J Cooper Photography

A heartfelt thank you for the wonderful Thanksgiving/Christmas festivities Colorado style. We love you all!

1.  I’m so thankful for my camera and the chance to express myself and memorialize this time with my children.  I love that photographs create memories for them that they might not remember otherwise.  I had the opportunity to photograph my sweet Jule for the Matilda Jane Photo Love contest.  The deadline is tomorrow…and while I’m not quite ready to share my entry…I couldn’t resist sharing a few sweet smiles that didn’t make the final cut.  It was a challenge to enter just ONE image that represents my style.  But in the end…I just entered the image that I loved best.  I have been eyeing this location for a LONG time and finally worked up the nerve to ring the doorbell and meet the owners.  I’m SO thankful they said YES!  (MUCH more to come of the contest in a day or two…please check back over the holiday….I would be SO THANKFUL for your votes!)

2.  We have Decked the Cooper Halls.  We didn’t go wild this year…just brought out our favorite ornaments and spent a lazy Saturday carefully (who am I kidding?) unwrapping and hanging.  I’m thankful for the chance to see the magic of Christmas again this year through the eyes of these little people.  The girls begged for hours for Mr. P to get out the Christmas tree…the excitement palpable….until they literally couldn’t stand it any longer and were nearly in tears.  The squealing and jumping that ensued the moment they saw us carrying the tree up the stairs was PURE JOY!!  So far this little man of mine is enjoying the tree from a distance (I know that is short lived).  He walks near it chanting “no no no” with a little scowl on his face.  So funny.  Because in his mind I know he is screaming “YES YES YES!!”

3.  I’m thankful for doctors who make the tough calls for us.  Mr. Sam will be having surgery on December 7th to have tubes placed.  He saw the ENT last week, had a full hearing test by the audiologist, and the doctor agreed that the tubes were necessary.  He seems to have some amount of fluid still trapped in his left ear which isn’t draining on its own.  Hopefully, the tubes will make him more comfortable!!  He passed his hearing screening wonderfully (so thankful for that!) but the audiologist did say that some of his garbled speech may be due to the extra fluid in his ears.  We’d be SO thankful for your prayers that day!  He is a bit under the weather again already and I am fearing that he is on the path towards yet ANOTHER infection…need to keep this boy WELL so we can get the surgery DONE!

4.  Speaking of Mr. Little.  He is starting “school” in January.  I haven’t really absorbed that last sentence.  I’m hoping I’m thankful for this opportunity for him (I think it will come).

5.  I have been thinking A LOT about how to best accommodate our newest little addition.  We worked tirelessly this weekend purging and organizing to make room for the girls to bunk together….which makes me SO thankful for sisters.  I grew up with sisters.  I’m so happy that my girls will always have a best friend!

6.  And on the topic of nurseries…Ithe hunt has begun.  I have found several bedding sets I love.  Here and Here.  I am really trying to keep the cost at a minimum though so I haven’t made any purchases yet!  I had originally planned on putting Sam in a twin bed this winter (I did that with the girls around 18 months) but have realized that would NOT be wise.  He is so different (enough said!!)  I would LOVE to not have to buy another new crib as I only need it for about a year.  If any of my fellow Kansas City folks know a source for a nice used crib to buy cheap or borrow I would be SO THANKFUL!!  My sister came to the rescue with a cute little bookshelf and dresser!!

7.  We’ll be leaving shortly for a little road trip to see family.  This is one of my BIGGEST thanksgivings.  We are so blessed to have family that supports us, encourages us, and accepts us for who we are.  My kids are thrilled about this trip and the long drive in the car.  For them there is nothing better than waking up in the middle of the night with your pjs on and hopping in the car.  We’ve got the snacks loaded and several new movies packed away.  If I can keep Little Man well through the day tomorrow we should have a fantastic trip…here we come MEMORY MAKING!

8.  I don’t always take the time to think about it…but I am SO thankful for my friends.  It is amazing how a simple gesture can change your whole day.  A loaf of pumpkin bread today did that for me.  And last night my sweet friend loaned me 2 Christmas dresses for the girls.  We are keeping the budget tight this year as we prepare for our new one…and I couldn’t find anything I liked for a price I wanted to spend.  Now the girls have beautiful shiny dresses (that they LOVE!) and I didn’t have to spend a dime.  Friends.  SO thankful!!!

9.  We are SO THANKFUL for NUMBERS that have moved us one step closer to the next little Cooper!!  I’m deaming of the day that I get to meet that little face for the first time!

10.  And thankful that I have this spot to share my thoughts.  Thanks for reading about our crazy lives and my photography antics.  I know as a stay at home (work a little from home) mom it is so nice to make connections with other moms out in the computer universe.  We all converge on the internet during naptime and hash out the details of our lives.  And I’m thankful for that.  Because in the end…I know I’m not alone!

Wishing you all a BLESSED and ABUNDANT THANKGIVING with your families!!  Gobble Gobble!

I’ve been blessed with lots of friends here and “out there” in the blogging/internet world.  But few women have touched me like my dear friend Nic.  We designed together on ebay and I knew instantly that she is a woman of strong character…and she’s fun and zany too.  And God has made her heart ache for the orphan.  I didn’t think I could love her more…but I do.  Because now we share another bond.  And her decision will forever be stamped on my heart.  God is preparing her children for her…I’m so thrilled!!
Please stop by her Etsy shop and help support her in this amazing journey.  She is talented beyonds words!  And stop by her blog to enter to win one of her creations in her recent giveaway.

Thank you Nic, for your beautiful heart.

So sorry to have become so neglectful of this blog.  Life has been comsuming me here!  I am finally done with the last of my photo sessions and diving into “full time mommy mode”.  This weekend we put up our Christmas decor and did some serious organizing.  I convinced the girls to get rid of 3 trash bags full of toys in preparation for Christmas…YEAH!!  I’ll be combining them into the same room after Thanksgiving and we really needed to let go of some of the clutter to make that happen.  I’m praying the transition goes smoothly.  Miss J is THRILLED beyond words to get to bunk with her big sister.  Unfortunately, her big sister is lamenting the switcheroo.

I’ll save some of our other news for tomorrow’s 10 on Tuesday post…but I thought I better pop in her and share another adorable Kansas City family!  I’ve known Mom for years.  She knew me back when I had permed hair, tight rolled jeans, and my oversized cheerleading sweater.  And she’s still my friend…that says a lot.  She’s also one of the sweetest, kindest, most thoughtful gals I know.  And her littlest man….don’t get me started.  He has STOLEN MY HEART!  Look at him in his little button up shirt and half zip sweater….little preppy fashion man!!

He loved the leaves (he ate most of them)…and practiced his NEW SKILLS!  So of course we had to capture his first wobbly steps.  I HEART this next image to the core.  I love Mom and Dad’s expressions!

And his reward when he got to the other side!  I’d walk just about anywhere too for that hug and SMILE

“Look Mommy…no hands!’  Is he so proud of himself or what?

This little guy is just a wee bit younger than my own little man and I can’t wait for them to get into trouble together!

Showing off one of his fabulous nature finds (ie…crushed leaves that went straight to his mouth!)  We camped out near this GORGEOUS tree for a lot of the sesssion.  I think it was the LAST tree in the park to lose its color!  Also…I have to give Mom BIG KUDDOS on the wardrobe choices.  The colors photographed amazingly well and were so bright and beautiful (they made great Christmas cards too!)

Had to snag a couple of Mr. GQ all by his lonesome too….Happy BIRTHDAY little man.  I’ll chase you around the park any day for one of your sweet smiles!

{edited to add:  Apparently from the comments my photos needed a bit of explanation   sorry to be so vague!!  We are on both the boy and girl lists since we didn’t specify a sex….so our numbers are BLUE FOR BOY 30 and PINK FOR GIRL 46.  Our case manager said to expect a 6-7 month wait for the boy list and an 8-12 month wait for the girl list…but it could be sooner!!  Can you tell we are HAPPY???}

1.  My kids need straight jackets.  Mr. P is out of the country, it has been raining/sleeting/snowing since Sunday morning, it was early release day, S man is cutting another tooth, A has an ear infection.  Oh wait.  I NEED the straight jacket.  Zip me up and haul me off.  That padded room would be my pleasure!

2.  Friday afternoon it was 70 degrees and sunny.  Today we woke up to this (illustrated by my budding newly-turned 5 year old).  Funny how I look happy about snow in November in this picture.

3.  WE HAVE NUMBERS.  Yes we do!  Can’t share til tomorrow though

4.  But there is a funny (it is only funny because we now actually have our numbers) story behind it.  We sent in our dossier last week.  Our international agency does dossier reviews on Fridays.  We were anticipating “THE CALL” all afternoon.  When it hadn’t come by dinner time we turned on our cel phones and went to dinner.  After our arrival home we promptly realized we had missed “THE CALL” from our agency.  The message light was blinking.  “I’d love to chat with your about your dossier…I guess I’ll catch you Monday morning”….I about died.  No calls to our cel phones.  No message relaying whether our dossier passed.  NO NUMBERS.  So we did what we had to do…we waited until Monday morning.  And because of a miscommunication we DID NOT make the wait list.  I didn’t send in our passport photos.  We have current passports.  I was told we didn’t need to send in additional passport photos.  But apparantly our dossier wasn’t complete until they had them.  This wouldn’t have been a big deal, except Mr. P is in AMSTERDAM.  So this morning I emailed him the following “if there is any way for you to excuse yourself from your full day at that conference, find transportation, locate a place to get passport photos made, find a color scanner, and email those photos to our case manager, would you mind doing so…and preferably by tonight!”  HA!  But you know what.  Mr. P DID IT!  He found an online program that helped him create a passport photo.  He used his Iphone and stood in front of the white bathroom door at the hotel…took 20 pictures of himself and loaded them into that program…then emailed them to our case manager.  I LOVE THAT MAN!!!  So now we HAVE NUMBERS!!!  Anyone want to guess what they are??

5. A loves to try out new words in conversation.  When I was getting her ready for bed tonight she said “you should DECLARE to yourself that you need to go to bed early tonight”.  Love her.

6.  I have to give a BIG shout out to my mother in law who is here this week cooking, kid wrangling, diaper changing, babysitting, and keeping me sane!

7.  Little man is going to the ENT on Thursday and I am anxious to hear what he has to say about his little ears.  Hoping he has some ideas for keeping the infections at bay!

8.  I am *almost* done with my fall session editing.  Thank you to all my clients for your patience!!  I should have my last gallery up shortly.  And if you are planning on ordering prints or Christmas cards from your fall session but haven’t done so yet we are getting dangerously close to our holiday time cut-offs!!

9.  Last week before the cold snap I took sweet J out for a photoshoot for the Matilda Jane PHOTO LOVE contest.  We had so much fun (read:  I bribed the heck out of her).  I think I got a really fun and unique image to enter in the contest and can’t wait to share it with everyone!

10.  Stop back tomorrow to help us celebrate our place on the ETHIOPIAN WAIT LIST!!

I’ve known this family a long time.  They knew me back when I had braces, 80s hair, and wore rugby shirts with my Birkenstocks (hanging my head here!)  I secretly wished in the 9th grade that this sweet guy would ask me to promotion (along with half of the rest of my class).  But he didn’t.  He asked this beautiful girl (can you blame him?)  And it lasted.  Through the rest of junior high, high school, college, and right into the “growing your family” years.  I’m so proud of this couple.  They are so beautiful.

Their little man was a complete champ.  Talk about a killer smile!

He is so VERY MUCH loved (and I’m pretty sure he knows it!)

We hit the tail end of color at my favorite spot.  There were just a couple of trees left with their branches full of golden hues…the color is always the prettiest right before it it completely gone!

One of my new favorite “poses”.  I hate to spend too much time posing my clients…as I really want to capture them interacting with each other.  But this one just feels right.

LOVE LOVE this image.  My sweet friend wanted their dog in some photos so badly.  But Roma was WAY TOO excited to be off leash at the park to fully cooperate.  I know she wanted that traditional shot where the entire family was perched on the couch with a calm dog eagerly looking into my camera.  But I think this is SO MUCH BETTER.  Natural and happy…perfection!!!

Little man gave my antique trike a serious workout!

And we FINALLY got that puppy shot just as the sun was slipping behind the hill!!

H family….you ARE truly beautiful.  It was a HUGE pleasure for me to get to capture your family this year.  I’m so proud of how far you’ve come

Before our own little man I wasn’t really sure what to do with them.  They always rolled their eyes when I talked about the Disney Princesses or My Little Ponies.  But I’m starting to get it.  And they are SO MUCH FUN!!!

Mom blew this one up to a 20×24 canvas for their room.  Are they the sweetest or WHAT?

Those little heads full of blonde ringlets completely stole my heart!!  Their mom warned me that they are fast and ornery.  WHAT?  Look at those faces…do you believe her?

I have a special place in my heart for identical twin boys.  I’ve watched my sister raise hers and they have such a unique bond that is indescribable.   This was my FOURTH set of identical twin boys since last year….maybe I should go into twin photography   Is there even a market for such a thing?  Probably not.

This next image really spoke to me…about how kids completely change our lives.  It’s all about DIVIDE and CONQUER!!

Our goal was to get ONE good family shot.  You know…where everyone is looking in the same direction and is happy…or least doesn’t look like they are in pain   And I think we DID IT!  I wish I had a video of the spectacle I was creating trying to get these two little munchkins to laugh.   They put me through the workout…but I think it was worth it for ONE HAPPY SHOT!

Much JOY and HAPPINESS to you O family this holiday season!!!

The last two months of our lives are stuffed into one FedEx overnight package and on their way to All God’s Children International.  I can’t believe how the last few pieces of the puzzle fell into place so that we were able to get this in the mail today!  And even though there were forms that were notarized not once…not twice…but THREE times…it is finally DONE!  AGCI reviews dossiers on Fridays.  We are PRAYING that we didn’t miss anything and that they will find our paperwork to be in order!

And no we didn’t lose a child   Ms. A was busy at school putting on a Veteran’s Day musical!  Here she is cheezing it out in the school gymnasium for my camera

So now we WAIT.  I can’t wait to come back on here and share our wait list numbers as soon as we have them!  It was a HUGE relief to finally mail everything off…but at the same time…I also know we are probably entering the hardest phase yet.  WAITING.  We can expect to wait at least 5-6 months for a referral….then wait for a court date…then wait for travel dates.  But I take such relief in knowing that GOD will be WORKING during that time to arrange all the details so that we can bring the next Cooper baby HOME!!!!!!

1.  Wow.  That’s how I feel right now…wow.  So much going on here this week.  But it is ALL about to end VERY SOON!  We are PRAYING that we will be able to mail in our dossier THIS WEEK!  We received confirmation that our home study was accepted on Monday.  I spent the day running around town securing the rest of our paperwork today.  We are hoping to have the notarized copies of our home study IN HAND tomorrow which means this HUGE stack of papers can go IN THE MAIL!  Once they are reviewed by our International agency…we will BE ON THE WAIT LIST!  Can you tell I’m a little excited??

2.  During our visit to Nebraska, my Mom dug out a big bin of my old costumes to sort through.  With every visit, I return home with another box from my past (whether I like it or not).  So after this trip I had a black garbage bag containing my old scarecrow costume, a safari costume, and a my German heritage digs from “Heritage Day” at my Pyrtle Elementary School.  My Mom and I were discussing what a shame it was that schools seem to have done away with the idea of Heritage Day.  We’ve been discussing such things heavily at our house (at least African heritage) so I figured my girls were pretty atune to their own heritage.  Lo and behold…upon our return home I was sifting through A’s backpack and there was a letter about her school’s upcoming HERITAGE DAY!  I was stoked!  So the next morning I dug these digs out of that black garbage bag and was SO proud of my little German girl.  One small problem.  My little German girl was NOT liking her outfit.  She cried and cried and wanted to take it off.  But I persisted (and took pictures)

She had on a little black skirt with a colorful floral apron, white knee socks, and black shoes.  I don’t have a full body picture as she was supressing SOBS between fake smiles and I just can’t put that on my blog.  But you get the idea regardless.  After much digging and probing, I got to the bottom of the real problem.

Apparently, the “Princess Leah” buns were dorky.  And it’s all about image in the 1st grade these days I guess.  Don’t let that smile fool you.  She was NOT enjoying the buns.  But she wore them…and we talked about the importance of being proud of your heritage.  I worried about her all day.  Wondered if I was too stern and should have released those little buns from her head.  But she came in the door after school as chipper as a lark and jabbering a mile a minute.  And the buns were still in place.  I asked how her days went and she said, “fine…except I can’t remember where they wear these dumb buns”.  So I guess we have a bit of work to do on the heritage thing.

3.  I have been doing a lot of brainstorming for fundraising efforts.  Anyone have any ideas?

4.  J COOPER PHOTOGRAPHY is officially CLOSED for the holidays!  Of course I am still editing away like crazy…but I won’t be taking any new family sessions until after the Holidays.  I am really looking forward to enjoying my family and getting back to the basics.

5.  Any ideas on WHAT to get a toddler boy for Christmas?  I am REALLY trying to keep it simple this year and can’t for the life of me think of ANYTHING to get our little man.  He needs NOTHING.  And I am so sick of all the tiny toys scattered everywhere.  Anyone with little guys have any great suggestions?

6.  Awhile back I mentioned the Matilda Jane PHOTO LOVE contest that I entered.  I received the dress today….and will be photographing it SOON!  As soon as the contest has begun I will be using my blog and mailing lists for SHAMELESS self promotion as well as begging you for votes

7.  I have been working on some handmade Christmas gift ideas and LOVE LOVE LOVE these CALENDARS.

8.  Mr. P just called from Kinkos and said he has our dossier and all three copies in hand.  I could just kiss that man…oh wait…I can!

9.  The post office near my house was already playing Christmas music today.  What’s your vote?  Too early or not?

10.  I am seriously scraping the bottom of the barrel here on interesting things to say.  So off to bed it is….night!