Happy Birthday Mom!

Dear Mom,
The boys and I wish you a Happy Birthday!!!! We wanted to come see you so badly, and will make it up to you in 2 weeks. We will gladly bring cake...yummy! I love you with all my heart and have a wonderful day!

Love,

April and boys

Busy, Busy, Busy!

A shout out to mommy!

Having fun with friend Jamie.

Collin, Dominik and Cooie

Mr. Cooster

Here are some more soccer pictures from practice #2. Cooie took a little longer to participate this time. He had been asking me all day, when do we get to go to soccer? He fell asleep on the way and woke up a grizzly bear. Notice the drool stain on his shirt. Anyhow, he warmed up about half way into it. Collin was great, he jumped right in and had a great time. My Collin is so grown up I just can't believe it! Tony came with and watched with Cameron, it was nice to have extra help.

Cameron has a Genetics appointment in Seattle the end of July. I am quite pleased that with-in 2 days of our visit we have had an ultrasound and referral to Children's hospital. I did not even have to beg. Amen to doctors who are proactive.

Collin will finish the week long vacation bible school tomorrow. He was hesitant at first since he was getting used to being lazy. Now that it's ending he is sad. I am glad I had him go, I should thank Jamie for talking me into it! He has been spending a lot of time with his buddy Dominik who will also be in his pre-K class next year. I think they are going to remain good buddies. Dominik's mommy, Jamie has been volunteering all week at VBS and she informed me that Collin was hanging all over some little girl. I suspected something was up because he kept talking about a little girl. He says he does not know her name. He had to find a new girlfriend since his old crush moved to Oregon. Jamie said she is a brunette and so was the last one. I see a trend here. At least he's keeping it his own age. It's Dominik we need to watch out for. I guess he's into the older ladies who are very high maintenance. That just cracks me up.

Cameron Update

I switched doctors this last month and did it pretty blindly. I really did not have many options (no one taking new patients), but I knew he would receive better care elsewhere. He had his 9 month well child exam yesterday. He is 22lbs now and is on track development wise. He had his immunizations and was in tons of pain after and had a fever all night into the a.m. The Dr. set him up with an ultrasound today at 8 a.m. to make up for the last one. The old Dr. did not order the first one properly, so they did not do the ultrasound according to protocol. Results from the new one I don't expect right away, but of course I will blog the results when we hear. I was told he could not eat for 4 hours before ultrasound. I woke at 4 am to feed him and by the time we got to the Dr. office he was READY TO EAT! The entire time i'm holding him down he's just balling! Finally, I was able to give him a baba and all was fine with the world.

1....2....3......Bunny Rabbits....huh?

The boys started soccer today. The name was chosen by the team and the winner was....the bunny rabbits. It was very hot and I was surprised at how well they did for the first day. Cooie actually kicked the ball into the goal and participated some. Collin was really interested and I thought it would take a bit to warm up. They surprise me every day! Anyhow, soccer goes until the end of July so, I will be posting lots of soccer pictures. They love it! I would post pics of the "team" but don't have a release to post. Maybe I will get one because they are too cute. The team has about 3 girls and 5 or so boys. It will be a great introduction to team sports and I will try my hardest to be a great soccer mom. It's official.....I can really say it.....i'm a soccer mom!

A day at the water park!

The boys and I went to the water park with a friend and her 2 sons. It was so much fun! We managed to get all 5 boys in the van and it was just adorable. The drive was a pleasant hour and 15 minutes there. The boys played in the water, enjoyed lunch and ice cream. They played so hard and I knew on the way to the car someone was going to have a melt down. It was Collin this time. Even with the melt down, it was a blast. At one point I think I threatened to never take him back to the water park if he didn't shape up, but I really want to go back. The boys are really enjoying the summer and we hope you are too!!!!!

Note: The last (2) photo's were taken by Jamie.

A sneak peak at my latest session, these kids are natural born models!

These kiddos are the cutest and sweetest! They are natural born models!!!! It was fun, thank you for making the long trip.

Fur Babies

Ok, so here are the other babies in my life. My two girls Kitty and Polly. They are so sweet and great with the kids. We miss Azrielle so much and next month will be a year since she passed away. I really wanted to try out my new pink backdrop so I found the only girls in the house. Polly would not sit on the pink but managed to get her later on sitting by the blue & thought she looked so good in black and white.

All took in Manual / iso 200 / ss 125 / F 2.8

Collin & Cameron

Collin and Cameron together again! I have a posting a few months back (March 12th 2008 posting) that has a similar pose to this one. Just thought it was cute to show the developing relationship between the older brother and baby! So sweet!!!

Cameron woke up in time for a couple.

Cooies favorite color is green!

Cameron was napping for the "green" photo session so here's one from yesterday that I turned into my siggy.

Here are some new shots of Cooie and Collin. Cooie loves green so I bought a new backdrop for him. He was so happy to take pictures with me because he was on his favorite color. I FINALLY captured my Cooie. Not to mention he has a throat infection, pretty sweet poses for a little guy so sick. BTW, I did not tell him to put his hand under his chin.

My little Cameron Cruz is NINE months old today!!!!!

Cameron is getting so big! All of the sudden he can say (HI, Dada, Baba, waaaasss sssssat) and he also gets around the house. He has discovered if he keeps moving eventually he will find a new room. He enjoys "repeatedly" going to the computer. When you try and remove him he trows a tantrum. Every baby I have the tantrums start earlier and earlier. He is sooooo happy and sweet and is the ABSOLUTE light of my life....along with Tony, Collin and Cooie too! Cameron is getting his first tooth and in some of the photos you can see it on the bottom. He is no longer my favorite model as he just will not sit still anymore! Boo hoo!

A day at the park with my boys.

Today I enjoyed a beautiful day at the park with all my boys. I have never laughed so hard as a mommy. Cameron was telling Cooie off as you can see in the photo. LMBO

Collin saw a lady walking 2 dogs. As she was passing the play structure he waved and said "Hi". She politely replied. Are those your dogs? Yes, they are. I didn't know you had 2 dogs. As if he knew her or something.

Two ladies strolling down the path, both with blond hair and green shorts on. Collin looks at me and says: Hey mommy, they are the same! They must be cousins or something.

LMBO again! I don't know if it gets any better than age 4! Although, he has a tendency to embarrass me in public too with his curiosity.

Cameron saw the Genetic Counselor today.

Today was the Genetic Counselor visit.

Here it is simply put:

Cameron does not appear to have any other "syndromes" usually associated with having Hemihypertrophy. Good news, already suspected that.
The affected parts of his body is mainly his arm and mostly in circumference.
We will be refered for the 6-8 week AFP testing.
We will continue the ultrasounds every 6 months if not every 3 months. Still undecided about that. We may also have the prev. ultrasound re-done since it appears they may not have done it properly.
He will see a Genetic Physician in Seattle to conclude the findings of the diagnosing doctor and the findings of the Genetic Counselor.

The lump on his skull was the plates growing together and not a tumor. She said sometimes that happens and it's nothing to be alarmed about.

Thank you for keeping Cameron in your thoughts and prayers. He is now army crawling very well and learned how to wave and say HI in the cutest little voice I have heard.

I've got my eye on you!

Just kidding! Having a good weekend with my guys. I took Collin to speed racer today. It was a mommy and Collin day. He is such a wonderful date! It was a cute movie.

Cameron has his appointment with the genetic counselor Tuesday. It's all I can think about. I keep worrying he has a brain tumor because his left frontal skull has a larger lump as opposed to the right. I am HORRIFIED! I suppose it could just be nothing and all this pain in my tummy could be for nothing. I HOPE AND PRAY!!!! I just can't wait to have him be seen by someone who knows a little something about this condition.

My house is a mess and I just don't care, infact I don't care about anything until he's ok! I will post as soon as I can on Tuesday.

A cute idea I saw on my favorite site.

Here is a card I made inspired by my favorite photography/scrap site. We are going to give this card to Collin's teacher along with his favorite book. I am loving this digital card stuff. I am going to make some cards for purchase for my photography customers. Fun, fun, fun!!!!

It was HOT today in Yakima!

We enjoyed a day of fun by the pool today! Kiddie pool that is.

Another Collin story that I thought I would share.

He was passing by the television the other evening and America's funniest home videos was on. The clip was of a little girl yanking out her front tooth with a string. As she would tug, she would scream. He watched the clip and very concerned walked up to me and said "mommy, I don't want to loose a tooth......I really like my teeth". I know he knew about loosing teeth because I had talked to him before. It was almost like he realized for the first time that this was quite real. I asked him if he wanted the tooth fairy to visit and leave money under his pillow and his response was simply No!

This morning as I struggled to get out of bed...

I heard Collin say to Connor "hurry the dragon is coming to get us".
Connor said "oh no". Collin said "I am going to get him with my morning breath".