Taking The "Sum" Out Of Summer

OOOH LOOK!!!

I actually can blog two days in a row.

I love camp!

But we were actually living life these past couple of weeks. So I figured, I would sum up our time, with some pictures.


So had her gymnastics recital. I had to sit in a sauna hot gym with about 200 other obliging devoted parents from my community to watch where my money went my beautiful first born show off her amazing gymnastics skills. She did great.

I even forced lovingly requested that Hun join us and he did.

I believe Ro and Ate were so OBVIOUSLY "riveted" at what they were watching. Hun, on the other hand...
I am not sure what he was looking at - probably watching all the other Husbands who were "lovingly requested to be there" walk in the door. But at least he is not on his "crackberry", so I can not complain.


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Ro spent every waking day and every waking minute with only one request...


She is the bike riding queen.

If you ever wondered how any mother would know that her adorable second child will most probably be diagnosed with "Obsessive Compulsive Disorder" some day, this is it. Besides how Ro lines up her shoes, and makes her bed - just before she gets in it at night, and after she is actually in it ... she also has to match her bike to a helmet and then of course, the dress.

How matchy, matchy can one kid get?

Gotta love Ro.

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This little boy turned three.

I did in fact, find time, amongst three stir crazy kids at home and one continuously latched on infant to make a homemade strawberry shortcake.

(I actually edited out Ate's real name from the cake.)

His attempt at showing us how many fingers old he is.


Mostly he spends his time being...


SUAVE.

("take a pisher of my GRILLS")



And he also likes being...




...well, I will let the shirt speak for itself.


I mean, seriously...



Does he really need to turn Bam's stroller into a pseudo-car, when his cozy coup is less than two feet away?


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And then there is one..



Oh yeah, your life is so tough...




...because you are doing a whole lot of this.


Except of course when Mommy and Daddy are...



...bothering you while we have fun with all your hair.



It has been a highly entertaining summer. And it has only just begun.

Tomorrow Is Another Day

Well, I missed another "Not Me! Monday" it seems.

It might have something to do with the fact that, both Hun and my brother decided to go out of town for the entire day Sunday, leaving my sister-in-law, seven kids and myself to fend for ourselves.

(because, spending the entire past two weeks with the kids was not enough...)

Well, my Mother came up with the "brilliant" idea, for us all to spend the day TOGETHER. (I believe the word "together" was tossed about, just a wee bit too casually.)

My parents are working on landscaping on their recently reconstructed home, and thought they might find some great ideas at the Botanical Gardens.

So my mother suggested that she take So in her car with my Dad, while my SIL and I drive in one eight seater van with all the other kids, to save us an extra parking fee, and we would meet there.

Two nursing women and seven children between us - take a wild guess how this turned out.

By the time we got there, and nursed our babies in unison in the van, and met up with my parents and So, Maa and Dad were ready to head for Bonsai or Peonies or Magnolias or Dutch Elm or something like that, but it seems it was now lunch time.... so the Grandparents were off and it was time for two nursing women to feed the older kids...

...while nursing.

When everyone finished eating (or nursing), we subjected ourselves to torture a forty minute tram ride through "this garden", "that garden", and of course, "the other garden". And watched as our tram almost ran down two unsuspecting senior citizens who happened to be my parents.

That was as much as we saw of them while we were there, and as TOGETHER as we got.

The motion of the tram put the infants to sleep and the tram conductor who droned on about Dutch Elm Disease put the rest of us to sleep.

And to keep Ate from jumping out of the tram, I had to bribe him with an upcoming treat, and had to make the same offer to the rest of the kids, resulting in the purchase of ice cream which costs more for a scoop than I ever spent on a 1/2 gallon.

But while they ate ice cream, two babies nursed. And then the Grandparents called, asking for So, because they actually SAW some botany and were ready to go home. And we went off to meet them, but not before the kids could run up and down some stone steps that also had them ruining the pictures of a lovely bride and groom who were posing on those stone steps.

And after we sent So off with my parents and returned to our ONE van, guess what we did.

Damn straight, nursed some more.

But this could not possibly have been enough self torture for one day. We then decided to go out to eat with all the kids, at which time, my SIL's brother and wife and a whole bunch of kids, including, yet another infant - showed up to the same eatery. And we all sat in 3 booths near each other, causing chaos to ensue. Because 7 overtired children and 2 famished nursing women is not enough to wreak havoc, we were excited to add another four children and another famished nursing woman to the mix. At least there was actually ONE husband there now. (Or one more child, depending on your personal view.)

It seems.............I survived.

And the cherry on top - today was the first day of

CAMP!!!

It's funny now, but the last two weeks are a blur.
And yesterday is a distant memory.
And I am looking forward to tomorrow.

Grief Knows No Boundaries

I just put Bam in his crib, and therefore, I should be vertical as well right now. However, sleep escapes me.

My friend N., only a year younger than me, has lost her youngest son.

I mentioned his situation a few posts back.

He lived only 14 short months and was a typical healthy boy through all of his short months until he suddenly developed a virus which entered his blood stream and spinal fluid.

He ended up contracting viral encephalitis and this caused him irreparable brain damage. He was in a coma, on life support these last couple of weeks. And this past evening, his soul departed from his body.

In the last couple of weeks, this small child accomplished more than most of us have in a lifetime. He had people around the world praying for him, friends, relatives and strangers, people from a myriad of religious backgrounds.

He had people taking on good deeds, such as charity and watching our tongues on his behalf.

His story touched us all, but the final chapter has been written.

I am sad for the life that could have been that will not be. I am sad for his siblings who are old enough to always have a memory of him, but will not have the joy of growing old along side him. I am sad for his parents who will transgress that which is natural in this world by burying a child, who should have had the chance himself, to grow old enough to see off his parents souls from this world.

No parent should ever have to bury a child.

Tomorrow, I will attempt to make it to a funeral, I wish would not be taking place - in a cemetery where rows away is the grave of my sister who was buried by my parents when she lost her life at the age of four.

The sorrow for the family will no doubt be tremendous.
I grieve for them. I grieve with them.
I grieve.
And grief knows no boundaries.

All Time Has Ceased To Exist

Trying to find time to blog these days is like trying to go rock climbing with no hands, no legs, and NO TIME.

(I don't really need legs to blog, but they do come in handy when the need to walk all over the house to FIND your laptop arises.)

Today, I will just share some random updates and "Thrilling" events.

The passports that I had expedited, showed up a week after I applied for them. This is a good thing, because we now officially have tickets...



....TO ISRAEL!!!

Quite honestly, as happy as we are to be going, it was not in our original plans for summer 2009. The last time we were there was 2007. We have also been fortunate to have been in Israel many times prior and we do not take that for granted. Hun has one brother, 4 nieces and nephews, and most of his family on his Father's side living in Israel (Hun, himself was born in Israel). I have four siblings, 30 nieces and nephews and many other relatives in Israel, myself.

We recently missed two weddings, of one nephew and one niece, and in general, do not make it to all family celebrations. However, we will now attend another Bar Mitzvah (a religious celebration of a 13 year old boy marking the age at which he is responsible for his religious actions and plays a more essential role within his community of men).

At the same time, my parent's will celebrate Wedding Anniversary 52 and my father, with G-d's help will celebrate 80 years of good life and great health.

It is not often that all 7 of us, with spouses and children can celebrate together, but it seems this summer was a great time to make that rare event into a reality.

I will update periodically on the preparations for this upcoming trip, but before then, I still hope to share a blog about the birth of Bam ('cuz I know Y'ALL love birth stories {mostly you Julie}).

But, even though we all tend to focus on the new addition to the family, I do still have three other kids that I planned to blog about.

So did very well in school this year. She missed the last three days of school due to some "fine swine", but received a perfect report card and wonderful commentary from her teachers. She especially received amazing remarks from her enrichment teacher. Her reading skills had been ahead all year, but her comprehension (which was 60th percentile for third grade level in January) jumped to 98th-99th percentile for third grade level in just 4 months time.

This should make me proud, but I am actually concerned for her potential boredom in second grade. I don't want to skip her (I like the kids in her class and I do not think she is emotionally ahead, although she is ahead in terms of maturity). At the end of first grade, she received a packet of math and reading work to do over the summer. She finished this work in two days. In any case, she has done well, and how school works out next year is yet to be determined.

In terms of her "Tamiflu Event" as soon as I took her off, she had no further episodes. (Carry - the nurse I spoke to did not seem overly concerned. These events are probably so rare, or typically not so many people are even taking Tamiflu, that I am not sure she was ever familiar with these odd occurrences. Because, the risk of spreading flu no longer outweighed the benefit of Tamiflu, we agreed that I should just remove everyone from the treatment.) Thankfully, no one else has shown signs of the flu and I hope desperately that it remains that way.

Ro has gone through such transformation this year. She has become much more talkative and assertive and comfortable with her environment, than ever before. She has matured emotionally, and she can not wait to go to So's school next year for Kindergarten.

Ate recently turned three and adamantly refuses to toilet train. We made him a family birthday party this past Sunday, but that will be it's own post some other day. He can not wait to go to camp, but in the meantime, he wakes up every morning and asks,

"Where are the grills?"
(That is not a typo, I love how he refers to So and Ro as a multitude of cooking devices. Of course, he just means girls.)

He loves his baby brother, Bam. He is very gentle with him and always asks permission to give him kisses. I am sure this will change once Bam gets more mobile and infringes on his territory, but for now, he loves his "budder"....and the "grills".

And of course I realize I have to change my header and my "about me" to account for the little one, but remember.... time... rock climbing... legs...

Oh camp, how I wish you had already begun. But, I must wait until Monday.... if I have survived until then.

In the meantime, I have been sucked into the "black hole" that exists between school and camp, where all time ceases to exist.

Tamiflu Is Outta Here!

I am having a really tough time. I have become a paranoid, neurotic mess. I can not differentiate between what I should really be concerned about and what I should not. But this "problem" is so outside my nature, that it is freaking me out.

Besides the fact that I have been crying on and off for a seriously sick little boy of a friend, for who we all continue to cling to hope, I am also home with all my kids and trying to keep my sanity.

Yesterday, So woke from a nap and she was crying profusely. I asked her repeatedly what was wrong, and she just shrugged her shoulders. Besides this open ended question, I asked her specific questions as well.

Are you upset about something?

Is something hurting you?

Did you have a bad dream?

Does it have to do with anyone in your family?

etc...

She only cried harder and was inconsolable.

I did not know what to do for her. This was unlike her. There are times, where I have to pull teeth to get an answer, but she always has one eventually.

I even asked her if she could take a paper and marker and draw out her feelings and what was bothering her. (Oh yeah, I am so forward thinking that way, my minor in Psychology.)

But she could not, yesterday.

Eventually the crying passed and we went on with our day.

Cut to today...

After a hectic morning with the kids, partly in the house (rain), and then after a mile + walk to a 7-11 for slurpies and a visit with Bobbie (Grandma), So took another nap.

And guess what

She woke up crying, inconsolable and could not explain to me what was bothering her.

Now all mothers reading this understand when I say, as Mothers - WE KNOW our kids, and this was not like So.

It immediately concerned me the second day in a row. I thought to myself, what is different lately? And it immediately came to me.

TAMIFLU

I have never given my kids Tamiflu. My kids have hardly needed antibiotics to tell you the truth. I have not really given them more than Tylenol and Motrin. I hate drugs. I hate most vaccines. And I realized, I don't even know much about Tamiflu.

So I went to read the pamphlet, and here is what I found...

Neuropsychiatric Events:

There have been postmarketing reports (mostly from Japan) of delirium and abnormal behavior leading to injury, and in some cases resulting in fatal outcomes, in patients with influenza who were receiving Tamiflu...

Now that I had this information, I decided to direct my question to So a bit differently.

"So, are you crying because you saw anything odd, or something is confusing you?"

To which she replied,

"Mommy, I saw all these things on my bed, like my Fiona doll, and clock and box and tissues and they were really big and I was really small and I was trying to kick them all off my bed..."

"Were they actually on your bed So?"

"Only the Fiona doll was."

And then she drew me a picture of a small child in bed with really large objects floating over her head.

So of course, I freaked out. I started googling "strange behavior on Tamiflu" and found things that scared the bejeezers out of me.

I called the Doctor's office... and long story short... ALL MY KIDS ARE COMING OFF THE TAMIFLU WHICH I JUST PAID $150.00 FOR.

I will not link what I found, but if you care to search, by all means...

Here is to drug free, tragedy free, good health for everyone.

Powerless

I knew that I would not get a "Not Me! Monday" in yesterday (even though I had some good ones), but I did think I would still be able to get out a post.

I was going to have a smarmy commentary on the plight of children in my carpool who apparently have swine flu all the same obnoxious flu symptoms, including So. I even discovered in her class alone, out of 17 kids only nine were in attendance yesterday. I would joke about how it's inevitable, spreading like wildfire. And if you did not catch it from the kid with the runny nose in class, or from the kid sneezing droplets across the room at your synagogue, or from the kid who is in your gymnastics class, you would certainly get it from your neighbor's, best friend's, cousin's, dog's, late owner's, sister's, husband who licked your ice cream at 31 flavors yesterday.

I was going to sarcastically intonate the unusual fact that I actually took my child to "sick call" at the Doctor's office - ME. I never take my kids to the Doctor. What for? I know what they have - it will pass.

But I was a bit more concerned this time. Not because it might be the big "S.F.", but because I have a 4 week old in the house. Those who are young, old, week, infirmed or pregnant do need to take more precaution, and Bam certainly falls into the category of young.

I spent the past two days trying to keep Bam as far away from So as possible. I had to consciously make sure that whatever So touched did not come into contact directly or indirectly with Bam. And then I realized - that is the WHOLE FRIGGIN' HOUSE. This includes me, who tends to a sick child and then tends to a baby. My hands are raw from all the hand washing. And furthermore, I have to keep Ro and Ate away from So, and in case they had too much contact with So, I must keep THEM away from Bam.

But all this is really a moot point when you consider the fact that So was probably already contagious on Saturday, before ALL the symptoms showed up, and before you register that her complaint of being cold was not in reference to the annoying Chicago weather, and she was all over Bam that day.

AAGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!

So I had her tested, and because I do have a 4 week old who has not had any immunizations yet and is still strengthening his immune system and is not allowed to take Tamiflu himself, all the other kids were put on Tamiflu. This includes Ro and Ate who are taking it prophylacticly, because if we prevent them from getting H1N1, then the baby will have less of a chance of catching it, and I will have less of a chance of being institutionalized.

But here is yesterday's tragic clincher...

In the midst of all this, I receive an e-mail -

My good friend's one year old son has suddenly and unexpectedly become critically ill. He does not have the flu. He was not feeling well for a few days, some head aches maybe. They actually just flew the night before yesterday to Chicago from their hometown for a wedding. Yesterday morning, their one year old son could not be aroused easily.

It seems he may have encephalitis. He is now in a critical state in a medically induced coma. He has signs of strokes causing brain damage to areas of his brain that lacked blood flow.

This all happened, practically - overnight.

And it made me realize, here I am doing every thing I possibly can to keep my baby from getting, something that can potentially be extremely harmful to him, and the bottom line - it's not up to me.

It is not up to us.

How does G-d choose who to strike.

I can tell you first hand, that the parents of this little boy are exceptional people. They do a tremendous amount for their communities. They have been running a youth group for years. In fact, the wedding they came to attend in Chicago is for a girl from their youth group.

They don't deserve this, not that anyone does, but certainly, they do not.

And a one year old boy? He does not deserve this.

We have no control over things such as this. It is not in our power.

Except for the power of prayer that we can control, we are just puppets in this world.

I can do all the things the CDC tells me to, take all precautions to avoid spreading disease, but sometimes G-d sends his own message in the mean time.

I have learned a valuable lesson, through tragedy and sadness...

...and I am praying for my friend's son with all my might.

(Please Daven for Rephael Menashe Kopell ben Naomi)

ACCOMPLISHMENTS

I was actually productive today, which means less time for bloggity blog.

I can not say the same for yesterday. My house was a mess and, bless my kids, Mommy had a short fuse.

Today I actually put away four loads of laundry (that I cleaned last week). I also went to two stores today. I actually got my children dressed today.

It seems sad that these things become such astounding accomplishments.

But when you accomplish something like THIS -







Then you have to be content with ANYTHING you can accomplish after. Even if it is merely the fact that you had five uninterrupted minutes in the bathroom.

By the way - no babies were hurt in the making of the above photo.

Not Me! Monday - Adequacy/Inadequacy

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival full of adequacy and inadequacies was originally created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been consistently doing this week.



In addition to going straight to So's 9:15 Bible play last week immediately following the "Bris" (Jewish circumcision and baby naming ceremony) that I made for Bam, I certainly did not keep two kids who usually nap, awake so I could schlep them and an almost two week old baby to So's "Recycling Program" this past Monday. This certainly was not an "event" that I had to prepare two hours in advance for, so I could watch children sing "This Land Is My Land..." for only FIVE minutes of bliss.
I CERTAINLY am not the world's most awesome and devoted mother. No, not me.


I am pretty sure that I am not the one, who many times in her exhausted stupor at 4 in the morning, attempted to diaper her baby's face and feed his tush.


I did not panic for even a second when I heard Bam crying at five in the morning but could not find him in his pack n' play, only to look over at Hun who was curious as to why I was frantically throwing receiving blankets out of the pack n' play, while he was lovingly holding Bam in his arms.


It is not me who laughs hysterically every time my tiny son passes gas because he sounds like a full grown adult male. I would never be that immature.


It is not me who has yet to completely change out the winter clothes for the summer clothes in our house. I can not possibly be grateful, then for the less than fifty degrees in June that seems to have become a staple in Chicago. I would never publicly express gratitude for crappy weather.


It was not me who left two of Ate's sippy cups in my car with fermenting apple juice inside which bubbled over into the console to create a sticky, smelly mess. And if I did, I certainly did not make respectfully ask Hun to clean up the mess.


It is not me who sometimes has it together and sometimes does not.


How did your week not go?

Just A Thought

I do not have much to post today, because it is Sunday and I actually want to attempt my return to my treadmill.

But three years ago on this date of June 7th my third child, my first son came into my life.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ATE!!!

Also, one more thought I want to share -

Sometimes I wish I could just unscrew one of my breasts and leave it with my baby.

On that note, no treadmill right now, because duty Bam calls.

Passport Hell

I am in passport hell!!!

I am pretty sure there is a hell here on earth that torments anyone who needs passports FAST, and I am in that hell.

I am not complaining per-say, because the fact remains that I may (or may not) be going somewhere in five weeks that actually requires a passport. But the operative word here is "FIVE" weeks.

So and Ro received their first passports when they were six and three months old respectively. Passports expire after five years, which means So and Ro who are now 6 1/2 and 5 years old, need renewals. But the real mess comes with trying to get a passport for a two week old baby.

{I digress for a moment to say, that at eight days old, said baby was in fact given a name, but I have been pondering how to refer to him for the sake of this blog, since I do not use my children's real names. For the first seven days, we called him "Bruiser" due to his enormous shoulders and chest girth, but his initials are A. M. However, A.M. can get complicated, so I think I will add the "B" and he is now "Bam". As in only ONE Bam, because he is not a baby living in a cartoon like stone-age.}

To make my life a bit easier, I sent Hun with the girls to a local grocery store last night where they take passport photos. It actually made sense since my foreign born husband needs to renew his foreign passport, requiring pictures as well. They left at 7:30 and at 8:30 pm they were still not home. I called Hun to see if he decided to shop for food we did not need or if he was consumed by the fiery travails of passport hell.

IT WAS PASSPORT HELL!!

It was taking over an hour because the guy attempting to get appropriate passport pictures out of my kids and Hun, had no training in this particular area of expertise. (Yes - one needs to be an expert in passport photo taking.)

An hour and a half later Hun returned home with the lovely photos (apparently rule 1. of passport photo Hell - not allowed to show teeth).

Even before I could think of taking Bam for photos, we had to consider the possibility that we may be leaving the country as soon as he was born. This possibility had us putting a name (not his given Hebrew name) on the birth certificate while in the hospital so it could be processed immediately. Even so, it still would have taken three weeks to receive the birth certificate if Hun had not gone directly to the registrar's office two days after Bam was born to pick up the birth certificate copies directly from a woman who went out of her way to expedite the process for us. This shaved four weeks off the time needed, in order to use the birth certificate to apply for the passport.

I am also still currently confused about whether or not Bam needs his Social Security number for the passport. The website says you do, but when called, I was informed that I could fill in nine zeroes in place of his not yet assigned number. I certainly hope this is the case, since I have been informed that the social security number may take 12 weeks to be assigned.

Today I planned to take the baby Bam to have his glamour shoot done. First I had to take him to Ate and Ro's school to drop them off. We then had to continue directly to Dunkin Donuts to pick up munchkins for the small birthday party I was to make Ate in school at 10:45. Then we returned home for lots of nursing. By the time Bam finished breakfast and two snacks we had to return to Ate's school for aforementioned birthday party - fifteen minutes of birthday bliss.

He's THREE!!!



Then I thought it would be a good idea to go to Walgreens to get his glamour shot passport photo taken. (Hun told me not to go to the grocery store.) I had to wait over ten minutes until someone even came to the camera counter. Then they asked me if Bam was awake.
(apparently rule 2. of passport Hell - a two week old baby somehow has to time his passport photo shoot with his passing moment of eyes wide open.)
Did Walgreens have some pliers? Because that is what it would take to get his eyes open.

So I asked, what do people who don't have eyes do? Are they allowed to leave the country?

Of course the two women at the camera counter thought that was a rhetorical question...

So now I had a baby who would not open his eyes and a pull down screen that would require me to stand off to the side and hold Bam out in front of said, screen.
(apparently rule 3. of passport Hell - the arms of a secondary person who may be required to hold a two week old baby out in front of a screen is not allowed to be seen in a passport picture.)

I am starting to wonder if I am THE first ever person to attempt to take a two week old baby out of the country. It would probably be easier to smuggle him out at this point.

Then one of the lovely "Indian" women who was not optimistic about taking a passport photo of Bam at Walgreens, suggested I take him to a professional studio that takes passport photos on D. street where the "Indian" community resides. I only bring up the fact that she was Indian because she had a very heavy Indian accent and things get lost in translation.

"Dey aw bery bery good at pwofessional poto pace."

"I used to go to a place on D. street called Sooter Studios, in fact, I went there on Monday in the rain with three older kids and a crying baby, parking a block away and taking a walk, only to find out they are not there anymore..."

"Yep cuz He is bery bery dead."

"Who - he, he - who, Mr.Sooter?"

"Yep he is bery bery dead, dey wo not der fo bery bery lung time."

"So when I called just the other day and heard an answering message that I had reached Sooter Studios and they were away from the phones, was that message from the grave? Wow Mr. Sooter really is bery bery, I mean very very far away from the phone."

"Deb is anober poto pace on D. and Ugly steet."

Translation (I think) - There is another photo place on D. and Ugly(?) street.

I had no idea where Ugly street was, but I figured if I went down to D. street and made a left, I might find it.

So I thanked Walgreens photo lady and gathered my closed eyed baby up and off I went.

I made a left turn on D. street and made it to what turned out to be "Oakley" street, where I noticed a photo studio that let me know from five different posts in the window that they indeed take passport photos - ready in under three minutes.

As soon as I walked in and was greeted by,

"Hebo, can I heb pu?"

I knew this was not going to go smoothly.

He told me that his assistant was not there and that I would need to help to make Bam's photos appropriate for legal passport use.

First - I had to get the baby to open his eyes...

"Umm, he is still 2 weeks old, has not changed since I left Walgreens."

"My wipe hap a baby two weeps abo too, May teniet."

"Huh? Your wipes make babies weep?"

Five more times and I realized that his wife had a baby two weeks ago on May 20th.

Also then the guy berated me for not holding my baby with enough support of his head and neck.

Listen buddy, I managed to keep three other kids heads screwed on just right, just tell me how to get the picture done.

So apparently I am supposed to sit on a stool with a white sheet thrown over me while I use my hands under the sheet to hold Bam who is sitting above the sheet.

I swear - it looks like the Ku Klux Klan has my baby.

In the meantime my arms are of little use under the sheet and his head keeps flopping over (because it has already been established that I do not know how to support a newborn head and neck).
(apparently rule 4. of passport Hell - two week old babies with floppy head syndrome are never going to leave the country.)

So we try something different. We remove my "Uppa Baby Bubble" from the infant car seat (If you don't know what that is, google it. An amazing baby product that should have existed years ago.), we lay the white sheet over the car seat and then sit Bam back in it on the white sheet.
(apparently rule 5. of passport Hell - the Government passport agency keeps voting on the ever lovely skin pigment draining background color of white.)

By now, with all the time that has passed, Bam begins to stir, but he is getting fussy. His eyes open intermittently, but then he wails and his hands keep coming up to his face and the photographer misses his opportunity.
(Rules 6 and 7 of passport Hell - in addition to teeth, also toothless gums, not appropriate for passport photos and hands are not allowed to exist on passport subjects, at least as far as the picture is concerned. But we ARE still looking for EYES.)

And then the Indian photo guy says,
"I tink he my be hunby now."

"I have no idea what you said, but I am pretty sure he is hungry now......oh, and he needs to unload in his nether regions."

Of course, I was not about to whip "one" out in the company of photo guy, so I decided now was a good time for one of Bam's supplemental bottles of formula, only I then realized that I would have to go back to the car to get it.

So I took Bam and his blanket and carried him across a very busy D. street to go get the diaper bag I irresponsibly left in the car, and then returned. I fed him in his car seat, while he sat on the white sheet and watched as he opened his murky, still ambiguously colored eyes, and heard the loudest rumbles coming from his nether regions, and I could only think,

"Oh please G-d, don't leak anything yellow on photo guy's white sheet."

And then the bottle came out and he was wide - eyed and content and I yelled,

"QUICK, PHOTO DUDE - TAKE THE PICTURE, TAKE THE PICTURE!!!"

It took about 12 shots, some re-arranging of the head, a couple belches and more bottle, but we finally got it. I hope!

Of course, a bit of photo shopping was required, and the photos were so NOT ready in under 3 minutes. The whole visit took well over an hour and a half. By the time I was finished, I had to return to Ate and Ro's school for pick-up. But Bam left the sheet as white as it was when we got there.

Anyway - here is hoping that my visit with the three kids to the post-office to process these passports goes way more smoothly. (If you know anything about the post-office in my neighborhood, you would understand why I am not holding my breath.)

And I now leave you with the "Glamour Shots"