1 Day Down

Yesterday I started it, the stupid hive diet thing again.  I haven't done this in years but I'm desperate.  Years ago one of the doctors I went to had me do this and it worked for awhile.  My hives left but then after I had been doing it for awhile I added foods back to fast, they were back and I was left still not knowing anything more than when I started.  Well I have thought about going to the doctor again since they have been gradually getting worse since March. 

For those of you who don't know I had chronic hives for 6 1/2 years.  No doctor could figure out what was causing them (after Xray's, and all the allergy tests they could think of) and I went through all sorts of different medicines and basically lived off Benadryl for years.  They had told me this is chronic uticaria and it should go away anywhere from now to 7 years from now.  Well I was one of the lucky ones, 6.5 years (1/2 shorter than the max, ugh!) and they left.  Then shortly after  I got pregnant.  Now many people say well maybe it's the hormones that kept them away while you were pregnant but they were gone before I even got pregnant.  Then in March after I had Noah they  have gradually started coming back. 

Well now I'm up to 3 Benadryl every time I take it, have them on a daily basis and last week almost every day dealt with some sort of facial swelling (which I don't handle very well).  So needless to say I'm frustrated, very frustrated!!  If I go back to the doctor I don't even know where to start.  Last time I went to the dermatologist in town, who sent me to a specialist in Charleston, who sent me to an allergist in Champaign, who I then gave up on and went to another one in Decatur.  And after over a year of doctor visits and testing, still nothing.  The doctor in Decatur was the one who had me do this diet and keep track of everything I ate.  To sum it up you don't eat for 3 days, then each day you add a food.  When you add foods it has to be something that is just that food.  Like a banana, apple, or carrots something that has nothing else in it and not processed.  We pretty much know it's not something obvious it has to be something little that is in a ton of things.  So yesterday I started, I kind of cheated though I did eat a banana.  My thinking was I know it's not something that obvious so I will start with that.  So for the next 2 days I'm eating bananas.  Fun Fun!  And the whole process is hard anyway because things can stay in your system for days.  So imagine my frustration when I woke up this morning to hives.  Lots of hives on my ankles, as a matter of fact it hurts to walk because my ankle has swelled so much.  So I didn't eat anything but a banana yesterday and I still have the stupid things.  However, I'm going to try my hardest with this, this time and hopefully can maybe figure something out.   Even though it could take quite a long time.  So just wanted a warning to be out there.  I will most likely be very tired and grumpy this week!  And keep me in prayers, I need to try and keep a good attitude and the strength and will to be able to do this! 

I can do all things in Christ who strengthens me!

So Handsome!

Yesterday Matthew wanted me to spike the front of Noah's hair up.  I told him I wasn't good at it and didn't have time to mess with it ( I was having problems finding something to wear, I absolutely hate getting dressed these days, I just can't find anything I like in my closet or in stores). So dad did his hair and was quite proud.  We went to church and he got all sorts of comments on his hair-do.  I should have taken pictures before we left but didn't think about it so  I got some when we got home after it had mostly fallen down.  But anyways these days he just looks so much like a little boy and not a baby, I just can't handle how cute he is sometimes! Noah gets tons of kisses and squeezes each day, way more  than he would like.

My little cheeseball

Showing off his tooth, you can barely see the 2nd one in this picture.  If I would have  taken it today, you would really be able to see it.  Poor guy, that thing really came up more last night.

Oh, how  I love him so much, how could you not love this face

Playing and Trip to the Park again

On Wednesday Matthew and I were both off.  Matthew was doing work on the windows most of the afternoon but he took a break and went to the park with us.  I wanted him to see Noah swing because he loves it so much.  I couldn't get any good pictures that day for some reason of him swinging but I got a few others.  We also rode the bouncy horses that were there.  Noah prefers swinging a lot more but still seemed to enjoy them. 

He was telling us stories while swinging

Okay so I posted earlier about getting Noah some balls, well the problem with them is, is that in no time they are all out of his reach.  He can get them all moved rather quickly so  I was thinking I needed a way to baracade them in so that they would stay around him longer. I kept trying to use toys but that doesn't work because he picks them up too.  Then I came up with the idea to use the boppy.  I put a bunch of balls in the middle.  I thought I had came up with  great idea, but as you can see that didn't last long either.

They all just rolled right on out once he started picking up a few. 

His favorite thing to do with them, hit them together!  So neat to see him using his hands to work together now!

8 Months

Today my little man is 8 months old already.  We don't go back to the doctor still until 9 months so we did our own weight check this morning.  And our chubby little boy is up to.......

Last month he was 21.2 so he gained a little over a pound.  He is definetly slowing down in the weight gaining department  but I know it's normal to slow down a lot after their first 6 months.  Since we didn't have a doctor visit I thought  I would look online for a percentile calculator just to see where he is there and I got anywhere from 75-90 percentile.  So even though he has slowed down a lot he is still up there.  He still just keeps getting happier and happier each month and more and more fun to play with minus last night (he was up from 3-6 am, just for the record his ma-ma and da-das aren't as cute at that hour)  I think his teeth were just bothering him.  His 2nd one that he has coming in looked like it was a little farther up so hopefully that's it and we aren't going to go back to that pattern again at night.  We just love him so much regardless of what he does.  It's amazing at how frustrating it is not sleeping sometimes but when he woke up this morning I couldn't wait to go pick him up and give him a big hug and kiss. 

Another Tooth

Noah has another new tooth coming in this week.  The one that has been right there for so long, has pretty much broken through and is creeping up each day!  He is going to look so different with 2 little teeth down there.  He already looks so much different with the one.  He has been doing pretty good considering he is "teething".  I haven't noticed really anything too different.  A little more whiny at times, but he has always been a pretty high maintenance baby so we can handle this easily!  I have been trying to get pictures but the teeth are so tiny and he won't let anything get to them hardly.  I will keep trying and if I get one I will get it on here, so so cute!

Ma-Ma

So tonight we got an official ma-ma. Last Friday, I thought I heard Noah say it and  then I looked at Matthew and he said he heard it too.  Well I still wasn't quite sure it was what he said so I was waiting to here it again.  Today at Nana Jill's she said he was saying it a lot.  I told her I had thought I heard nana alot but not a sure ma-ma and she said she heard both. The two are really close, not like da-da which is a stronger sound.   Well tonight we had friends over for dinner and Noah starting blabbering and we all heard it.  So officially he now says, da-da, ma-ma, and na-na.  It's funny though because now tonight I never heard him say da-da. I hope he doesn't quit that because I think da-da- is so cute when he says it.  The last few days he has also picked up a new mouth movement it's very odd, it's like he's trying to say something but there isn't anything coming out.  The first of many new words!  Excting!

Labor Day

Today for Labor Day we didn't do anything too exciting. Noah and I went and got groceries like we do every Monday. Today while we were at Walmart I was on a mission to find some balls. Noah has really starting to like them when he has been around one. We have these stackable cups but when you put 2 of them together you can make a ball. We have been playing with them lately and rolling them back and forth. I guess it's more me rolling and Noah just trying to get rid of it and he gets so excited once he does. It's been super cute! Anyways since he enjoyed those I thought we needed some real balls for him. They didn't have what I thought I was looking for but they had a bag of 100 balls (like the ball pit ones without the pit) and I thought they were probably a little too old for him but would still be fun. Once I got home I was quite excited for him to be able to play with them so as soon as I got groceries in I opened them up and put some on the ground for him to play with. Now there are 100 but I don't think anytime soon will we be using all of them. They make quite a mess in my living room and as a neat freak I'm not sure why I thought these would be a good idea, but now I put Noah above my need for neatness and if he enjoys them I will just deal with them all over.

I kept trying to get him to look at me and it took me forever because he was so interested in all the balls. I tried every animal noise I could and finally got a smile!

Since it was nice out again today after Noah woke up from his nap we went out to hang out in the backyard playing with toys and looking at trees. A lot of times inside when Noah has a view of the windows he catches the trees moving outside and goes into a trance staring at them. It's quite humorous, well he was playing today and got into one outside. I captured his famous stare and of course his mouth is wide open. I also just love the blue eyes here!

Cheesy smile here but you can see his tooth on the left side, and today we noticed he has another that I think just barely broke through this morning. If it's anything like the last one it will probably take awhile to get where his other is now because it came up soooo slow. Poor guy!

He was fascinated with the grass but everytime he touched it he wasn't a fan and would sit right back up and just look at it.

What a great day, we even got dad to stop working for a little bit to hang out with us outside. Noah loves hanging out with his daddy. Now we both have to go back to work tomorrow, boo! But then Wednesday we are all off again so not bad at all!