Christmas Card 2013

Merry Christmas! And welcome to our Christmas newsletter!

Last year there was *ahem* some disagreement about what kind of Christmas cards we should send out and what pictures we should use. (Cute Christmas cards? Do you include a picture with them? How about a newsletter? Can you just put pictures in that? What about an all-inclusive photo card...?) That culminated in not sending out any cards, so if you didn't get a card from us, it's not because we didn't think of you.

This year, though, is different! Hopefully you've gotten one of our Christmas cards. And to save the trouble (and also paper!) of writing and printing off dozens of newsletters that people may or may not care about, I just included a link to our blog where I'd post a newsletter for people who care.

And I see that *you* are one of the caring few! Aww... A special gift for you at the end of this post. If I could figure out how to make chocolate peppermint cookies appear out of your screen, I would.

So here's what we've been up to this year!

Family Adventures

One of the most exciting developments this year was when we found out we were expecting a new baby Sullivan! Baby is due January 24, 2014. We've been very happy with our choices to have home birth with a midwife for our other kids, so we're planning to do that again for this baby. Since our insurance doesn't cover this route, and since ultrasounds are crazy expensive when they're not covered by insurance, we're going to leave the gender of this baby a surprise. We're already prepared with baby girl and baby boy necessities anyway! You can check back on the main blog page to find out baby's name and gender when we do! (For the record, we were both certain this baby was a boy early on, but now we're both leaning toward girl, so anything could happen.)

Joseph in the new car in Lynchburg, VA.

With a third baby on the way and only a small, faithful sedan to our name, we knew we'd have to upgrade to a larger vehicle. Our main requirement was that the car we found would not be even a little bit like a minivan. After a lot of research, we settled on a 2012 Mazda CX-9, a sporty seven-passenger vehicle with a pretty good fuel economy.  After even more research, we found that the particular car we wanted basically didn't exist on the West Coast. The same model and year could be found in larger quantities for $5,000-$10,000 less in places like Texas, Florida, and Virginia. It made the most economic sense to buy a car from one of those places and then drive it home ourselves. Because we have good friends in Virginia, we bought our car in the Washington, D.C. area. With our two adventurous kids, we traveled from Virginia straight through the middle of the country to West Virginia, Kentucky, Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Colorado, Utah, Idaho, and finally back to Oregon. The entire trip took about two and a half weeks. Along the way we visited friends, stopped in at some fire departments that used Active911 (more on that in the "Joseph" section), took a tour of the nation's playgrounds for leg-stretching and kids' sanity breaks, saw Monticello, visited adorable little towns and local farmer's markets, and learned to be road trip experts. There were lots of charming and picturesque places along the way, but we didn't see anything that compared to our home in the Willamette Valley in Oregon. 

The view from our future driveway.

In fact, we love living in Philomath so much that this year we bought a new piece of property in the same town, only about a mile and a half east of where we live now (in the Neaback Hill area, for those who know Philomath). It's about half an acre in a nicer part of Philomath and on a hillside, so it should have an incredible view of the town, the countryside, and the coast range with Mary's Peak (when it's not covered by clouds) when we finally build a new house. We hope that will be within the next year or two. 

In the meantime, we've still been fixing up our current house. Since buying it in 2010, we (mostly Joseph and his family) have: rewired the house, re-plumbed the entire house out to the water line at the street, removed an old porch and sidewalk, designed and planted a new front yard, poured new front and back patios, insulated and put up new sheet rock in the two bedrooms and hallway, completely torn out and remodeled the bathroom and kitchen, and installed a laundry room and a laundry sink in the garage. Our house is SO much nicer to live in now than it was even when we first bought it! This year, we: installed a new fence, designed and planted a new back yard, put carpet in the bedrooms and hallway, and had someone come to put on a new front porch (that Joseph designed and built) and redo our roof, install new skylights and doors, and replace our icky aluminum siding. The house looks great with the face lift!

Before (top) and After (bottom). Still needs a few cosmetic touches like new paint, but it's already so much better than it was!

Joseph

Joseph during a rare and relaxing weekend at the coast.

Joseph is constantly busy, which is secretly pretty much the way he likes it. There have been some particularly stressful times, but mostly he comes home every day telling us that he is the happiest man he knows and he loves his life. I'd say the year is pretty successful by those standards! 

He is still running two growing businesses. Alyrica Networks is a local wireless internet provider that he helped start about 11 years ago. They've been hiring new employees and have just reached 1,000 customers! However, he stepped away from the day-to-day operations of Alyrica about a year ago to focus on growing his newest company, Active911. Joseph created Active911 when he was part of the Philomath Fire Department and realized it would be much more useful to get information about emergency calls sent to his smart phone rather than listening to a clunky old pager all the time. He designed a messaging system that sent out much more information about each emergency to smart phones and tablets registered to a fire or police department. Emergency responders (firefighters, EMTs, police officers, etc.) using Active911 will get a text alert sent to their phone. Instead of having to hunt through giant map books in their responding vehicles to find the correct address, they also get a digital map in the same text alert that has the emergency location pinpointed, shows information about nearby fire hydrants, etc., and also shows the location and statuses of other emergency responders in the same department so they can see if there are other people on the way. It has been very useful for hundreds of fire and police departments around the country, and has saved some of them thousands of dollars. Instead of complicated and clunky computer systems for their stations and vehicles, they just need some smart phones or tablets and to pay a small fee for the Active911 service each year. Active911 is even used internationally! It's rewarding to Joseph and all his employees to know that they're building a business that is helping people and saving lives.

When he wasn't busy with work, Joseph and his coworkers and some family members joined a local city slow-pitch softball league. Even though he's athletic, Joseph has never played organized sorts before and really enjoyed the experience! He's also gotten pretty good at lap swimming while working out. To relax (as much as someone who loves working can relax), he visited New York City and San Jose del Cabo, Mexico with friends this year.

Nichole

Me and eight months of New Baby

This year I've been keeping busy being the pregnant mom of two very active little ones. It turns out you don't need much more than that to take up all your time. However, I've also been part of an International Moms Group that meets near the Oregon State University campus every week. Most of the international moms are here because their husbands are studying for advanced degrees at OSU and they are new to the country or at least Oregon. Every week we hang out and hear a speaker talk about a child health-related topic while the kids play. Occasionally we have events like cooking demonstrations and holiday parties that are lots of fun. Diana and Liam have been enjoying playing with the other kids (usually between 1.5-2 years old). I also got to take a solo trip this year back to see my friend in the D.C. area and her brand new baby!! It was so much fun seeing them (and holding a warm, snuggly baby!), but a very strange experience to be away from Joseph and the kids for four days.

Diana

Our Diana Bean turned three years old this year! She is a smart girl who loves learning, talking, reading, singing, and alternately spending quiet time by herself and spending quality time with people. We have our struggles- in particular, her eczema, which we are still trying to cope with after seeing multiple doctors- but in general, she is a happy and healthy three-year-old. She knows her alphabet well and can identify all the letters in a word and even sound out small, simple words like "dad," "cat," "mom," etc. I think she will be excited to start reading. She has already memorized most of the stories in her books anyway. She likes the library, playing at parks, and roughhousing or going on walks and stargazing

Diana the flower girl

with her dad. She is beginning to be interested in Disney Princesses (Yessss! Soon I'll be able to justify a trip to Disneyland!), but still loves trucks, trains, and robots. Some of her favorite books right now are, Good Night, Good Night, Construction Site and Steam Train, Dream Train. This year, Diana got to be the flower girl in a friend's wedding, and what an adorable flower girl she was! She loved her "princess dress," and still talks about weddings. According to Diana, a wedding is when you get married, but most importantly, there is a party with cake and FIRE! (Her fire obsession may lead to a career in the fire department like her daddy.) 

Liam

There never was a louder, goofier, happier, more energetic or people-loving boy than Liam. He is incredibly good-natured. He's a year and a half old now, and running and roaring around everywhere, creating happy chaos. He doesn't speak in sentences, but he knows a lot of words and communicates well by using the words he knows and his incredibly expressive face. Mostly he loves to laugh and be with people. Currently he has a small obsession with Elmo and Cookie Monster. He also likes for people to read books to him, but mostly if there are lots of sound effects and hand gestures to accompany the story. He loves his sister, and he loves babies. I hope this will still be the case when the new baby comes along. Right now he has three baby cousins under six months old, and two of them live nearby. He loves those babies. I think he'll make a good big brother.

Our 2013 was full of growing families, growing businesses, travel, home improvements, and happy, busy times with friends and family. I don't think you can ask for much more than that. We have been incredibly blessed. We look forward to 2014, especially meeting the newest member of our family.

And now, for you caring few, a selection of hilarious pictures that we didn't include in the Christmas cards because there was always someone or other who didn't look quite right. Enjoy, Merry Christmas, and have a happy New Year!

This picture would be adorable... if Liam didn't look like he didn't trust the photographer...

Great picture of mom and dad. Diana looks very relaxed and Liam again looks like he is suspicious of everyone.

And, for what it's worth, a picture showing that Liam was actually happy during the photo shoot.

Baby is a....

Today we went in for New Baby's first ultrasound. We're very happy going the home birth-midwife route, and insurance doesn't cover that, so it doesn't cover full diagnostic ultrasounds either. Luckily, occasionally our local Pregnancy Resource Center puts out a call for ultrasound models to train their nursing staff. The ultrasound is free (!) they just can't medically diagnose anything, including gender. It's great if you just want to make sure there is indeed a baby (instead of a pterodactyl or something) in there, that they have all their limbs and vital organs, and they're moving around in a healthy way. Since that's mostly what we want to do, it's a great fit for us. Unfortunately, I'm terrible at reading ultrasounds. ("Oh, is that it's little eye? It's the stomach, you say?')

I remember when we had Diana's done around 20 weeks and the tech was repeatedly scanning the Area in Question and asking "Does that look like anything to you?" "Can you see anything that's there or missing...?" No, I couldn't. Joey thought afterward that he saw a distinct lack of anything, and he was right. The same thing happened at Liam's ultrasound and he definitely thought Something was there. Later on, to satisfy my curiosity (in a very expensive way), we had a full diagnostic ultrasound done at the local hospital and confirmed that Liam was our Liam boy. This time, Joseph wasn't able to make it, so I didn't have any help. In fact, I had two small people in the room gleefully competing to make the loudest dinosaur scream, which is the opposite of help.

(Oh my gosh, Nichole, we don't even care about your rambling. We're just here to see whether you're having a boy or a girl. JUST TELL US IF IT'S A BOY OR A GIRL.)

I have an oversharing problem, and I warn you all it's just going to get worse as this pregnancy goes on. Anyway, when the Area in Question was scanned in passing a couple of times, I really thought I distinctly saw Something. However, as the nurse pointed out later, the cord was showing up very strongly, so I might have been seeing the cord passing over the Area in Question and connecting to the body. When I asked if they could just scan that general area again for my sake, though I knew they couldn't tell me anything, they came up from the underside, as if the baby was sitting on a glass table and we were looking up from underneath. Honestly, I didn't see anything there. So who knows, maybe we're having another girl. Rather than spend $200 and a trip to Portland to get a diagnostic ultrasound when we're pretty sure the baby is healthy otherwise, I think we're just going to leave this one a surprise. We're already prepared either way. We're not hoping for one more than another. I think Liam would probably appreciate having a little brother to rough house around with (Heaven help us all) more than Diana would enjoy having a little sister, but I know I'd have fun dressing up another little girl. (Moms of girls know they have a way better clothing/accessory selection.) We already have a short list of boy names, so we'll pick some girl names and be surprised in late January, I guess!

Baby in profile at 21 weeks! Can you see the little heart? It was beating at 140 bpm.

Another baby profile shot.

Liam is one!

Liam on the day of his birthday. Enjoying dirt, sunshine, fresh air, and hose water.

Liam's first birthday setup. It got so much messier once we added the birthday boy. :)

(Actually, Liam's birthday was on May 26, but I get around to posting when I can. Sometimes that's three weeks late.)
It's hard to believe that we've already gotten to spend a year with Liam! I went back and read my old blog posts because in the haze of sleeplessness and chaos, sometimes it's easy to forget the newborn days. He certainly has changed a lot!

Liam may have started out quietly, content to just look around and learn about the world, but that is certainly not Liam now. He is loud. No, he is LOUD like you wouldn't believe. I've never heard babies with this kind of volume. When he wants to be heard, or sometimes when he's just happy or excited, he BELLOWS. He can be heard outside across parking lots or in busy grocery stores. There is no mistaking Liam. He gets it from the Cespedes side, which he still very strongly resembles in looks. My guess is it comes from the Filipino side of the family, but all I know is the boy has lung power, and if he doesn't do something with it when he grows up (Singer? Actor? Coach? Drill sergeant?) it will be a waste of natural talent. Can you imagine if he had Filipino lung power and his dad's Welsh singing voice? That would be amazing!

Liam with his "mouth blanket," so named because
it's almost always in his mouth (and it smells like it!)
He wads it up in his mouth and
sucks on the silky edges like a pacifier.

Liam has a drop-dead gorgeous smile, the kind that makes older ladies stop to complement him all the time. He is very free with it too. He is shy with people at first, so he'll do a bashful smile and hide his face in my shoulder. He seems to have topped out at eight teeth for the time being. His eyes are giant and just incredibly, beautifully deep blue. He drools like a faucet. It never stops. He really hasn't grown much in weight since his six-month checkup, though he may be starting to stretch out a bit. Almost all Liam's development in the past few months has been cognitive, and it really shows!

Liam doesn't talk much, certainly not nearly as much as Diana did at his age. He can say "Mama," "Dada," "Dana," "dog," "cracker," and "TOAT!!!" pretty well. ("Toat" = toast, but it's always said with utmost excitement because it is one of his favorite things.) He gets along very well with hand gestures and monosyllables. I can almost always understand if he's gesturing for rice, Goldfish crackers, graham crackers, his water cup, his blanket, a book, etc. He very obviously understands what we say, though. If I ask him what he has in his mouth (there is almost always something), he'll smile at me and fish it out, then put it right back in. I can even tell him to give a toy to the dog and he'll comply without hesitation. He's a wiggly boy who doesn't like to hold still, so he's always standing up in his high chair. I just have to tell him to "sit down" and he does... at least for a moment, and then he stands up and starts jigging again in a happy, rascally way. I've taught him some unofficial sign language, waving his hands back and forth for "all done" (eating) and opening and closing his hands if he wants more of something. He picked it up pretty quickly.

And oh, does this boy have personality! He is always on the go now that he can crawl, pull himself up, walk along things, and walks while holding on to people's hands. He loves getting into everything, sometimes with the help of his sister, who he simultaneously idolizes and loves to antagonize. He loves to laugh. He loves playing with everyone and wrestling and roughhousing with daddy. He will happily go off and play with other kids (he adores big kids!), but if he's been apart from me too long, he'll crawl back for a quick reassuring snuggle and then go back to play. He rarely has patience for an entire book, especially when Big Sister is so much more interesting, but sometimes he'll just pull out book after book from his shelf and hand them to me with lots of energy and a "DA! DA!" that clearly means he wants to read a book. Mostly books keep his attention if there are lots of sound effects and hand gestures that go with them, and even then he only has the patience for a few pages. He may not speak much, but he does love making sounds for everything. If you hand him a toy car, he gets a fond, knowing twinkle in his eye and a little half-smile and he starts driving it around making car sounds. He indicates dogs by making a high-pitched bark, which is usually followed by a "shhhh!" and putting a little finger up his nose (to imitate us laying a finger in front of our lips) since barking dogs are almost always shushed. He likes making buzzing sounds for bees or flies. He's even invented a raspberry-like sound whenever I pick up a Kleenex since with allergy season I'm always blowing my nose.

Liam's eczema is virtually gone now that we've pinpointed most of the causes. When I was nursing him, too much dairy set it off. Now it mostly just appears to be acidic foods. If he eats anything with tomatoes, parmesan cheese, grapes, oranges, strawberries, peaches, craisins, lemon, etc. he'll break out. It's so much more manageable than Diana's eczema since we know what to avoid. If he eats contaminated food, he'll get some red bumps on his cheeks or look like he's been punched in the eyes and start scratching at his face, but it usually fades after a day. People mostly don't even notice he has eczema. I think his is a little more common for kids and I'm confident he'll outgrow it. He's also pretty allergic (though thankfully not anaphylactic) when it comes to peanuts, so it looks like we'll just never have peanut butter or peanut oil in our house again. Lol!

We certainly have a fun little boy. I've loved enjoying him as my "baby" this past year, and I can't wait to see how much he will grow and change in the next year.

The Upshot

We've already established that I'm terrible at keeping up with blogging, especially when real life beckons with  such a persistent "MommyMommyMOMMY!!!" We were able to stay on Diana's elemental diet for a little over a week. After the third day we added oatmeal back into her diet because we thought it was very unlikely she was allergic to oatmeal. After the fifth day we added wheat back in because no one in Joseph's family has an allergy to wheat, but we took out fruit and corn because after talking with Joseph's mom to get some ideas of family history, it sounded like there were some fruit and corn sensitivities when the kids were little. Every day I took detailed notes of what Diana ate and how itchy she seemed to be as well as taking pictures every morning and evening of her skin quality. At the end of our experimental diet, we assigned her itchiness and skin quality a numerical rating (1 through 5) and compared it with the presence of possible allergen groups in her diet each day. Then we graphed her itchiness and skin quality for each day. Not SUPER scientific since the numerical ranking was fairly subjective, but we tried to be at least a little scientific about the whole thing. Here are some things we learned:

• "They're unlikely to have environmental allergies at this age" = nonsense. As restrictive and difficult as this diet was, our observations were also largely inconclusive. Our graphs suggested that there might be a slight sensitivity to wheat (with a 24-hour delay in affecting her skin quality and itchiness), which surprised us since there isn't a family history of wheat sensitivities.
• Diana's itchiness and skin quality are almost completely unrelated. She was itchiest on some days when her skin was almost perfect, and the days she didn't scratch at all, her skin was at its worst. 
• Oral Allergy Syndrome (OAS) is a thing. When Joseph's mom told us some of the kids were allergic to fruit, I was floored. I admit I did not take that information gracefully. God makes pure, natural fruits out of sunshine and dewdrops, and my daughter can't HAVE ANY??? I did a lot of research into fruit allergies. Most of my non-anecdotal information came from the Mayo Clinic and the website of Dr. Adrian Morris of the Surrey Allergy Clinic in London. It seems that people who are allergic to certain kinds of fruits can  actually have a sensitivity to allergy-provoking pollens. For example, the major allergen in birch pollen has a similar structure to the major allergens in apple, hazelnut, carrot, cherry, pear, tomato, celery, potato and peach. Birch pollen can cross-react with the allergens in any of these fruits and vegetables and people with a birch pollen allergy can have a sensitivity to any or all of them. Symptoms of OAS include tingling of the mouth, tongue, and throat or a localized itching reaction on the face around the mouth. When I gave Diana a handful of sunflower seeds as a healthy snack one day, her cheeks flushed red and she started scratching around her mouth. Sunflower seeds fall under a possible ragweed pollen sensitivity, so she may have to watch out for that one day, and she may also be sensitive to anything else that cross-reacts with ragweed pollen (bananas, melons, tomatoes, honey, chamomile tea). Here are the major OAS food-pollen allergen groups:
• Birch pollen: apples, carrots, celery, hazelnuts, plum, wheat, fennel, walnut, peaches, pears, raw potatoes, parsnip, onion, buckwheat, honey, nectarine, cherry, peanut, tomato, spinach, kiwi
• Ragweed pollen: bananas, melons, tomatoes, honey, chamomile tea, sunflower seeds
• Mugwort pollen: apples, carrots, celery, melon, kiwi, peanuts, various spices, chamomile tea
• Grass pollen: melon, tomato, swiss chard, orange, wheat
• Latex (not a pollen, obviously, but still a sensitivity associated with food):

What we're doing now

It was a bit disappointing that there were no definite correlations between food allergies and Diana's skin, but it was at least relieving to be able to rule out some potential allergens that I'd been unsure about. She spent a whole week without dairy or eggs and her skin condition and itchiness went all over the place anyway, so it seems unlikely that she's allergic to those. 

Since she showed a possible slight sensitivity to wheat, we decided to try a gluten free (GF) diet for a week and see if that affected her at all. Interestingly, despite the fact that there's no family history of wheat sensitivity on either side, we started seeing changes in her skin after only a few days. I noticed that the raised, rough, red, almost calloused patches on the inside of her thighs and backs of her knees disappeared. Though it was still itchy (maybe itchier?), her skin felt softer- like normal, healthy skin. Since I'm the person who spends the most time with Diana, that was a big change to me, although it was more difficult anyone else to see. The biggest and most unexpected side effect was that Diana's nose cleared up. She has had an almost constant stuffy nose for more than a year, and she was always sneezing and having a hard time breathing if her mouth was otherwise occupied. After less than a week without wheat, her congestion just went away! That was definitely noticeable to more people. It feels like a small victory to have something to show for all our diet and allergy speculations. Diana has been GF for more than three weeks now! She's too young to understand about allergies, but it seems to work if I just tell her that she can't have whatever wheat-based food she's asking for and offer her rice crackers, fresh or dried fruit or cheese instead. Her sensitivity is fairly minor, so if we have lunch at someone's house and she eats some bread or pasta, it doesn't set us back too far. 

UNfortunately, Diana's skin is currently a wreck. Like with so many flare-ups in the past, I don't really know what could be causing it. We have been using Arm & Hammer Free and Clear Detergent in the laundry. We ran out a couple months back and I bought Purex Free and Clear, because I assumed all free and clear detergents were the same. [Sitcom laughter.] Both kids' skin broke out and after about a week I realized it was the detergent. We went back to A&H, but their skin didn't improve much. It's possible they may have changed their formula somehow. After about a week of having my heartstrings pulled by watching Diana cry and bend her nails backward ripping at her legs, I was feeling frustrated and lost and found the website solveeczema.org. I may have been a little weepy that week, but I did actually cry while reading it and the blog of a mom who fought her son's severe eczema with the plan from the Solve Eczema site. Their approaches- the background, the science, their hypotheses, and testing- just made sense. The bottom line is the difference between detergents and soaps. Go to the Solve Eczema site to read about it if you're interested. Normally I hate anecdotal cures relating to eczema, because everyone has an eczema story. "Oh yeah! My grandma/mom/son/grandson/self had eczema on their hands/face. It was so itchy, but they grew out of it/found a lotion that helped." That kind of story is COMPLETELY NOT HELPFUL. You just have to look at my children to know that their eczema is not like the mild eczema your child had on their hands when they were a baby. But moms who deal with moderate-severe eczema are troopers and scientists who are devoted to finding cures for their kids because they have to watch them suffer every minute of the day and night. These moms in particular make a good case for switching to soaps vs. detergents. We're trying to make the switch, but we're also working on finding the right soap products that won't irritate the kids' skin. It's another long process, but it seems like a worthwhile thing to try.

And that's where we are. Aside from her skin problems, Diana is an incredibly smart, growing girl. She loves running around and being with her family. She can count to ten (five, reliably, but ten when no one's looking) and is learning the alphabet and having fun with discovering puzzles and asking "why?" about almost everything. She loves reading Dr. Seuss books and sometimes surprises me by opening them up and reading them herself. (She has a good memory!) She is disarmingly sweet sometimes and stubborn other times. I guess that's a two year old!

Liam is 19 lbs with three teeth and beginning to get around. He's a tank of a little boy who loves his sister, the dog, his dad and his mom (almost in that order). He sits up, rolls across the floor and swims in circles on the hardwood to get where he wants to go. He's enjoying more solids and is happier as a result of getting more food. He's trying out lots of different sounds in his baby talk. He especially focuses on imitating Diana, and many times just seems content to let her do the talking. His interests especially include pulling hair and eating paper. 

Liam at eight months old and Diana smiling for the camera.

The Third Day

Diana's leg in the morning after scratching. Ouch!

Left hand healing up.

 Today we decided that it was extremely unlikely that Diana was allergic to oatmeal. (Who's allergic to oatmeal?) We added that back in to her diet, but after Joseph reminded me that his family had sensitivities to artificial colors, we made sure to take out anything with artificial dyes. Despite being incredibly itchy in the morning, Diana spent 10-15 minutes on the potty again without scratching! She ate things like meat, corn tortillas, oatmeal, grapes, beans, orange juice, but still didn't scratch at ALL when I changed her into her PJs for nap time. The rest of the day there was only some occasional light scratching.

Some healing on her left leg. 

Ankle is looking a little better.

Right leg. It's better than it has been.

A great family picture. Or at least a good story.

I have no misconceptions about how photogenic I am (not). Thankfully, I married a man who looks great, and it shows in pictures.

Isn't he a hunk? Thankfully, he passed that along to our daughter, who looks like a little baby model sometimes. I may be slightly biased.

So imagine my delight when we had our picture taken for the church photo directory and the picture came out great! 

For two thirds of us!

(I especially can't stop looking at Diana. She's so adorable!)

So WHY does Joey look like he's about to eat the photographer's head off?

Because that was probably exactly what he wanted to do at that moment.

To hear Joseph explain it, he doesn't DO fake smiles for cameras. I guess I have to agree. He's so naturally good-looking that his candid shots or a slight smile works best. But that's not what this photographer wanted. He wanted everyone to make a big fake smile for the camera.

(Except Diana's is genuine. She liked the Tigger toy he was waving around. Have I mentioned I think she's adorable?)

Mr. Photographer's mistake was in trying to patronize Joseph. "Oh come on, Dad, give me a big smile for the camera! Look at Tigger!" [Shakes Tigger in front of Joseph's face in an aggravating way.] Is it common for grown men to entice other grown men into happy, genuine smiles using stuffed animals? I would guess not. Clearly his hilarious techniques did not produce results, unless you just like good stories behind odd pictures, which I do.