Princess Leia

A few days ago, In a galaxy far, far away, it is a period of Halloween civil disobedience. Rebel dachshunds have digging a hidden hole strike terror in the trunk or treat fall festival participants.

During the ensuing chaos, dachshunds were able to escape with the secret plans of a chocolatier and the recipe for punchbowl cake.

Pursued by day care workers, Princess Leia races home on all fours to save her dachshunds and restore freedom to the nursery.

more photos

Photo's Bonanza

Practice for the Parade

Every Parent has an especially proud memory of a moment in the early life of their child, when he or she expresses a glimpse of the who they may one day become. Usually a talent, discovered early in life for things like math or music, mechanical prowess or linguistic might. Emily Jane's first apparent communication with the outside world appears to be in preparation for riding in parade floats.

Other Things She's Done This Month:

Making motorboat noises with her mouth

Pulling up to her knees

Speed crawling attempts to escape the nursery

Speed crawling attempts to follow Penny and George

Feeding herself fruit cocktail

Whispering to herself.

Her first art project (painting and placing the eyes)

Making two bottom teeth

Fully outgrowing all her 6 month clothes

Realizing she can reach outside the bars of the crib

Surgery Update...

Friends and Family, Emily Jane's surgery appears by all accounts to have been a success. She is 9 days post-op and her eyes are doing well. The procedure literally took 5 minutes. EJ was gone from us for about 18.5 minutes. She woke up hungry and was her regular self by lunch time.

Meanwhile Cindy and I have both had bad colds and Cindy had to miss two days of work last week. You might imagine, Cindy, on crutches, with a severe cold tending to a baby who is now getting a big kick out of trying to "get away" by crawling really fast and giggling.

Emily Jane's most recent words are "Olie, olie, olie" pronounced, "ole-lee" and making motor boat noises with her mouth. I'll try to upload a video later (when I'm finished re-downloading a driver.)

Look for another update soon.

It's Technically A Surgical Procedure, But It Only Takes Five Minutes

"It's technically a surgical procedure, but It only takes five minutes"

Tomorrow morning, Friday, September 26th @ 8:00 a.m. Emily Jane will have her nasolacrimal duct unblocked.

Since about 2 weeks, EJ has had constant eye infections. We've been massaging her tear ducts twice or more a day in hopes they would unblock themselves. However, since she has not gone more than a week or so without an eye infection, the only recourse is "surgical probing." It's likely that the duct isn't completely formed. Our tear ducts run from the corner of our eyes into our nose. This is why our nose "runs" when we cry.

Wednesday, Emily Jane went to the ophthalmologist for an examination. The good news is that she has perfect vision and her eyes have not been damaged. The bad news was that she'd need this procedure. Normally it can take several weeks to get an appointment for the procedure, but there had been a cancellation for this Friday so we got in for tomorrow.

Her parents are naturally nervous. EJ will be under anesthesia for 15 minutes, the procedure only takes 5. She can go home immediately afterward. Cindy has taken all day Friday off. The doctor performing the surgery (Dr. Weeks maybe?) does them every Friday morning with a latte in one hand.

Your thoughts and prayers are appreciated. It is a common and "routine" procedure. But there isn't anything routine about it for us.

Emily Jane Learns to Crawl

Much has happened with Emily Jane in the last several weeks. EJ is 8.5 months old. She sprouted two teeth which serve as a constant reminder to us not to put our hands in her mouth. Ouch. She is also eating regular food pretty regularly. She started crawling this very Labor Day Weekend. The world changes again.