All About The Potty

You can probably guess from the title what is happening around our house these days. Yes, Potty Training Boot Camp is in full swing. We have been talking with Jacoby about how after Christmas we would begin going potty like a big kid. And since he is both a perfectionist and loyal to the toddler school of thought that trying out new things must not be done at any cost, I decided to just let him know that we are all done with diapers and that we don't use them anymore (except if you're Morgan). I also took advantage of being home extra days over the weekend due to the MLK holiday to really start our potty routine. And Jacoby is doing great! We've of course had a couple of accidents, but he is really doing well and learning fast. We're only using pull-ups during nap time and overnight, and that seems to be going well. He gets to pick a treasure out of the "treasure bag" (thank goodness for cheap matchbox cars/trucks!) whenever he successfully uses the potty. We are very proud of him, but I will tell you that we have done nothing but live and breathe potty time for the past four days! Everything is centered around the potty, and I've been surprised by how much energy this takes! But I have no doubt that he will be a pro in no time.

In other non-potty-related news, I've been enjoying the extra time at home and Justin has been taking advantage of a little extra study time. We cleaned carpets this weekend, which was not difficult in and of itself, but definitely hard to have parts of the house off limits to two energetic little boys who are used to having the run of the place. We also enjoyed a play date with some friends. We've been going for walks in the afternoons and Morgan is big enough now to ride in the wagon with Jacoby. Jacoby thinks this is really cool until Morgan passes the invisible boundary line and accidentally touches Jacoby's side of the wagon! Morgan is all about feeding himself these days and shovels in just about anything we give him. Besides that, he's into everything right now. I'm just about finished with a really good book on food allergies. It has been very helpful and informative as we continue to navigate the world of food allergies.

I promise to spare you all from potty-time pictures!

Riding in the wagon together

Working on a little duet

We do supervise this child, I promise!

Happy Christmas Tales & The Start of 2010

Our annual holiday trip to Montana was wonderful. The boys were such good travelers and excellent troopers during all of the activity and moving around. They thoroughly enjoyed our visits with grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins. Here are a few highlights:

Visiting Grandma Pam, Grandpa Bill, and Aunt Kenzie in Great Falls, MT.

Attending the Christmas Eve candlelight service. Both boys were completely enthralled by the lights and music, and Jacoby held a candle all by himself.

Jacoby's mantra during present-opening time was: "What's It Going To Be!?!?

Visiting Grandmanette, Grandpa Barber, Uncle Jared, Aunt Jill, Uncle Marc, and Cousins Des and Jax in Billings, MT.

Hours of playtime with Cousins Desmond and Jax. Jacoby and Des opened a "bookstore" in Grandmanette and Grandpa Barber's living room.

Jacoby enjoyed a trip to the Lockwood Fire Station with Cousin Des.

Visiting Uncle Mark and Aunt Megan in their new house in Billings, MT.

It was a super busy trip and we enjoyed the time very much but were also glad to get back to our home. We've dived right in to 2010 and are in full swing with our weekly routines. The boys enjoyed being back in school last week and everyone kept commenting on how much Morgan had grown! Besides following Jacoby around like a shadow, Morgan is practicing standing all by himself, walks with the walker, and tells us "night, night" when he's going to bed. Jacoby has a monstrous appetite right now and is very busy with his trucks and trains. Wherever we go, we have to pretend the Subaru is a garbage truck. Justin is doing two independent studies this quarter to round out his courses in his PhD program. One is in Hebrew reading (Judges) and he's learning Coptic for the other...yes, Coptic, another one of the ancient languages to add to his repertoire. Work is moderately busy for me and I'm also joining a bible study with some other moms.

What's on tap for 2010?

Here are some of our goals and hopes for the New Year:

Justin ~ Finish courses, pass comps, defend dissertation proposal, keep up a regular workout schedule, consume less sugar in diet, implement meditation into daily routine.

Jacoby ~ Start and complete Potty Training Boot Camp, maybe try skiing, maybe try itty bitty soccer in the spring, maybe try learning lower case ABC's, and maybe try writing his name.

Erin ~ Keep up practice of striving for balance with home and work life, foster some sort of social life with friends, continue to strive to be a good steward of our resources, keep up regular workout routine, continue to strive for healthy meals for the family.

Morgan ~ Master walking (Mommy predicts it will be before his first b-day), transition to toddler room at school, start jabbering with us, maybe start sharing a room with Jacoby.

Fun Things We're Excited About:

1. A skiing trip this winter.

2. More fun in the snow.

3. Birthday extravaganza now until March.

4. Summer break! Camping, hiking, and a trip to Montana.

5. U2 Concert for Daddy & Mommy in June (anyone want to babysit?)

6. Time with family ~ we're always excited to have visitors!

12 Days of Christmas

We're getting ready to embark on our road trip to Montana for the holidays. We actually will be gone for about 12 days and will be celebrating several Christmases over that time! We're really looking forward to the time with our families. We wish all of you a very merry Christmas and a blessed New Year!

Christmas Preview

We've spent the weekend celebrating Christmas! Since we travel to Montana every year, we decided to start celebrating sometime before our trip as a family of four so that we can start establishing some of our own traditions. On Saturday, the boys received a few gifts, chowed down on monkey bread, visited a living nativity, and went for a drive to see Christmas lights. Monday is our much-anticipated visit to Denver Zoo Lights.

Jacoby received a train table and a few Thomas the Train accessories for his Christmas and birthday gift this year. It was a combined gift from Mommy & Daddy, Grandma Pam & Grandpa Bill, and Aunt Linda. Most of you know that I love to shop on Craig's List here in our area. Most of the gear we have for the boys (that hasn't come from the grandparents) has come from Craig's List. So, this summer I started looking for a train table for Jacoby. I found one up in Loveland, CO for a great price that came with a dozen or so engines, miles of track, and a bunch of accessories. Its been a big hit, and Jacoby has already logged quite a few hours playing with the trains. Morgan likes watching the trains go around the track and has taken it on as his personal mission to undo the track, much to Jacoby's dismay. We hear "I need help with Morgan!" a lot right now.

In other news from our week, Justin gave his final exam to his students. They all did very well in the end and he's officially done for the quarter. One of the professors he's worked closely with on a Dead Sea Scrolls project asked him to come in a couple of days this week to assist her with some things. He's also finalized classes for next quarter and is trying to prepare for his comprehensive exams.

I took Tuesday off from work while the boys were in school. I can't remember the last time I was home by myself...actually, Justin was allowed to stay home too only because it was 7 degrees outside or something like that. After we dropped the boys off at school, we went out for a quick breakfast together and then I spent the rest of the day getting caught up on a bunch of different things. It was a great day, but by the end I was definitely missing the noise of my little guys in the house. My "Mommy Mistake" of the week was accidentally leaving Jacoby's blanket at school Tuesday evening. He went to bed fine and I thought maybe he was ready to be without it...but I found him and Justin sleeping on the floor together in his room Wednesday morning!

Morgan Ethan turned 9 months old last week! He had a great appointment with our pediatrician and is weighing in at 22.5 pounds and is 30.25 inches long. We worked some some sleep issues out this past week, so he's back to sleeping almost 12 hours at night time and is taking longer naps during the day now that he's actively crawling. Morgan loves to clap, play peek-a-boo, wave, and shows us how big he is now. He also signs for "more" and is starting to say "uh-oh" and "ball". He is busy following Jacoby all over and loves it when his older brother plays with him. They currently enjoy emptying the kitchen cuphoards and chasing each other under the dining room table.

New cargo box thanks to b-day gifts from Grandma Pam & Grandpa Bill

When life tosses you lemons...or a food allergy

The week Jacoby came down with H1N1 is also the week he had a couple of serious reactions to some food. We made an appointment with an allergist and our pediatrician armed us with Benadryl and epi-pens to have on hand until food allergies were confirmed.

The Appointment

We had our appointment on Wednesday this week, and I first just have to say that we are so blessed to live in a community with such excellent medical care. Our allergist is wonderful. She spent about 30 minutes with us discussing our observations on Jacoby and the foods that seem to bother him. After our discussion, he was tested for about 25 different allergies.

The Allergy Test

I'll be honest, the testing portion of our appointment was awful. Jacoby was scared and upset and throughout the test he tried to come up with every way of saying "No", "Stop, please", "No thank you" he possibly could. I think in his little mind, he must have thought he was getting 25 different shots. It did not take a trained eye to see that he had allergies. Over the course of the 20 minutes that we had to wait until they would come back in and "read" the results on his back, Justin and I watched nearly all 25 marks fill up with hives and redness. Now, we both knew that some type of allergy would be confirmed at the appointment, but it was still very distressing to see just how many we might be dealing with. Jacoby finally settled down a little but when they came back in to read the test, he got upset all over again. The only way I was able to distract him somewhat was to talk with him about our upcoming visit to Zoo Lights. We talked about the animals we'd see and which ones might be sleeping while we're there (it's a night time visit to the zoo to see a fabulous array of christmas lights throughout the zoo).

The Results

Jacoby is allergic to peanuts, tree nuts, sesame and sunflower seeds, fish, and eggs. It was no surprise about the nuts and seeds, but we were surprised about fish and eggs. As I've been trying to process all of this over the past couple of days, I've been thinking about both the positive and negative implications. In some ways, I think Jacoby has been trying to tell us that some foods bothered him. We all know how picky toddlers can be about food, but I think we interpreted pickiness (like with eggs, some baked goods, peanut butter) when really Jacoby was trying to say "Mommy & Daddy, this stuff makes me feel really icky!". As a result of his "pickiness", he hasn't consumed a lot of the things that would make him sick. Looking back over the past year, there are situations that have come up that I can now attribute to a reaction to food. Another thing that I think has been a blessing, is that Justin and I for some reason have never been completely comfortable feeding Jacoby nuts. He was exposed to peanuts and nuts sometime after his first birthday, but I think Justin and I both felt like we still needed to be really careful. And because of that, we have really kept our home nut-free for the most part. Back to the results, Jacoby developed a hive that measured a little over 5 cm to pistachios (a nut we've never given him, thank goodness) and a hive right around 5 cm to peanuts. The other biggies were sunflower seeds (which is what he reacted to in October) and sesame seeds. Fish was surprising to us because he generally enjoys tuna if I bury it in casserole. Eggs were also surprising but also somewhat less worrisome because he'll likely grow out of this one by age 5. He is able to tolerate eggs if they are really well cooked. A few environmental allergies that he tested positive for were cottonwood trees, cat hair and dander, and dog hair and dander (although not has much as cats). He was given Benadryl after the test because they were worried about the strong reactions he had to pistachios and peanuts.

One Step At A Time

Since the appointment I've been busy filling out paperwork, making follow-up appointments, getting prescriptions filled, and talking with his teachers, the school program director and health liason about our situation. Another huge blessing is that his school is nut and seed-free, and they provide an alternative for Jacoby when they serve eggs or fish. On Thursday they served quiche for breakfast and gave something else to Jacoby. I talked to him about why he couldn't have what the other kids were having. A little while later while he was playing trucks, he stopped and looked at me and said "I'm allergic to eggs. They make me sick". And thus begins the process of teaching Jacoby about his allergies and the foods he'll have to avoid. He can now list off everything he's allergic to. We've cleaned out our cuphoards and have a few things to give away to friends and the food bank. We're doing a lot of reading and research and are quickly becoming experts on food allergies and how to read food labels. It's amazing how well-disguised some things are that we're going to have to be careful with. For example, his favorite cereal bars are made with sesame seed flour. And sunflower oil is often found in the ingredients list of things we have in our house. We also have to stay away from things that say they are processed in a plant with tree nuts or peanuts, which will be really challenging since that's on almost every label you read. We'll be ordering him a medical bracelet to wear when he's not with us. Morgan has to be tested for dairy when he turns 1 before he starts consuming dairy. He'll be tested for the rest of the things when he's a little older.

That's where we're at right now. For the most part, we're doing ok with all of this and know that it's manageable, and we're hopeful that there might be new treatment options on the horizon by the time Jacoby enters kindergarten. I've probably felt the whole spectrum of emotions from sadness, being overwhelmed and fearful to relief that we know what we're dealing with and determination to handle this as best we can and live a normal life with it. There are a whole array of life-threatening, chronic illnesses we could be facing, and we actually feel really thankful that food allergies are what we've been given. And we also know that Jacoby is going to be able to manage this as well. He's very verbal and very smart, so we're going to be able to teach him about his allergies and how to help us manage them. Jacoby is still Jacoby, and he's still a very healthy, smart, caring little boy.

Our sweet, sweet boy