Wednesday, February 03, 2010

Rascals

As always it's been pretty busy in our house. We have been concerned with Jase's communication skills and looking for resources and options. I have contacted the county school system and they will be testing him. We had his hearing and vision tested and he passed those both. We are on week 4 of getting Jase to be on a dairy/casein free diet. I have been reading about how our diet affects our behaviors and our development. Of course being totally organic, no processed foods, no food dyes, toxic free home is the ultimate goal but one step at a time. I found on a website www.generationrescue.com that removing diary from children's diets can help them with their behaviors and communication skills. You would have to read more about it since it's all new to me about the details. When I read what other parents were saying about their children and how they had improved, I thought "why not give it a shot?" He is now able to answer many questions when I ask him, whereas before he would just look at me and repeat the question. He is now starting to be able to answer "yes" or "no" to some questions. It's still a work in progress but he is improving. He is more calm and has less fits, which is huge because it was a daily occurrence for him before. I need to learn more about it and wish there was a course or something I could take because by the end of the day I just want to veg out in front of the TV. I will keep you posted on his progress.

Jase normally doesn't like to color or paint and almost always never participates at school art activities. So I thought I would give it a go and sure enough he painted a "rainbow" for me. I gave him the paint and he went at it. I asked him what he was painting, not expecting him to answer me, and he said rainbow. I almost cried.

Examining that paint before mixing them all together, which made a rainbow colored affect. Doubt he intentionally did that but it was neat.



Zach thinking he is so big eating his cereal with a spoon. It has been a week since I stopped nursing Zach and we both haven't even looked back! I was nursing him twice a day and it just seemed that I wasn't making much milk and he was getting really angry when the milk took to long to let down. So I pulled the plug and did us both a favor. Looks like my body may not produce milk past 16 months since this is when it stopped when I was nursing Jase but I thought it was because I was pregnant with Zach.

It is hard to get him to smile and look at the camera at the same time. Usually he closes his eyes because he thinks it's going to flash in his eyes.


I am not sure what went wrong with my Chocolate Mousse pie that I was making with dark chocolate tofu. Maybe I beat it too long and too high? Well this is what it looked like. Sunken in and quite awful looking. It went straight to the garbage.




Zach loves to feed himself and many times gets very angry and refuses to eat if you try to feed him. He is a stubborn little guy. See that bottle? Well, I nursed him exclusively and right before turning one I thought I would occasionally give him a bottle to just make sure he was getting enough fluids. I probably used up about two canisters of formula total. I stopped doing it for a couple of months and then one day he found a bottle in the pantry and pulled it out and was grunting and handing it to me. I filled it with warm milk and he drank the entire thing. So now when I get him up first thing in the morning and after his nap I bring him a bottle. This is the only thing that keeps him from crying and kicking when I lay him down to change his diaper. You would think that after 16 months he would realize that he has to have his diaper changed no matter what. Nope, I guess it's a habit to get angry and cry and kick when I change his diaper. What happened to my chill baby?


As you can kind of tell by this picture his front is turning grey. He was trying to play with his new big wheel and was rocking back and forth real fast and bumped his mouth on the handle part. It wasn't until about two weeks later we saw it getting grey. We took both Jase and Zach into Jason's office and had their front teeth x-rayed. We are almost certain that he will lose that tooth. Root canal on Jase?! I can't even imagine it. The x-rays were so cool though, you could see the permanent (adult) teeth sitting right behind the baby teeth waiting to come out. This may be something you know but for me I was shocked! I yelled out "it's like a shark!" Too cool.


Playing in the pine straw is tons of fun for them.



Jase loves playing with his "Christmas Thomas" in the dirt. He will do this for as long as you let him and boy does he get dirty.


I could keep this hat on him all the time. I wish I would have bought one in every size when I originally bought it for Jase. Zach is still not talking and I am only giving him his pacifier at bedtimes. He babbles but he has a lot of catching up to do. He does sign though and actually uses them to get what he wants. It is so cool when he is grunting and wanting to tell me something then sticks up his hand and does the milk sign. He shakes his head no when he doesn't want to eat something, which cracks me up because I don't remember Jase doing that at all.


Look at those sweet BIG little hands.


Jase is so much gentler with Zach since removing dairy from his diet. He actually offers him toys and food, where before he really had no interest in him except for pushing him or knocking him over.
Jase has been sick with diarrhea and some throwing up the last several days. This photo was taken yesterday afternoon. We went to the doctor and they checked for Strep but it came back negative. They then wanted me to get stool samples to be tested for parasites, E Coli, Salmonella and some other things to rule out if it wasn't a virus. When I went to get him out of his room yesterday there was throw-up all over his bedroom floor and he was covered in poo. Poor guy didn't even cry for us and I found him all curled in a ball on the floor in his Thomas tent. I have no idea how long he had been up but he was so pitiful with sunken eyes and pale skin. He still has bad rings under his eyes but seems to be feeling a little better and ate breakfast and some lunch. Hopefully his body can get rid of this and he can gain some weight back. He has lost 4 pounds.

Zach fell at school and chipped his front tooth. They called to tell me that he had fallen and weren't sure if it had chipped. Well, let's put it this way, 1/4 of his tooth is gone....uh YES he chipped his tooth!!! So now both boys have chipped front teeth.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Nice update. Hope the next set of teeth don't suffer as much as the first set. dad

Anonymous said...

Wow, what a busy time for y'all. I hope things prove to be positive with regard to the testing from the county school system for Jase...

Amy

Betsy said...

good thing daddy is able to fix teeth the way these boys are going!

momtomichaelandjosue said...

There is a saying, "There is a special place in heaven for mothers of boys" You are definitely getting there. It has just begun. I remember when Michael had tutor come to the house when he was 4. She was send by the county.

Anonymous said...

chipped teeth, diarrhea and vomit -----they look mighty sweet to their Grammy!!! The new diet sounds worth while trying and encouraging. Hope all are well SOON! Love and miss you all. No school today--6-8in new snow.Expecting 1-2 FEET Fri PM thru Sat Wish the sweet boys were here to enjoy it 'cause I'm getting sick of it, Love Grammy

Andrea said...

Oh my goodness Carmen!! You have been busy. Both boys are still absolutely adorable even with chipped teeth!

Congrats to you on nursing for so long with both boys. I made it until August and I was really hoping to nurse Madeline until she was one - maybe with the next baby I can nurse for an entire year or longer.

I love your updates and all of the pictures are great!

orange and black stipes said...

Whatever you do, Jase, don't let go of that train!!! It's in every photo, even while he paints...too cute.

Meaghan said...

Well that was a heck of an update! You are like freaking super mom! I'm totally not kidding! I didn't realize you were still nursing Zach- that's awesome!

I'm sorry to hear that Jase isn't feeling well...I can't imagine how I'd feel walking into a room with throw up and poo everywhere and my baby just balled up in a tent... :( I'll be thinking of y'all.

Keep us posted on the new diet and Jase's progress. I hope it works for him- I know it must be stressful not knowing exactly what's going on.

I totally love Jase and his Thomas train- so freakin' cute that he loves that thing so much. :) You should get a few more incase that one becomes MIA. ;)

Can't believe both boys have chipped teeth! Couldn't be cuter, though! I'm just waiting for the day when Ava hits hers....she's constantly falling!!

Glad to see an update. I've been a HUGE slacker with my updates...I'm gonna try to do one soon...

Love to those boys...