Family Friday: Nov 15

I got published in a magazine!!!!!!!  I'm just a little excited about that, can you tell?  Last year I submitted Cameron's birth story to Pregnancy & Newborn Magazine and it was chosen for publication on their magazine's website.  Click here to learn about submitting your own birth story!

This past summer, I was personally contacted by the magazine's Editor in Chief via email.  She said that Cameron's story was being considered for publication in their printed magazine and asked for me to send some hi-res files of some photos.  I sent them and she said she would send me a digital copy before it was published.  I never heard anything after that so I only mentioned it to a few people.

I assumed it wasn't published since I didn't hear anything, but last week I picked up a copy of the magazine anyway.  I never even opened it to check, I just set it aside... I am totally kicking myself for that now!  This morning I finally decided to browse through it while drinking my morning coffee and saw the story!  I screamed, I did a happy dance, and then I had Johnnie take some photos so that I could show the world.  This is a pretty incredible feeling :)

This has been a pretty awesome week all around.  Big news is that Johnnie got an award for the work he did during his last deployment!  He says it's no big deal but we are incredibly proud of him for this achievement and for everything else he does at work and at home!

Cameron and I went on the Hawaiian Railway Society train ride with a friend.  Cam loved it and we adults thought it was relaxing fun.  Maybe I'll get a blog post about it up soon.

Cameron decided this week that she likes to wear hats.  It started with wearing her sweatshirt as a hat-cape around the house.  Then she brought her bicycle helmet in and wore that around for a day.

Johnnie's squadron had a Thanksgiving potluck lunch.  Cameron had fun watching everyone while she ate and then she ran around exploring.

Dulce got a new bed for her daytime naps downstairs.  Cameron climbed into the bed as soon as I set it down.  I can't blame her since it was soft and just her size!  Dulce tried to nudge Cameron out of it but couldn't so she snuggled down next to her.  She didn't mind sharing her new bed for while.

Dulce was nice enough let Cameron play in the bed alone for a while after that.  Cameron got comfortable with the TV remote and a pumpkin, and then chatted away on her toy phone.  I love her developing imagination!

Once Cameron lost interest, Dulce climbed into the bed and took a nap.  We moved the new bed to where the old one was and Cameron has left it alone since then.

If you noticed in photos above, I finally decided to embrace the bangs now that they are long enough to do so.  I haven't had bangs for 18 years so I have been resisting.  When Cameron was about 4 months old, fierce postpartum hair loss set in.  I lost hair all over my head and it was most noticeable around my hairline.  My hairline receded almost a ½ inch in the front alone (first photo below)!

The new growth wasn't bad when it first started but the longer it got, the more ridiculous it looked and there wasn't anything I could do with it for a long while.  Once it started getting longer and literally sticking out all over (bottom right), I started plastering it to my head every day with an excessive amount of hairspray (bottom center).  I'm not kidding - I have not used this much hair spray since the early 90's.  My hair has been in a ponytail almost every day while it has been regrowing.  It was the only way to keep it all contained.

This week, I realized the new growth was finally long enough to look like normal bangs.  (Finally, after nine months!)  I had to trim it to even it out (the front was slightly longer than the sides) and cut a few long strands to blend it but these bangs are 99% new growth - that's a lot of new hair!  I actually kind of like the bangs so I think I'll keep them for a little while.

Cameron's hair is getting longer as well but the curls keep it up and out of the way for now :)

*******

"Do what you can, with what you have, where you are. "

~Theodore Roosevelt