)

So, although the short hair wasn't my preference, I am embracing the new opportunities it affords us. It also gives us a good reason, in this colder season, to trot out hats. And now that she doesn't have thick, wavy hair, the hats actually stay on, which is a huge bonus.



Does she look different? Certainly. Is she any less beautiful to me? Nope. Now, without the longer hair, you can easily see her cheekbones, her eyes, and her cute little ears. You can even see a little swirl shape on the top of her head.

I dare you to tell me she's not cute.

12 on the 12th

So I am trying to keep up with monthly pages for Alexandra - 12 photos on the 12th of every month. It was kind of a rocky start -- but I am working on it!

More scrapbooking pages now that I have tamed my stack of random supplies and photos. It took me a while to corral everything & to remember what my intentions were in printing things out or setting supplies aside. I have a LOT of catching up to do!

Another page for our May 2011 Disney album


This one uses photos from January 2012


And some of my favorite pictures from May 2011 Disney trip - Snow White was quite taken with her!

The Odd Life of Timothy Green

So, we just got back from watching The Odd Life of Timothy Green. I am glad I put tissues in my purse. We both needed them.

The film captured so many moments that we experienced as hopeful parents - the realization we were not going to have biological offspring - the ache upon seeing a happy child with a parent and wondering if that would ever be us - the opening of our hearts to wishing & knowing it would cause pain but we had to do it anyway, and the hoping-against-hope that this child was really and truly ours.

We cried at the beginning ... and we reached out for each other to hold hands and squeeze tight when there were moments we knew all too well. We sobbed at the end, feeling an echo of the broken heart ... and then cried again when the story came to its completion.

On the drive home, I confided that I really do very much want a 2nd child. For so many reasons, but the one so well demonstrated in the film - because I have enough love to share. We have enough of many things a child needs to grow into a fantastic being. I don't know how we can make it happen, but I'll keep holding the idea in my heart.

I read a quote somewhere that said something like, "If you dream of something every day, don't give up." One of the qualities Joe and Cindy wanted for Timothy was for him to never give up ... and in the end, that's what he taught them. So, I will wait and be poised for a 2nd dream to come true.