thanksful that's over!

we spent this morning at children's visiting with an allergy doctor for tman. when we finally figured out he was actually allergic to peanuts our pediatrician suggested we get him tested since peanut allergies can be severe for some kiddos.

to tell you the truth, i've been dreading this morning ever since i set the appointment up. lance had told me how awful he remembers his allergy testing and i most definitely wasn't looking forward to subjecting tman to that torture. but i was also looking forward to getting some definite answers. we've been completely avoiding all nuts since we figured out peanuts were off limits and i was hopeful to get a definite yes/no on those. and to see if there was anything we hadn't thought of to try for his horrible seasonal allergies/drainage/throwing up.

lance took the morning off to go with me (no way i would have wanted to have done it alone!). they did two environmental tests and then tested for 11 food. and yes, it was pure torture for both of us. lance held his arms and i held his hips down, sang 'jesus loves me' trying to calm him down at least a little and tried not to cry. he screamed and cried. as soon as it was over i picked him up and he puked all over me and him from being so upset (i had planned on this possibly happening so thankfully we all had a change of clothes in the car).

 snuggled up with mommy waiting for daddy to get our clean clothes from the car.  

he perked up a little bit when he realized he could wash his hands (and of course this mommy would let him do whatever he wanted since we just finished a torture session).

top left was the outdoor stuff...clearly allergic to a lot-bermuda grass and marshhelder and elm were the top 3. gotta love that bermuda grass is everywhere...not much we can do at this point but keep the allergy meds going. bottom left weren't too bad-the dog and cat test were in that batch and thankfully those were negative. 

the numbers down the side were foods. shellfish came back negative. peanuts were a definite allergy. almond hazelnut, pistachio and walnut all had some reaction.

the almond and hazelnut were small and the doctor thought we might be able to try those (he suggested trying them in their office first just to be safe), but definitely no peanuts. 

we're going to learn to be a label-reading family!!! 

the doctor did say there's lots of trials going on helping kids become desensitized to peanut and he said he was certain that tman wouldn't go to college still allergic to peanuts-they are going to figure this out! after this, we had to get lab work. torture session #2. clearly not fun having to hold your child down while he cries, but thankfully the nurse got it on the first try.

being near the train track, we had heard several choo choos go by while we were at the hospital and tman kept asking to see them. so after enduring two torture sessions we figured he deserved a fun trip to the main hospital to see the awesome trains!

while this morning was tough and exhausting (i was sweating before we were even finished with his vital signs-he doesn't like those either!), i was thankful that we were only there for some allergy testing. thankful that while his boo boos from this morning weren't fun, having a band aid boo boo from a blood draw is nothing compared to the boo boos that some of the kids have to face. i am beyond thankful for my healthy little guy who hasn't needed to visit the hospital for anything worse than allergies and can walk and run and play and talk...definitely things i usually take for granted. a children's hospital will put things into perspective for ya real quick!

catch up

ugh-it's been over a month. so this is going to be brain-dump/blog catch up and hopefully i won't fall so far behind again. although some of it is for a good reason...after we got moved back in from the skunk, lance had a 8mm kidney stone and was home for almost 2 weeks before getting it blasted. so things were a little hectic around here! we did a LOT of this:

we visited a fun place called the gentle zoo with kristin, anna, audrey and ellery over spring break. it was tons of fun-tanner's favorite part was the big sand box. he liked feeding the animals too-followed his big cousins lead and wasn't scared at all.

we've had a couple of fun baby showers for taylor. tanner even got to attend the one at her school and "help" her open all the gifts. he kept saying "tanner's" after each one...he hasn't quite figured it out that it's not all for him! pic on the right he was cheering "YAY!" about burp clothes (aka tanner's binkys)

we got to go to dinner with rachel and chad while they were here house hunting and checking out rockwall...yes, they're MOVING HERE! so exciting!

i made borscht with my new neighbor, anastasia. she's russian (lived here until her mid-20's) so it was totally authentic! lance was a great sport and tried it for dinner!

we went to the zoo for the first time with taylor. tanner loved the lions (HUGE he said) and watching me feed the giraffes. he wasn't quite brave enough to feed them himself.

 he LOVES driving!

 watching the lions on tay tay's shoulders

and probably one of the highlights...watching a digger over the bridge. true boys!

we had a fun playdate with our new Rockwall mops friends at the arboretum...my allergies were going nuts, but still a fun time. of course i decided this one time not to take my camera. several of the other moms were taking pictures and apparently tanner felt left out because he looked at me and asked me to take his picture...normally when i pull out my camera he waves me away saying NO! go figure! but i did get a fun iphone pic of the 2 of us...one of my new favs (minus my crazy red, itch, watering eyes). we've loved meeting some new friends as we jumped in mid-semester in rockwall mops!

funny story-as i was changing tman's diaper, i realized i had started to put it on him backwards. i said something like, "oops, mommy was trying to put your diaper on backwards." with no prompting he looked at me and called me a "do do." it was hilarious! he loves the big bird movie and the do do family in the movie...so now anything silly is a do do-including ME!

we had a fun afternoon of painting. he would paint, decide he was dirty, and then forget about it and keep painting...over and over. he painted LOTS of paper and then decided to paint his knees, arms, tummy and even ears!

tomorrow we are headed to the allergist for tanner. i'm dreading it...skin tests or blood draws-neither sound fun, but i'm guessing it'll probably be more traumatic for me than for tanner.

things to remember (besides crazy skunk stories)...

a few fun/hilarious/cute/crazy things the boy has done lately...

-he's quite the prayer. he insists at dinner that we pray...clasps his hands together and sometimes even closes his eyes SO tight and then opens them right back up. the other morning we had 2 neighbors over for coffee and he came running downstairs, up to the table and insisted we PRAY! he also loves his bedtime prayers. and i love it-he usually wraps his arms around me and lance while the 3 of us pray...one big family bear hug! oh how i hope his love for prayer sticks with him forever!

-we had been telling him we love him to the moon and back. he got a kick out of that and will now sometimes just skip the "love you" part and just tell us "moon back!" but of course he always tells us it at just the right time!

-he loves to tickle people. he wiggles his fingers and runs up to you and starts laughing!

-he is such a sponge and will repeat anything we say. the other day playing "birds" (angry birds" with lance, he started saying something. it sounds like d*#% it but me and lance haven't said that in front of him. but i can't figure out for the life of me what he's saying...maybe dang it?!?! he's said it several times sense and in the right situations...working on telling him we don't say that and getting to the bottom of what the heck he is actually saying!

-ever since sesame street live, he is SO into dancing. he dances to cartoons, dances to my phone, dances with the ipad. and insists on dancing naked every night after bath all over his room. he apparently thinks he has quite the moves!

-he is all boy and wants to be naked all.the.time! getting clothes on every morning is a battle. and of course stripping down at bath time is a highlight in his day! one morning last week, i was downstairs finishing my breakfast and tman was playing (or so i thought) upstairs. he runs to the top of the stairs and yells NAKED! and indeed he was completely naked...no diaper (he was already without clothes because he he gagged on breakfast and proceeded to puke on his pjs). i went up and asked him if he had gone poopy. he said "no, trash." yup, he had pulled the changing pad out into the tv room, apparently laid down (it was covered in poop), taken his diaper off and put it in the trash can. we ended up in the bath tub before 9 am-he had poop all over his legs down to his feet! oh good times!

my life is definitely not boring! :-)

what a nightmare!

last night we were having a nice, relaxing sunday evening. ate breakfast for dinner (YUM!), watched a little tv and were just enjoying the end to a good weekend. i headed to wash my face while lance took the dogs out one last time. over the running water in the bathroom i hear lance yelling my name (well, in a whisper-don't-want-to-wake-the-kiddo-but-really-need-you-ASAP kind of yell).

as i walk into the living room i see him holding dakota by the backdoor...dakota is foaming at the mouth and gagging and his chest is covered in something yellow. all i hear is lance say skunk! at this point we don't even know if gizmo is sprayed or not since he's acting normal. i start googling what to do for dogs sprayed by a skunk. we take them to the laundry room and then decide they just need to be in their kennels until we figure out a plan. at this point we realize gizmo is covered in skunk stink too...ugh! thank goodness lance actually went out with them-we often just open the back door, let them do their business and then let them in a little later...so it could have been much worse!

after a quick call to the emergency vet to figure out if they would be ok besides the stink and some more googling to figure out how to bathe them, we started the baths in the driveway at 11 pm. i'm sure we were a sight to be seen. with a little bit of dawn and 2 containers of baking soda, we scrubbed them down. of course we were just using what we had at 10 pm at night...we were out of hydrogen peroxide (of course that was one of the ingredients people suggested) and the other suggestion was tomato juice, but of course all i had in the pantry was 2 cans of tomato (with garlic and onions...so of course that was out).

so we bathed both dogs, one by one and then took their kennels apart and washed those too. then we had to scrub down the garage floor. we finally came in to start cleaning inside...mopped the floors and then realized gizmo had gotten skunk smell all over the living room rug. so pulled that up and hauled it out the front door at midnight. figured out their dog beds were "contaminated" so those went to the trash.

after de-skunking ourselves and throwing away all towels and clothes that had been used, i finally fell into bed about 1:15 am. and poor lance ended up sleeping in the garage. there was NO way we were letting the dogs back in the house and gizmo decided to start crying/barking in his kennel-he was quite upset about sleeping in the garage and we had no idea how to keep him quiet and not wake tman up so lance was super hubby and bunked in the garage last night.

of course we both still smelt skunk every time we took a breath...not sure if that was in my head/nose or if everything still just stunk. everytime i rolled over in bed, i smelled skunk.

we kicked off this morning with some more mopping and spraying anything and everything that might help with the smell. dogs went off to the groomer for a bath/deskunking shampoo, lance took the rug to a dumpster, we scheduled an electrician to come put up a light in the backyard, and met with 2 cleaning (although it's way more than just cleaning) companies for quotes.

the smell has definitely gotten less as the day has gone on...we've left all the windows open today and had candles burning all day. and you become numb to it. i really thought it was almost totally gone. but we left and ran to walmart for a few things we needed after last night's fiasco, and i nearly fell over when i walked back in the house. the smell is MOST DEFINITELY still here!

so they are coming tomorrow to do a massive clean downstairs with all kinds of special stuff. cleaning floors, carpet in our bedroom and fogging the entire downstairs. the dogs are being boarded until this is all resolved, and i am praying it works because i am tired of smelling skunk and feeling like i'm dirty and stink. the electrician comes thursday to put up a light in the backyard and most importantly, lance is getting his pellet gun back.

next time, skunk, you are going to DIE!

bigbirdelmo

last week tanner and i headed to temple in the middle of the week to go see sesame street live with grammy and ipop. yes, big bird and elmo were coming to temple! we told tanner we were going to see sesame street and the entire week before he talked about bigbirdelmo...just one word to him...he always referred to both of them together! he was so excited. he insisted for several nights that he must wear his elmo pjs and then on monday before we went, he refused to take his elmo pj shirt off so we wore it all day long!

we got there a little too early (i maybe misread it so we had about 15 minutes to kill before they opened the doors). once we went in, they had a whole area set up for pictures and the sesame street set to play on. tanner was quite the piano performer (as he looked around taking everything in!).

trying to get a picture with elmo, but he was too distracted by everything...and then he decided to take off running for another fun character.

 the kiddo does LOVE the trash...throwing things in the trash and the trash truck.

 

characters would come out and sing with the kids. tanner was amazed...

 

and had so much fun singing and dancing with grammy.

 

 after we saw all of the characters' homes on sesame street, it was time for a souvenir (or 2 or 3 or 10). he always likes to pay!

 he picked out a big bird and he LOVES him! since we've been home, big bird comes downstairs every morning, is often included in car rides and is a MUST in the crib for naps and bed.

 headed to find his seat with ipop and then waiving his pennant waiting for the show to start. we were talking about how big bird was going to come out soon, and he sat down and started screaming as loud as he could "BIG BIRD!!!" hilarious!

 the show finally started and he sat wide-eyed watching and waving at all the characters

 

we made it through the whole show with a little help from a package of m&ms and a container of goldfish

 with lots of smiles and laughing and clapping and watching with amazement.

mr noodle and elmo had him cracking up laughing!

 and he must have liked the count because "8" was the number of the day and he actually remembered it. and now any time we talk numbers it's always "8." it's 8 o'clock all day long in our house! :-)

we had such a fun time and it was so fun watching him. he loved seeing them dance and tells me all the time that big bird is tall! we've been dancing every day since the show-apparently it inspired his love for dancing! such fun memories!