Funny Babies!!

My kids are hilarious and awesome and cute.  Right now they're both cracking me up with a couple choice Phrases:

Paul: Everytime I ask him a question about something he'd like instead of "yes" or "yes please" he responds with a very matter of fact, "Of course." 

Me: Paul- do you want some juice?

Paul: Of course.

Me: Paul- do you want to go to the playground today?

Paul: Of course.

It's adorable.

Olivia:  She's got her manners down with plenty of please and thank yous.  Sometimes we have to gently remind her that she has words she can use to ask for what she wants instead of screaming...  When she does get what she wants, the answer is always the same: "Thank you much." 

Also adorable.

Me: Olivia- here's your coat.

O: Thank you much.

Me: Olivia- Let's change your diaper.

O: Thank you much.



Tiny Little Taster

Lately I've been gotten back on the baking wagon after a few years off.  When we first found out about Paul's allergies (wheat, egg, milk, sesame) I made several mediocre attempts at baked goods thinking I could create some special, yummy, and more affordable treats.  After lots of wasted $$, time, and failures I kind of just gave up.  I would bake for birthdays and kept cupcakes on hand for Paul to take to birthday parties, but other than that I just found what we needed and paid the ridiculous prices for stuff that was pretty gross, but not as gross as mine.  

And then came this lady...

http://glutenfreeonashoestring.com/

I was searching gluten free Cake Pops after Paul and I went to a birthday party and they had Cake Pops and suddenly my Paul Safe cupcake I brought from home was just not good enough.  I stumbled upon this website and everything has changed.  This lady really knows her stuff.  She's all gluten free, but not egg free.  I've been able to modify her recipes and everything has turned out excellent, so much so that even Matt LIKES the things I'm baking.  

And she recommended this...

http://betterbatter.org/

This is easily the best gluten free flour I've tried.  I seriously can't tell the difference.  **Disclaimer: it's been a LONG time since I've baked with wheat flour, so my taste buds might be biased. 

Anyways, now I'm back to baking and loving it.  I'm making homemade bread - like the kind you let rise and then bake in the oven - cinnamon rolls, cookies, biscuits, even homemade graham crackers (which I highly recommend as they are super easy and ultra delicious).  I even made pie crust. Successfully.  I'm thrilled.

And my favorite part is my little helpers...

Note 1: Paul was away on a Home Depot trip with his Dad.  Lucky for Olivia, she didn't have to share this enormous beater. 

Note 2: This beater is not actually enormous, just looks that way next to my petite little girl.  This little girl really knows how to take advantage of the fact that while she's almost 2, she's the size of 1 and can get away with almost anything.  

The Amazing Grandpa Les!!

I must be the luckiest daughter-in-law in the whole world to inherit such a talented father-in-law.  Grandpa Les is incredibly talented at creating custom, wood-work pieces to perfectly fit into our lives.  It's fun discussing an item that we're dreaming about and then Les figures out how to create exactly what we're looking for.  This latest piece blows my mind.  It's so beautiful and exactly what we needed.  Thank you Grandpa Les for your time and efforts.  And thank you winter and rain for keeping Grandpa from the golf course and occassionally bored looking for new projects. :)

And big kuddos to Grandma Kathy for the artistic side of these designs.

This is our new backpack bench.  It will hide all the backpacks that clutter our entrance way and makes a perfect little place to put on shoes.  Oh yeah, and it's gorgeous.

 This is Paul's work bench.

 Custom boxes for our shelves.

 Grandma Kathy also does fantastic work.  She's the artist and drew this height measuring giraffe.

 We'll keep track of our babies as they grow.

 Grandma drew the monkey and elephant toy boxes too!

 Olivia's big girl bed for the big kid room.  Complete with removable bed rails.

This is my jewelry box. So beautiful.

WSU cribbage board.

Allergies. Boo.

So we had our first real actual scary allergy incident tonight.  But it wasn't from something we expected: egg, wheat, or peanut. 

Paul and I were sharing a tasty snack of hummus and tortilla chips.  About 10 minutes in he said he had a tummy ache.  The next hour was pretty scary, but in a slow-motion kind of way.  He had some hives but not many, his lip swelled up, but not too bad, and he was coughing just a little bit.  Then he threw up. 

We gave him benadryl and everything calmed down by the time we got through to the on-call allergy doctor so we didn't give him the Epipen. 

The next week I did a lot of learning and talking to different people about this and determined that the reaction was an anaphylaxis reaction.  This is the kind that can lead to anaphylactic shock, which is the really bad type of reaction that we never want to experience.  This scary episode was a big eye opener for us that these food allergies are serious and need to be taken that way.  We will never again be leaving the house without the Epipen and next time, I won't hesitate to use it. 

At the follow-up with allergist we learned that Paul is allergic to sesame as well.  He's had sesame before, but didn't react.  The hummus had tahini which is concentrated sesame paste and was enough to trigger a reaction.  We're thankful that the reaction wasn't any worse...

This little dude is a trooper and amazes me all the time.  He has a good understanding about Paul Safe foods and uses caution when we're out and about to stay safe.  At the doctor he doesn't cry or whine and when I tell him to look away for the blood draw, he tells me he wants to watch so he can see what they're doing (even when they miss the vein 3 times).  I am so impressed and feel so lucky to have such an amazing little boy who takes this serious condition in stride and doesn't let it get him down. 

Meet Baby Wesley Robert!

We were blessed with a New Year's surprise in the form of our new nephew/cousin:

Wesley Robert Wiser

His wonderwoman momma brought this little cutie into the world in 1.5 hours of labor at about 12:30 am on 1/1/2012!!  At HOME!!!!  I am trully amazed and impressed by her efforts, skills, and courageousness.

Matt, Paul, Olivia, and I travelled north to meet our newest family member, who was just 6 days old.  We got to snuggle him and took advantage of all the kids together for the first time for some wonderful photos. 

The big kids (now Paul, Henry, and Olivia) enjoyed playing together as usual and we had a great visit with Andy, Joanna, Grandpa Mark, and Grandma Dawn. 

Welcome Wes! We love you!!