It’s amazing what a really good photographer, who knows his subject, can capture. When Yehuda got this shot of his brother, I said, “Yes! That’s it!” This picture embodies Zeli. It’s an interesting idea to think of trying to capture the essence of each of your kids in one picture. Yehuda managed to catch a few of them during our recent vacation, and this one really sums up Zeli.

What does this picture communicate?

Zeli isn’t the most agile of human beings. He’s the kind of kid who was in physical therapy as a 10 month old because he never learned to roll over. Or crawl. These types of things worry pediatricians and physical therapists. But Zeli wasn’t worried. He just loves taking his own time to come around to things.

So, about a year ago he started winking, thinking it was cool. But poor Zeli couldn’t exactly get the knack of the wink. When he tried to do so, it was a bit like he was having an alien invasion – his whole face would crinkle up and he’d work as hard as he could to close one eye. He spent the last year perfecting the wink (I kid you not) so that he could get to a point where he was winking, smoothly, at you.

But now, he’s so proud of his wink and he spent so much every ffort on it, that he winks ALL the time. And when I say all the time – I mean something like 100 times a day. Whenever you turn a corner and find Zeli there and say “Hi Zeli!” his response is to wink.

When Yehuda caught this shot, I declared “Wow, that’s an amazing picture!” and Josh said, “Well, the kid winks 1000 times a day. Obviously Yehuda will catch him winking.”

I love this picture, not just because it’s really cute, but because it shows the effort that Zeli put into something he really wanted to accomplish.

He’s very proud of himself. And clearly, it shows.

Now he’s working on the left eye wink. We’ll let you know when he’s got that one down.