Prepping for Preschool

At this time next week Jackson will be in preschool!! We've spent this week getting ready. Yesterday I sat through an orientation that I swear I was too young to participate. School supply list? Permission slips? What?!?

Jackson's ready and I know he is. He is eager to learn new things and engage in learning activities-- the kinds of things that I am not as super great at as a mother. Preschool is just the thing we need around here... for his sake and mine! Fortunately, the school district has a free preschool for two mornings a week. I am just not ready to send him away for much more than that!

We picked up school supplies yesterday and Jackson got his backpack all ready. A Bible wasn't on the supply list, but he asked if he could take it anyway! Of course you can, Buddy!

This morning, we worked on our first "homework" assignment. 

As the day progressed yesterday from orientation, exploring the classroom, buying school supplies... my anxiety about his food allergy increased. Jackson's school is a peanut free facility, but Jackson's allergies are to tree nuts and they are extremely severe. I was on Pinterest yesterday, which is something I so rarely do, and I stumbled unintentionally to a blog post about back to school preparations for kids with food allergies. God is so good to even use blogs to help guide and direct us! :)

Using tips and resources provided on the post, I began putting together a better, more detailed allergy kit. Target has this first aid container that is the perfect size for all of the items I need to send with Jackson!

It has his epinephrine injectors, prednisone, his inhaler, antihistamine and his allergy bracelet.

I printed off this handy form that will be in his kit, along with the nurse and teacher. 

I purchased some Oreo packages to send with Jackson so that when people bring birthday treats, he can still have a special snack that is assuredly safe for him to eat. I feel much more at ease! The staff is great at the school and is eager to help in keeping Jackson as safe as possible. 

It's hard to relinquish control over every little aspect in the lives of my kiddos, but I know it's part of my job as a mom. Jackson is ready to spread his wings a little bit and it's just what he needs! This preschool preparation is just as much for me as it is for Jackson! :) 

Eleven Months

Eleven months. Holy Moley! Next month we’ll be having her birthday party and I just quite believe it! It’s been a fun month and of course, we just love our little sweetie to the moon and back.

Dear Belle,

Wow! You’re eleven months old now! You have four teeth and you’ve started taking steps! Pretty soon you’ll be begging to get your license! Ha. Maybe not, but it all feels like you’re just growing so fast. You are still just the happiest little baby. I love when people say, “is she this happy all the time?” and I get to say, “Yes, she really is!”

You are super ticklish, especially on your neck. You can’t control your deep belly laugh when you’re getting tickled and it is so cute!!! You always giggle when I give you lots of kisses. I love it!

Watching your reaction when Daddy comes home is one of my favorite parts of my day—his too. You will stop anything that you were previously focused on and crawl at the speed of light when you see him. You will push any toy out of the way and you will crawl over any obstacle; nothing will break your determination. It is *so* cute to see how much you love Daddy. It really makes him feel special and I hope you continue to give your daddy hugs all of your life. Dads need that.

Jackson is still one of your favorite people. He can make you laugh at the silliest little things. You two love to play together and I really enjoy watching. When we go to a friend’s house or even in the doctor’s office waiting room, you two gravitate to each other. I hope you guys continue to stay close! Don’t get offended when he doesn’t want to play all the time. He’s just a boy and he’s also older. But one day when he calls you old, you can just turn around and say, “well, you’re older!” {I had to do this to Uncle Phil last week!}

You started taking steps just last week!!!! You’ve been cruising around furniture for months and then it was just like one day you decided, “hey, I can take some steps!” I feel that the term ‘walking’ is ambitious, but you’re almost there. The thing that is most successful at getting you to walk—holding a stuffed animal. It’s amazing, you *love* stuffed animals. You always sleep with one. Whenever you first pick up a stuffed animal, you always squeeze it and cuddle close. Some of your Christmas presents were animals and you gave them kisses first thing! You’re already a loving, compassionate little person.

Practicing some steps while in line at Oklahoma Joe’s—
now if that’s not enough reason to walk, I don’t know what is!!

This month you celebrated your first Christmas. You actually spent most of Christmas morning cranky, but we took you all out of your element, so it was kind of our fault. Wrapping paper was your favorite. And you looked super cute in the tutu I made you!

We took you in for allergy testing this month. It is pretty early for this kind of testing, but your brother has some severe allergies and I just wanted to see if we needed to be taking special precautions with you. And the best news—no allergies! Well, no food allergies. But maybe you’ve lucked out and gotten my immune system. :) The not as good news is that you lactose intolerant. Crummy news, but it explains why you have always had the most catastrophic poops I have ever seen. I know it’s not very ladylike to mention it and I won’t announce it during your senior slideshow or anything, but it was seriously bad. Things are finally “normal” now that you’re off milk formula. It could be something you outgrow, but it’s not life threatening and easy to work with so I won’t complain. Sorry that it took us so long to figure out what was going on, but you’re such a happy baby we weren’t really sure if anything was actually wrong!

Let’s talk about hair. I am so, so glad that you have lots of hair. It is super, duper straight. Not a bit of curl, which really isn’t like anyone in our family. You’ll love it when you’re older! But right now, it just looks a little awkward most of the time. It’s really long at your side burns and the middle of your head, but not so much anywhere else. Bows are a hit and miss with you. When I blow dry your hair right after a shower or bath, it does look fluffy and cute, but that just doesn’t happen all of the time. And check out this bedhead—once it happens, there isn’t anything you can do about it without fully submerging your head in water. It’s way bad.

But I did get actually manage to get you in pigtails yesterday!! They are kind of like little horns, but at least it looks like I actually tried. And it beats the above hairstyle. You weren’t much of a fan, but I’m hoping you get used to it because I truly believe that little girls are made for pigtails.

Two words: Daddy’s girl. You sat like this for several minutes {which is like eternity in Belle cuddle time!}. You really have become more cuddly this month in general. Maybe you’ve figured out that it’s okay to relax every once in awhile and not always be on the move. Whatever it is, both Daddy and I love it.

You look so cute all bundled up in your fluffy coat. You aren’t really a fan, but I’m not either. It is a pain to get on you and then buckle you in the carseat. Let’s just hope for a continuation of the super nice winter and that we won’t need it much longer!

This is your favorite spot. If I am in the kitchen, you are here. You love this cabinet and cookie cutter drawer. You would actually prefer to play under the sink, but I won’t let you. Go ahead and sign me up for the mean mommy award.

And lastly, girl, you love to climb. Anything and everything. Sometimes I see you holding on to something just trying to get your foot up high enough to climb higher. You can’t stop your feet from climbing! Of course, stairs are your favorite. Climbing up Jackson’s slide is your second favorite. You are quick and quiet. I was making Jackson’s bed and I didn’t even know you were capable of climbing until you just appeared on the bed! About gave me a heart attack.

Jackson got this little chair for Christmas and you like to stand in it more than he gets to sit in it!

And just the other night as I was getting you a bottle at some ungodly hour as you were screaming {no, you’re not consistently sleeping through the night. not cool} and as I was about to your room and I heard a giant thud and MORE screaming. Yes, you climbed out of your crib and fell. When I picked you up, you were still basically asleep—wouldn’t even open your eyes. I didn’t really sleep much more than night because I was so worried. We are going to figure out a way to move your mattress down even lower this weekend.

Daddy cannot stand for you to even get a tiny boo-boo. If you keep this fearless attitude, you might near drive him crazy. We love your outgoing, active, independent, determined little personality. As parents we will do our best to foster those traits and help you grow to become exactly who God made you to be. We love you so very much, but always remember that Jesus loves you even more!

Peanuts

Today, I have two types of peanuts to discuss. First, we'll talk about the actual peanut-- the kind that Jackson is allergic to, the kind that we have avidly avoided his entire life.

Unlike most cases, we fortunate enough to discover Jackson's allergies preemptively, before we ever had any adverse reactions. Derek's allergist is also a pediatric allergist and had urged us to bring Jackson in for a visit due to Derek's abundant allergies. It's been about a year since we took him in and discovered he is allergic to eggs, soy, tree nuts, and peanuts (because peanuts aren't really nuts). His allergies to eggs and soy are mild enough that he can handle when they are included in products, just as long as he's not eating just eggs or just soy. The nature of eggs and soy allergies are also that they will cause puffiness, redness, and discomfort, but their most serious effects are nothing like minimal effects of coming in contact with nuts and peanuts. So, of course, we have taken very strongly to keeping them out of his system.

And it was something we had succeeded quite effortlessly. That is, until Jackson picked up a peanut shell off the ground at the Chiefs game that we were at the other day (this was bad news on several different levels)! It took a minute for me to actually realize what had happened and the whole ordeal was probably over within three to five minutes. But being that it was his first contact with the food he was allergic too, it definitely seemed much longer! I was trying to race through the information the nurses had so adamently made me rehearse in the office so I would be prepared. I knew I had his epi-pen, but it didn't seem like he needed it. Of course, I took the shell out of his mouth and then a few seconds later, he threw up. Fortunately, the friends sitting down the row from us have sons with similar allergies and they reassured us that throwing up is what happens when they eat peanuts. Which, of course, was nice to know because I had no idea. Jackson ended up falling asleep at the game and I came home and gave him some Prednisone after we got home to help combat anything left in his system. After talking to the doctor the next day, I did everything right, though I should have had given him Benydryl too.

Ironically, the nurses had hoped that by Jackson's yearly allergy check up that he would have possibly outgrown the egg and the peanut. We are going to get his blood drawn today and something tells me that his peanut allergy is still going to be there. The only scary part, is that peanuts are what he's least allergic too, which makes me shudder at the thought of him actually ingesting a nut. At least, I can know what to expect and how to deal if (when) we have another encounter with peanuts.

__________________________________________________________

And now for peanut topic number two:

For the past several weeks, I have referred to the little baby inside of me as "peanut" but I clearly need to change the nickname to something that doesn't induce the vomiting reflex in Jackson. I mean, that's not the best way to start the sibling bonding process!

Anyway, I've seen several bloggers do this little survey each week through their pregnancy. I'm am definitely not going to commit to that because that I know I won't keep up, but I am hoping to keep updating periodically throughout the pregnancy.

*How far along?: 15 weeks

*How big is your baby?: approximately the size of an apple: 2 inches & 4 oz.

*Total weight gain?: Nada

*Sex: Too soon to know. Yes we will find out. Most of my friends and family are convinced it's a girl.

*Maternity clothes: A friend gave me tons of super cute clothes last summer, so I have a new (to me) maternity wardrobe.

*Stretch marks: Nada
*Movement: I first felt the baby move at 14 weeks and have felt similar small movements, but nothing quite so big.

*Sleep: It's not the child I'm pregnant with that keeps me up at night. But when I do get the opportunity to sleep through the night, I always have to get up to pee.

*Best moment this week: Feeling the baby move.
*Food cravings: Water actually. I can't get enough. (which is the cause of the above frustration)
*Labor signs: Definitely not
*Belly button in or out: In

*What I miss: Basically just Derek. I haven't really been pregnant long enough to really miss anything

*What I'm looking forward to: finding out if we are having a boy or girl when we go visit Derek in October!

Jackson's Allergies

A few weeks ago, I took Jackson to the allergist, because his eyes were really red and puffy and it was right at the time that Derek's allergies were acting up. I was expecting a simple prescription for Benedryl (since it isn't available OTC for infants anymore...), but I got so much more than I bargained for!

Instead, Jackson had a food allergy test, where they pricked his back with about 16 different food allergens to see which would cause a reaction. It was tough for me to watch him get pricked so many times, but it was only frustrating to Jackson because I had to hold him still for them to do it. Jackson is allergic to eggs, tree nuts, and soy. His allergy eggs and soy will cause an skin reaction, such as welts and rashes, He seems to tolerate both eggs and soy when they are mixed in a product like cakes and cereal, so we plan to mainly stay away from direct intake of like scrambled eggs and mainly soy products, like the SoyJoy bars, etc.

The food allergy test-- the red welts are the
reactions to the nuts, eggs, and soy.

Jackson's allergy to tree nuts is much more prevelent and the blood results showed came in last week. His highest allergy is to cashews and is ranked as a class 5 allergy. Other nuts he is allergic to include walnut and pecan, but the doctor strongly mentioned that he avoid all nuts to be on the safe side. And although the skin test didn't show, the blood test discovered a peanut allergy (separate from tree nuts, because technically, it's not a nut). Since the tiniest trace of nut can cause such a severe reaction, it is important to not only avoid food with nuts, but also those labeled "produced in the same facility that uses tree nuts". Fortunately, food companies are required to label products and often the allergen information is in bold underneath the ingredients.

Unlike the egg and soy allergies, the reaction to a nut allergy is anaphylactic, which means the swelling in the mouth, tongue, etc. can ultimately block the ability to breathe. The doctor prescribed an Epi-Pen that is now with Jackson wherever he goes. For those of you who spend time with Jackson, I ask that you watch this quick video on how to administer the Epi-Pen in case of an emergency.

Along with the allergy diagnosis, Jackson was also diagnosed with asthma due to his past wheezing and also family history (not mine!). :) We were also given an "plan of attack" for the asthma and just the name of that alone, sent me into shock as I didn't even know we should be worried about asthma at all. We have an inhaler (with a contraption thingy) to use every day- two puffs. Then, when he has a little wheezing or coughing then we have another type of inhaler to use. And if that doesn't solve the issue, then we have liquid Prednisone.

Jackson's daily asthma medicine- Qvar

It has been a few weeks since our original appointment and all of this has had some time to sink in and doesn't feel so overwhelming. The doctor has hopes that Jackson will grow out of several of his allergies (eggs, soy, peanut butter) and it is possible to grow out of the tree nut allergy, but it isn't as likely. But we still have hopes. I am so glad that we were able to find out all of this information before we had a major crisis! Fortunately, Jackson's pediatrician recommended early on to avoid nuts, peanut butter, and egg until age 1 because they are the most common and I am so glad that we did!!