among other things...

so here is a shot of sick amelia. she has her first post-ear tubes ear infection last week & into the weekend. she's doing much better now but still battling a very intense cold--you know, heavy green snot. so gross. so this is the new toddler carrier we bought a few weeks ago. & amelia is not so into it but adeline loves it (yes, it can carry adeline!) but now amelia has warmed up to it.

& i noticed how nicely matched i am with the carrier & also the wall. it was all planned, you know. important things.

***
this past weekend we had grandparent visitors! wes' parents stayed almost a day with us & overnight. adeline talked about it all week, so excited. here is a picture of the girls before we all (stupidly) went out to eat. (why stupidly? well, we went to carraba's b/c of their gluten free menu. we called ahead to get reservations at a certain time. we arrived on time. they told us we still had a 25-45 minute wait. what? better: whisky-tango-foxtrot! {thanks, scotty}. ugh, both girls were starting to lose it by the time our food arrived & adeline wanted to lay on my lap instead of eat, amelia was tossing ice cubes around. good times!)

so, yes, a picture of the girls pre-eating-disaster

adeline showing off her boots

***

ah, gluten free. how is that going? well, this week we've eaten pretty good after my lunch of carrots, celery, & an over-easy egg. i've had some painful stomach cramps & aches but i guess it's all part of my stomach getting used to the new gluten-free food. we're learning; i've finally shopped at whole foods which i've mostly avoided b/c i think it's a bit over-priced & well, just not necessary for us to drive 25 minutes to do grocery shopping. thankfully it seems the cheapest option is just a mile down the road at the raisin rack, a local health food store. same options, just about a dollar cheaper. anyway, they also have frozen gluten free doughnuts! & highlander grogg coffee! glory be.

we have cast out food worth hundreds of dollars, then spent another few hundred dollars on new food. did you know most soy sauces have gluten in them?! really. & chili beans. & some ice creams. so much stuff to part with. & some things we've spent a hefty chunk of change on turn out to be *nasty* like some pre-mix pizza crust. amelia even tossed it aside...yea, that disgusting that our garbage disposal wouldn't eat it. (for example: amelia ate cold refried beans out of a can today when we were preparing dinner. she will eat nearly anything, so you know this pizza crust was so terribly vomit-inducing).

i have more to say about it all but i'm tired & maybe just not ready to talk about it all quite yet. i think it's all so emotional for me not just b/c i'm giving up my favorite food choices...somehow i have to feel worse before i can feel better again. will it work? i just don't know the answers. i'm just tired of the trend of new diagnosis, ya know? (i'm praying this is the last for a good 30 years.) i have a lot to learn about when it comes to this celiac stuff.

***

welcome, natalie johanna parsons to this world! what a cutie.

a few more fav things

life isn't just about the food we eat, so i am re-focusing my blogging mind on other things that i love, my girls.

amelia is here wearing some shorts that are in the dress-up bin. i think she looks pretty darn spiffy. she gets her fashion sense from me, of course. shiny & layered are in, right?

adeline running in the snow. she wasn't running b/c it's the fun thing to do in the snow but b/c she didn't want her picture taken (which is totally the norm for her right now. i think it's b/c i took thousands of pics of her when she was 9 months & younger.)

adeline wearing a drum major outfit (also from the dress-up bin, a fav play time of the girls recently). this is also wes' drum major outfit that his mom made for him (halloween, i believe) when he was a kid. B/C wes wanted to be a drum major when he grew up...for a very long time apparently. maybe even as a middle schooler.

& here is adeline being a little kid.

you know, let's take this doll-moses basket my gram-mum made for my doll & use it to instead go really fast down the slide! (it does look fun, eh?) i think the next phase will be the steps & this moses basket...

amelia doing her version of 'hard-core-slide-kid'.

the pathetic tiny snowman adeline & i made yesterday. i blame it on the weather (the snow wasn't packing snow & we hardly had any to work with, so this is what you get. plus amelia was inside crying instead of napping, so we had a short time frame. all good excuses for pathetic snowman.)

there *are* good things in life aside from food.

***

so i called my dr's office & left a slightly perturbed message asking for more info about the blood results & gluten-free stuff & what he really means about 'highly reactive to gluten'. & to ask him to call in all the scripts i have lost along with my notebook that contains my life. surprisingly, dr im (not his nurse) called me back within 90 minutes. the result? scripts are called in, i indeed have celiac's disease (it's 'mild' right now, changing my diet now will save me years of pain & such). he kept saying 'you are highly intolerant of gluten' etc. then he said that my girls would also benefit from going gluten-free mostly (b/c gluten sensitivity is genetic). he also said he feels strongly that this will over time take care of many of the pains & problems. combine this gluten-free diet healing with hopeful healing from adrenal fatigue via the meds i'm on & then overall healing from my surgery (ie, numbness, balance, etc) i could feel much better over the next year. he mentioned that i could start to feel better in a matter of weeks, as far as stomach pain & muscle/joint pain go, but real healing will take much longer. i'm glad he called. he did agree that giving up pizza & baked goods with wheat flour will be difficult...then he said 'we all would benefit from eating mostly gluten-free...but you need a totally gluten free diet right now'. i know, i know. i think i'm getting there.

ah, amelia is awake & refreshed from her nap. must get the millie-monster out of the crib before she collapses it with her incessant shaking of the rails.