Photo Shoot

We had our Christmas photo shoot today. I love having natural light, photojournalistic pics taken. Love it. My obsession started with our wedding photos – and has continued with countless pics of Charlie. Poor Baby E hasn’t had one professional pic taken of her this year, and I had so hoped we’d get some good ones today.

Unfortunately E is still a little sick. She’s also teething or something because she is drooling like she’s got a faucet in her gums. She has been soaking through a bib an hour, seriously. Her little rash is still there and she’s doing this funny thing with her tongue – licking her face constantly. We could not get her to keep her tongue in her mouth! Sweet Kelly (our photog) reassured me – if we didn’t get a great solo pic of Ella, we can re-shoot her some morning during the week.

Charlie is a little more predictable these days when it comes to pics (most likely due to a little thing called bribery) but with a baby, you just NEVER KNOW.

I think professional pics are a great investment – they’re classic. I know my girls will appreciate looking back at them over the years.

Will hopefully have some sneak peeks to share soon!

Life and Pumpkins

Last week Ms. Marla invited the girls and I to the Dallas Arboretum to see the fall pumpkin houses. So fun, but SO crowded. All was going well until Charlie stepped into a wading pool (wasn’t watching where she was going) and got soaked up to her knees. I think the water must have been cold because she screamed like crazy – I did manage to catch her before the rest of her got wet, but it was traumatic nonetheless. Luckily, I had an extra pair of pants in my bag, and two suckers later, my girl perked up and we finished up our visit and headed over to my grandmother’s house to meet up with Mimi, Poppy and Owen. I LOVE that Charlie has cousins her age – I never did. I cherish these times and realize – THIS is why we moved back. It is not lost on me that my relationships with my family seem stronger than they ever have. Times of great stress or tragedy will do that, but I think it’s more than that. In the past 10 years I’ve had to limit my visits to 2-3 times a YEAR. Since we’ve been here I’ve crashed with my younger brother and his wife after a night of partying, grabbed coffee with my older brother and kissed on my sweet nephew, and stood in the kitchen of my grandmother’s house and cried with my grieving father. I feel so blessed to be here. This is what life is all about: relationships, love, fear, struggle, survival.

Big Girl Room

The Big Girl Room. Finally. Still need a few things: curtains, a rug…but I’m really happy with how it turned out. My mom made the little green dress-up hanger and also painted and hung the Eiffel tower and frame. Charlie’s bedding is from Kukunest – the duvet was actually in the wash when I took this picture, but I wanted to show off her new sheets from PBK. Yesterday I walked out of there with a full sheet set for Charlie and chamois sheets for both girls – $125 worth of bedding that I got for $20. Gotta love giftcards, right???The darling dresser is from a local gal who runs her own furniture refurbishing company, Urban Farmhouse. I heart it.And the paint color? Only the most gaga-gorgeous pink, appropriately named “I Love Pink” from Benjamin Moore. Found it in House Beautiful magazine, and let me just tell you – it is adorable.

Fleas and all that Fun Stuff

Quite a lot to blog about lately.

Here are a few life lessons as of late:

1. I shall never work in a clothing store. I volunteered at the baby consignment sale I consigned in last weekend and I’m not sure I’d like to repeat it. I did it because it allowed me to get 80% of my sales – but man, one 4 hour day and one 8 hour day later – and many, many pieces of clothing picked up off the floor and rehung – well, let’s just say that people are not very considerate. And people STEAL things. Doesn’t that just stink?? I had a very cute Babygap beret stolen from me – a person actually removed the tape off the bag and swiped it.

I’m glad I did the sale…but the clientele was not quite what I expected. Not much of my “good” stuff sold, which was a huge bummer…BUT out of 4 packed bins of clothing I came home with only one, and made almost $400. I got it all out of the house, and made some cash. I was hoping to clear a grand, but the customers just weren’t buying the boutique stuff. And I guarantee you, my stuff was the best looking in the whole place! So, it’s back to eBay to recoup some Christmas spending cash.

2. I thought we were almost out of the woods regarding sickness but then poor Baby E got the worst of it. Cough, runny nose, sneezing, etc. AND the worst rash on her face which had Vann very concerned until sweet Lauren told me not to worry – a very normal reaction to whatever virus she’s contracted. Fortunately she’s been sleeping well at night. I am praying that she is better by Friday – not only is the girl’s cousin Owen coming for a visit but we have our Christmas card photo shoot on Saturday afternoon. Poor little girl.

3. The Bischoff house has fleas. Gross, I know. Please don’t run screaming. What we thought was a normal grooming session for Siena last week turned out to include a fleabath and some Frontline. Don’t ask me HOW she got fleas – the cat has never been out of the house. Ever. The only thing we can think of is that she must have gotten them during her stay in the “country” this summer. I didn’t even think of it when she was shedding heavily and chewing on herself a lot…just never occurred to me that she would have fleas.

Siena is now all clear…and I’m afraid I was living in denial thinking they would just leave on their own.

I thought this up until the point I found BITEMARKS on Charlie.

I know.

So, $75 later – pest control is coming tomorrow and we will hopefully be rid of these anklebiters. It’s probably not a bad idea to spray considering this is Texas and I’ve been told that bugs are just “part of it” – and we all know how I feel about invertebrates so – please, anything I can do to rid our world of bugs – so be it. But what a pain in the you know what!

Challenges

I know I’ve mentioned Baby Ella’s feeding challenges. Everybody always says, “Every baby is different” or “She’ll get it eventually” etc. etc. but it really doesn’t ease the worry you feel when your child is potentially behind in any area.

As time has progressed, we’ve noticed that Ella doesn’t put anything in her mouth, let alone food. In fact, I don’t remember the last time I saw her knawing on something. She will inspect things carefully – pick them up and study them, turning them over and over in her hands, even transferring them from hand to hand. She will pick a cheerio up, but only for a split second before she drops it.

She’ll eat most things you put in her mouth. What we know for sure is that she loves pureed food. She gobbles it down…if you are feeding it to her.

I’ve tried leaving her in her seat with a tray full of finger foods and all she does is scream. We’ve smeared vanilla pudding on her tray (recommended by the pediatrician) to stimulate her taste buds and she just smushed it between her fingers. It’s almost like the step between picking up the food and chewing it is missing…maybe it’s her fine motor skills that need tuning?

Keeping in mind that she is not quite a year (a month to go as of this w/e!), I recognize she may just be late in the game on this one. But when she shows absolutely zero interest in feeding herself…well, I’m just starting to worry, to be honest.

So all this to say, we would really covet your prayers on E’s development in this area. I would love for the lightbulb to just…go on. I would assume we can’t even proceed with early intervention until she’s officially reached a year anyway. Please pray for our patience too, as we allow her to develop in her own time.