Anyways, here are some pictures of no particular significance taken
between September and January. Enjoy!
Anywise, Missy came along, though I think there were 
moments
when she wondered what she'd gotten into. When we first brought Kayleigh
home, Missy had high hopes that finally she had found someone who would
throw the ball for her. Kayleigh has been a grave disappointment
in that respect. To compound the affront, she will fearlessly crawl
all over the dog, and has learned to steal Missy's ball and play with it
in front of her. Given all the grief she's been subjected to, Missy's
gentleness towards Kayleigh is remarkable! :-)
But I get ahead of myself. At 
the
time these pictures were taken,Kayleigh was still not quite crawling.
Or throwing balls. She did enjoy going down the slide with Francine,
though!
She was cruising (pulling herself along a couch, for instance) and doing
the trench crawl (flat on the tummy). In fact, we thought she might
skip crawling and go straight to walking! especially given how much
fun she seemed to have when Daddy helped her walk (click several times
on the pictures to see the whole dance).
We had a really gentle autumn and an unbelievably mild winter.
So had we not been sick so much, we could have spent a lot of time in parks.
Ah well, we'll have a lot of fun this summer!
Her
outfit was given to us by a co-worker of Francine's. It's my favorite
outfit of hers. With her stocking cap on, she looks like a little
tie-dye terrorist from Eugene, looking for a Starbuck's to smash!
She doesn't like hats or caps, so it's hard to capture the full effect.
Okay, so that wasn't the most politically correct thing I've ever said.
Still. . . cute, ain't she?
The
thing you absolutely have to have at a DeGrood Family picnic is a fire.
Unlike the traditional Taylor bar-b-que, it isn't necessary to burn parts
of the house, but you definitely do need a fire. The Keeper of the
Fire is, therefore, a position of great respect and responsibility.
Traditionally, the Keeper of the Fire is Al, Francine's Dad. However,
this year, Tom became the Keeper of the Fire. As an engineer, he
had a few improvements in mind over the traditional "briquets+vat o' starter
fluid" policies of earlier Keepers. The greatest of these is the
Paper Fire Starter. Note the other engineers, wannabe engineers,
future engineers, and "guys", engaging in that other traditional pursuit--kibitzing.
Kayleigh is modelling a cute little dress sent (along with the cow)
by my Uncle Bob & Aunt Joyce. Uncle Bob made Francine an honorary
dairy-girl last year after she milked cows with him. . . twice! I
think they're figuring to get Kayleigh started as soon as they get their
hands on her! She's not much of a clothes maven yet, but she loves
showing stuff to her cow.
September was right about when she started getting some teeth in.
For the longest time, she just had these little bottom teeth. Then
a couple top teeth popped in. Now she's got four on the bottom and
almost eight on the top! She still has a bit of an underbite, though--makes
her look like a little bulldog. :-)
That's Francine's sister, Luana, holding her. Dakota, Luana's
little girl, was terribly jealous of the attention her Mommy was giving
another little girl! 
She's
the cutest little girl I've ever seen, so you can see how she deserves
to be the center of attention. Tom, Luana's husband (and the Keeper
of the Flame) is half Okinawan. So Dakota has some of the delicate
asian features, and strawberry blond hair, and looks like a little woods
faerie. Francine caught a few pictures when Dakota decided to run
away from the picnic. :-)
We
decided not to have a big birthday party for Kayleigh this year.
Admittedly, we felt like celebrating our survival as parents, but we thought
she was a little young to really appreciate a birthday party. So,
for her birthday, we just celebrated with the immediate family. Everyone
got some cake!
Click on the pictures multiple times to see all of them. There
are about ten birthday pics!
After the party we went to bed. Bath and bedtime is one of our
favorite times. Mommy and Kayleigh have the whole routine down to
a science. After all the excitement, she was really ready for bed,
and her sheep (she sleeps with a sheep that plays "Jesus loves the little
children"). The next morning, there was something else in the bed
besides the sheep!
Oh, there were those who used my birthday argument against me--she's too young to enjoy it, they said. I replied with a reasoned rational response: "Blpppht!"
So, we dressed up, and we went.
Kayleigh's a little princess
anyways, so dressing her up as an Indian Princess was a no-brainer.
However, in the event, it was harder to accomplish than I thought.
Apparently, unless Disney has made a movie about it in the last year or
so, it ain't going to be a costume. Pocahontas had, apparently, come
and gone several years earlier. Therefore, I had to construct the
head-dress from scratch. Didn't know I had it in me! :-)
I hadn't even given my costume any thought. Finally, I thought
to go as a "Harried Dad". You know--tie loose, shirt unbuttoned,
milk bottle in the shirt pocket, toys clipped to my belt. However,
I figured that it was too close to my natural state for anyone to mistake
it for a costume.
Not being able to score a pilgrim's costume in the next half hour,
I finally decided to wear the costume I fence in--rapier, boots, blousy
shirt, baggy pants, heavy gloves. Figured I might get mistaken for
a Spanish conquistador, or at least a 16th century pirate. Maybe
not thematic, but at least I've got the historical period close.
No such luck. The first friend who sees these pictures writes,
"I get the Indian Princess thing, but what are you supposed to be?
A gypsy welder?". It's comments like that wot get people hurt. .
. .
I was trying to get Kayleigh to do a war whoop. The closest she
managed was a sort of shushing gesture. "Shhh, be quiet, we're trying
to have a war here. Keep it down please".
Hmm.
Even Indian Princesses need their dinner. Note the cute little
medicine pouch around her neck? Daddy is so very clever!! :-)
After a wild night of trick-or-treating (we only managed to get to
about five houses. . . hey, it was too cold for pirates) with Daddy, we
were ready for our bedtime with Mommy!
Normally, we either head South for Christmas with my folks, or we do Christmas at Francine's parents. So we normally just string a few lights up outside, and forgo the tree. I mean, why go to the trouble, if you're not even going to be there?!
Well, this Christmas, we decided to have at home. Oh, we went over to Francine's folks for Christmas dinner, and spent a few hours over there Christmas morning, but the real jazz happened at our place. We had a cookie-making night, and a Christmas sing-along night, and a sybartic Chocolate Decadence Movie Night! On Christmas day, Kayleigh played with her wrapping paper while Daddy played with her presents! :-)
And I didn't get a single photo. :-(
So, despite not partying on New Year's, we did get to experience the morning after-->
Once
Kayleigh started feeling better, I did something I'd been planning
to do since June. After we gave up on the idea of having children
via the standard methodology, we started looking into adoption. The
first place we tried was Catholic Charities. Their adoption services
program is run by a wonderful, godly woman named Paula Jones. She
helped us through the process of getting into their pool for domestic open
adoptions. While we eventually decided to adopt from China, her support
and kindness really gave impetus to our quest for a child. So, I decided
to visit her, and show off Kayleigh. As you can see, they hit it
off pretty well. :-)
These last two pictures were taken with the new camera, just about two
weeks ago (Jan. 6th).
Kayleigh's teachers in day-care love to play with her hair. Sometimes
it's a little Japanese top-knot, other times it's pig-tails. One
time, they had slicked it up into a kind of mohawk! We went out to
dinner, and Kayleigh is sitting, waiting for her food. I'm not sure,
maybe she's saying grace.
After dinner, she was pretty tired. I have a little pendant,
a phaux jade snake, that I brought back from China. Kayleigh
and I were both born the Year of the Snake, so it seemed a "must have"
at the time. She loves to grab it and play with it when I hold
her. This time she fell asleep with it clutched in her little hand.
Well, truth to tell, I'm tired too. Thank goodness, these are
the last of the pictures for now!
Hope you enjoyed them!
The Taylor Clan