Some Fantastic News!

Ian had a school physical a couple of weeks ago and so while we were there I asked the doctor to run a blood test on him to check his allergen reactivity. Ian was such a trooper during the appointment. He made me proud. Well, this past Monday we headed back to the doctor for an appointment to go over the results. I took this as an opportunity to take Ian on a day out with Mommy alone. We left Aaron with the sitter because who really wants to take a healthy baby to the doctor's office anyway.

Ian was weighed and measured and we went in the room to wait for the doctor. He came in and then went to get the results from the computer. He came back in and showed me the lab reports. I took one look at them and nearly started crying. Ian is no longer reacting to dairy proteins or eggs! I just teared up! This past 30 months of dealing with dairy allergies has been such a weight on my shoulders. Reading every label, policing every snack, watching the school and the CDC's food regimens, paperwork, etc. It's all OVER! My child can be normal and have what the other kids have. Birthday cake. Ice cream. Chocolate candy. No restrictions. No more carting around a "substitute" for cake. No more making sure that no one hands him a cookie that he can't have. No more trying to make his food as close to the other kids' but without the dairy. He's outgrown it and we can put this past us!

So we left the doctor's office, our lab reports in hand, and then Ian and I went to Chuck E Cheese to meet some friends and celebrate! Ian had cheese on his pizza and loved it. It's been 2.5 years since he has deliberately eaten a dairy product. I am pleased to report that he had no skin reactivity (sometimes the lab tests can be wrong.) Here's a picture of my dairy eating little man!


Ian and I had a lot of fun just the two of us and he melted my heart when he asked if he could have some "M beans" when we were in Hobby Lobby. Ian knew that he could have "S beans," also known as Skittles, but that the "M beans," aka M&Ms were off limits in the past. So he had his first packet of M&Ms on the way home. When I asked him what they tasted like he said "Yummy Chocowate." He also said, " The gween ones are my favowite because gween is my favowite colwor."

The Cake and the Party

Well it was really about the birthday, but we ended up with a fabulous cake and I just have to share it! I wanted a special cake for Aaron's first birthday to share with our friends at the party we were holding at McDonald's. I really wasn't sure who made cakes or how to go about it, but at one of the Mom's Night Outs I met a lady who does cakes. I figured that I would just give her full liberties to make the cake how she wanted as long as it was a nursery rhymes theme. I couldn't have been more pleased! It was well beyond my expectations.

The first layer was designed like a book. It was a chocolate cake with white frosting and it said, "Happy 1st Birthday Aaron." It also had a fondant Mother Goose and a candlestick for Jack Be Nimble.

The second layer was a yellow cake with green frosting. It had fondant pieces in the shape of many of the characters/scenes from our favorite nursery rhymes. There was a clock with a mouse running up it for Hickory Dickory Dock, a pumpkin house for Peter Peter Pumpkin Eater, a spider and spicket for the Itsy Bitsy Spider, a Humpty Dumpty, a pail and a well for Jack and Jill, and a black sheep with 3 bags of wool for Baa Baa Black Sheep. She specifically made this section dairy free so that Ian could have some cake which made it that much more special to me. Ian rarely gets a chance to have the real birthday cake because of his food allergies.

The top layer was a chocolate cake. It was shaped like a hay stack and Little Boy Blue and his horn were asleep on it. It was designed as the special smash cake just for Aaron.

The details were amazing. I was almost sad to cut it to serve it because it was so cute. It tasted amazing though!



Anyway, if you need a special cake and live in the Killeen area, let me know and I will give you April's information. You won't be disappointed!

And now to report on the actual birthday! HOLY MOLY! Our friends are too kind and generous. To think that we've only been here 6 months and we have that many people interested in helping us celebrate is beyond my imagination. We truly are blessed to be surrounded by so many wonderful people! About 40 guests showed up at McDonald's for Happy Meals and cake! It was crazy, but it ran amazingly smoothly. The kids enjoyed their food and ran around the play structure and sang Happy Birthday and ate cake! They all received a coloring book that I printed out with permission from Chrissie at Flipflops and Applesauce. www.flipflopsandapplesauce.com She sold a copyright release to me and I printed off the pages on white cardstock at the Fedex Office store. I had them 2 hole punch the side and then I bought ribbon and bound them. Totally cute! (Chrissie has other coloring books that you can purchase on her blog) Since it's Back to School time, I was able to snag 24 count Crayola Crayons for 25 cents per box so I stuffed goodie bags with those and some ring pops and candy for each of the kids.

And here is the happy birthday boy after he enjoyed some of his cake!


When we finally got home and got all of the gifts out of the boxes, we were overwhelmed with the generosity our friends showed us. It was like a Christmas morning! There were so many toys and clothes. We know that God has blessed us so much! Aaron had one of the best birthdays! We were able to send Daddy some pictures and he was amazed!
Thank you to each and every one of you that helped to make our day PERFECT!

ONE YEAR!

Where oh where has this past year gone? It has passed by so quickly. Last year at this time I was trying to sleep knowing that the next morning I was going to the hospital to be induced. I was excited and anxious and nervous all at the same time. It ended up being a different birthing experience than I thought I would have, but I ended up with one very beautiful baby boy! My Aaron turns 1 tomorrow and I couldn't love him more. I'm not even sure how we got along without him as it seems like he's been with us forever.



My sweet little 7 pound 7 ounce bundle of joy!



Has grown into a little boy!

When It Rains It Pours: Back to Square 1

I just want to cry. I've been such a whiner the last couple of posts, but I am about to lose it. I came home from work today and the nanny dropped the bomb. "I'm moving. I have to quit. My dad is making me move back home." This after she gave me a year commitment and allowed my boys to fall in love with her. What a nightmare! Here I am working a set schedule and I need a set babysitter. Please pray for me that I can find the right person to fill the void and that I can do this quickly. I think I am going to lose it if this nanny stuff doesn't stop.

That Terrible Alone Feeling...

I've had one of those days. And my husband has been moved to a camp in Afghanistan where he can't call home anymore. UGH. Anyway, I feel the need to vent so if you are feeling grumpy, lonely, sad and don't want to hear my whining, here is your chance to click the little "X" in the upper right hand corner.

Today has been one of the most frustrating days and I think it stems from this morning. I haven't felt this alone since my husband left 8 weeks ago and I was panicked. Most of you know that I work. Pharmacists work weird hours and so conventional daycare doesn't work for us. This generally means that we need to find a reliable babysitter and that involves quite a process. So I get here to Killeen and dug in and hired my sitter. Things have gone relatively well. There are always a few hiccups at first, but mostly it's been good. Well, until today. She didn't show up. It was the 2nd time she hasn't been on time so I decided to call to see if she overslept. Well she didn't answer. She didn't answer x 2. PANIC! My shift started in 20 minutes. I am not supposed to be late. It's so rude and unprofessional. It's against policy. It's all of these things and it's even more disgraceful that a pharmacist is the one who is late. ARGH. I didn't even know who to call. I started packing a diaper bag for Aaron and figured I would try to ask for a favor from a friend, but I never want my kids to be someone else's burden. It's my responsiblity to take care of them. But I was going to have to do something and quick. My employment is on the line when it comes to stuff like this and I was feeling like a complete failure. The system that I had worked out has failed and my Plan B wasn't really in place. (I obviously need to work on Plan B.)

She finally called. She showed up here 2 minutes after my shift started. I sheepishly went to work after calling the guy I was relieving and apologized. But now I can't shake this feeling that I am alone in all of this and that I am letting my kids down in some way.

It's probably stupid. It's not like someone died or anything terrible honestly. It just brought up all those feelings that I've squashed for the past 8 weeks. I feel like I lost all of the control that I had on the situation and I don't like this feeling at all. I know I am not the first working mom with a deployed husband. Someone please tell me to get off the pity party wagon and suck it up.

I'm sure this is just the first of many bad days over the course of a year. I'm sure that if I'm half as intelligent as I am supposed to be that I will figure something out to fix this. But in the meantime, you'll find me sulking and whining like a great big baby...

Growing Up! First Haircut!

Aaron is growing up so fast! His hair was over his ears so I decided that it was time... time for the first haircut. With summer upon us and a little boy who thinks that he should wash his hands in his hair, I was tired of trying to comb the tangles out.







Since I had no one to wield the camera, there is only one shot of us in the chair, but at least there is one!

Brothers May 2009