So here’s how October went…

We have taken to bringing Leah to our bed when she wakes up in the morning so we can play and be silly before we all have to get up. We take lots of silly, silly selfies and sing lots of silly songs.

We also stand on our mommies.

She has some shmutz on her bib and some sass on her face.

Look. We don’t get out much. So when Auntie Jo brought home a puzzle she found on clearance at Target, we were like, “Hey, cool, something to do all together after the baby goes to bed!” So we did it. And then we did another one. And another one. They were only taking us a couple of days, and I was just thinking we needed more of a challenge when I found a coupon code for a custom puzzle. I may or may not have put together a collage of baby pictures, and there is a distinct possibility that I thought it would be a good idea to order a 2000-piece puzzle. I don’t remember exactly what day we started, but the picture above was taken October 7, by which point we had made some significant progress. We did not finish in a couple of days. Auntie Jo and Mommy Mandy were relentless in their mockery of Mama Lisa’s brilliant 2000-piece idea. I’m just glad we finished in October.

Of course, we missed a couple of days on account of Leah getting her heart all fixed up. Here she is, waiting patiently for the OR to be ready.

Babyfingers

X marks the pulse. Also, toes.

Naptime is over! Prepping for her procedure with a few push-ups.

Post-procedure Mommyfingers.

“Um, Mama? Help a baby out?”

Morning! Time to go home!

Delighted to be home, but way too distracted by the kitty to bother with a smile.

“Mama. I NEED him.”

Silly billy baby.

I’d say we were doing pretty well by October 10.

Can you find a baby?

Petting her kitty-tails book, which she got from the Butterfly Fund. Hopefully it will keep her little paws off of the real kitty tails.

Yep! This happened! Our friends Brian and Lisa came down to LA for a wedding, so they visited us and met Ms. Bug while they were in the area!

LeahBug was a wonderful hostess, and even made sure they were happy with the photography arrangements. “How’s it going back there, guys?”

This is our “I will do push-ups for an hour while I’m supposed to be going to sleep, but don’t tell my PT ’cause I’ll just tell her you’re making it up” face.

“I NEED TO SQUEEZE HIM.” Why do I have the feeling this cat is going to be a major motivating factor in my child’s mobility development?

Foot.

October 15. Coming along!

Mommy chin.

Mommy chin.

Mommy chin. “Mama, you’re getting this, right?”

What do you say, folks? Is she teething, or is she teething?

A couple of months ago, a woman (AlisaMarie) posted on one of the special needs Facebook groups to share a project that she and her husband would be working on. They are planning to do a road trip across the United States and photograph families along the way who have kids with special needs. They will provide the families with (gorgeous) digital photos, and also use the photos to create a coffee table photo book telling the stories of the many children they meet along the way. They wanted to start with a few families before launching their KickStarter, and since they are based in Southern California for now, they were kind enough to include Leah in their pre-launch photo group. We love the pictures they took, and are keeping fingers crossed that they are able to fund their project. It sounds amazing. If you would like to help (or if you would like to participate as a family being photographed), please check out their web page, Project: A Road Less Traveled, as well as their Kickstarter campaign. The different levels of pledges include various benefits, including t-shirts and copies of the finished book.

Here are some of the photos that AlisaMarie took.

A little Etsy-type shop on Instagram offered to send LeahBug this adorable shirt in exchange for a photo they could share of her wearing it. AlisaMarie was kind enough to snap this on my camera so I could send it to them. This picture is exactly what I envisioned in my head, and she got it in one shot. I’m impressed. 🙂

October also marked Leah’s mommies’ 12-year anniversary together. We decided to squish her in celebration. Squiiiiiiiiiish. What did Mama and Mommy do on their anniversary? We went out for tamales at our traditional anniversary/celebration restaurant, and then went down to the 3rd St. Promenade to walk around and get dessert. Somehow we magically found ourselves in front of the Old Navy baby clothing clearance rack. I can’t imagine how that happened.

This face.

October 19. “But look how much progress we’re making!” “You said that last time!”

Grandpa Billy Goat chillin’ with the bug

“NEED. TO. SQUEEZE. KITTY.”

Leah has been making slow but definite progress in her oral feeding. She is still only getting small amounts therapeutically, but last month we started feeding her Gerber Puff crumbs by mouth, and now she is able to eat several whole puffs in a row!

“Well this is new.”

October 22. Getting a little less creepy now that some of the Bugs have faces.

SILLY SELFIEEEEES!

What is October without a visit to a pumpkin patch? Initially we couldn’t find one nearby that was open and unlikely to be packed with people, so we went to an elementary school “harvest festival” instead. Still had some cute photo ops. 🙂

“What is it?”

“Okay. I accept it.”

Family photo!

October 25. “We’re so close!” “You’ve been saying that for weeks!”

We decided to do our own little photo shoot with the pumpkins we bought from the harvest festival. We felt a little guilty having sat by the pumpkins for so long taking pictures, so we kinda had to buy a few. Of course I had to put LeahBug in the dress we bought for her on our anniversary.

“Mommy. Please. This is MY photo.”

“Mama, if you don’t get out of my photo I will eat your hand! Actually, I’ll eat your hand anyway!”

“Mama, am I doing the duck-face right?”

“Gran, I don’t even want to hear it. Why does everyone want to be in my picture?”

“KITTTTYYYYYY”

“Kitty, YOU can be in my picture!” Yeah. Someone crashed our photo shoot.

Cheeeeeeeeeese!

October 27. DONE! YES! FINALLY! We have now painted over it with puzzle glue and are trying to find a cheap way to frame it and put it on the wall without destroying it.

Toes.

A few days before Halloween, Aunti Staci and Mama and Baby went to the real pumpkin patch! They had a petting zoo, and pumpkins, and PONIES.

Leah tries to pet the goat with one finger. That’s her big thing right now – she likes to do “ET, phone home.”

Bunnies! Bunnies, it must be bunnies!

“Oh hi, Mr. Goat. I like my toes too.”

Hey, remember that time when we went to the pumpkin patch and a herd of goats tried to eat the baby?

Aunti Staci decided Mama wasn’t doing a good enough job of fending them off, so we traded places. We think they smelled the food from her g-tube.

Chickies!

“Mama! It’s a pony!”

“I waaaaant… that one!”

Cutest punkin’ in the patch.

Sillie selfie to send to Mommy!

Ms. Bug was a “Teeny Tiny Honorary Nurse Practitioner” for Halloween. When I get to November I will share a photo of her with her Grown-Up Actual Nurse Practitioner.

So that’s October!