Friends

This is Regan, she gets dropped off about the same time as Kail does every morning and is only about one week older then him.  She is amazingly close to his size (only 3 lbs less then him) which is a big deal considering how big he is (yes he is growing out of his 12 month pjs).  I've been told they are BFFs and will play in any area happily much longer if they are kept together.  They get hungry at the same time, and sleepy at the same time.  Kail really likes Regans hair (and will often grab for it).  Reagan likes his helmet (and will often grab for it).  

Obviously they do side by side play still, but I actually watched Kail hand her a toy yesterday, he just held it out to her until she took it.  I think he is learning this from his older friend Charlie who brings him toys constantly when she is in his room in the morning.  (Charlie has actually graduated to the toddler room but gets to hang out until her teacher shows up).  Of course he took the toy back a few minutes later but it was still funny to watch.

Helmet Update

We have now been in the helmet for 5 weeks.  And out of those 5 weeks we have needed to take him in to get it checked 4 times.  the thing just never seems to fit right.  Its been a "fun" adventure but we are happy to say it seems to be working.  When we get told he can stop wearing it I'll have full before and after shots but for now this should give you an idea of how we are doing. Obviously from the ear placement you can tell my picture angle is off but I still think it demonstrates the point.

We also got an actual measuring scan again yesterday and the tech confirmed its moving in the right direction.  We are still hoping we will only have to have him wear it for the next 8 weeks, so sometime around July 25th.

Day Care Pictures

As I've said in previous posts, Day Care is not something Jordan and I love, but we are grateful for the Day Care we do have.  Not only is it super convenient for both of us to pick up and drop off.  But I really like the people that work there.  A few weeks ago I left a note in his room with my cell number so that the women who takes care of him most of the time would have it handy if she needed me.  He had had a very ruff night.  the next day i started getting almost daily texts and pictures from her.  I LOVE this.  It makes my day to get random happy faces from him, and know that he is doing ok and is happy while he is there.  So here you go, Day Care Photo dump:

I blew out my diaper . . . AGAIN

 I never realized until this post how often I put him in this green elephant outfit.

Thank you Grandma Pace for my blanket!

There goes my diaper again.

And we are back in our spare clothes .. .  AGAIN!  We do this a lot.

Mothers Day

Mothers day this year was great.  Max sent me some beautiful flowers, and  Jordan gave me a really nice new charm for my charm bracelet and with the help of his care givers at daycare Kail made me these great gifts.  I love all the art work we get from daycare, its fun watching his feet grow,and according to daycare Kail giggles when they paint his feet.

6 months old

Kail turned 6 months old on May 6th. 
We can't believe how big he is getting and I'm not talking about his size for once.  He is acting more and more like a little boy then a baby every day.  Even over the last week he as become a lot more aware of his surroundings.  He has discovered how to pull toys from his toy bin, and is getting really good at grabbing his toys in the tub.  Last week he tried to put his binky in his toys mouth with the most serious facial expression I've ever seen.

 He tries to pick up everything on his changing table and knock it to the ground and when you pick him up from the changing table you better make sure he hasn't brought the wipes, booger sucker, extra diapers or burp rag with him.  He absolutely loves R2D2 and C-3PO on daddies video game (yes he is his daddies clone).  He got his two middle bottom teeth on April 23rd (still cant get a picture).  He is starting to really cuddle.  He would cuddle before but only when he was sleeping.  He has started to try and drink his bath water, and his favorite bath toy of course is R2D2 (thank you Grandma Max!)   He is getting 90% of his food in his mouth instead of on his bib.  He reaches for you when he wants you to pick him up.  He thinks he is funny in the mirror.  He can pick up his own bottle and put it in his mouth, something Jordan has been working with him on. He loves to watch the cats and tries to pet them/grab their tails (they are not so sure about this).

 Not that you can tell with the helmet most of the time but his hair is getting long, in sunlight its really red but mostly it looks very blond.  His eyes are still light blue, although Jordan says he is going to end up with my eyes, Yea! maybe he got some of my gens.

He does really well on bike rides and walks.  He sits in his stroller without his car seat and gives us big grins whenever we kneel down to check on him.  We decided longer bike rides will have to wait as he falls asleep and we worry about his head bobbling around too much, and with the helmet we worry about him getting too hot but he really seems to like the ride.  He likes going outside and feeling the bushes, trees and flowers.

For some reason when I look at this picture I imagine him saying "its a box" and "I blew out all my pretty candles" 

Only my side of the family is going to get that, so lets just say he looks like I did when I was 2 here.

He LOVES music and if you want him to smile just start dancing with him.  He gives big grins when we come home or pick him up from Day Care, unless mom just cut her hair off and he doesn't recognize her, then he gives these sideways half smiles clearing stating "you sound like mom, but you look funny, and I'm not really sure where you are taking me".

He is a happy little boy and we are so very lucky to have him.

Teeth

Kail got his first bottom teeth to break through on April 23rd (sorry this post is so late, life got crazy).  I have been trying to take a picture of these teeth ever sense.  Jordan keeps telling me its never going to work.  The other day i actually went so far as to just ask Kail to show me his teeth.  This was followed by a huge grin that actually showed his teeth!  I should have known he was teasing me, he is his fathers son after all. The second I took the picture he stuck his tong out and this is what I got, as my mother would say, "Little Stinker!".  He continues to refuse to smile without his tough sticking out to cover his teeth so you are just going to have to trust me when I say they are there.

Art Project

We had plans to get Kail's helmet wrapped, but when Jordan called the car wrap company that said they would do it, to find out why we had not heard from them, it became clear that "I don't know when I'll get to that"  just meant they should have said no at the beginning.  So we decided to paint it.  Thus began the nightmare art project. 

A couple years ago Jordan figured out a way of painting our nursery wall.  We painted the wall, then put a decal down, then painted over the decal and then pulled the decal off.  This makes the first color we painted show through where the decal was so that now said decal is in paint instead of vinyl.  It worked out awesome on our wall so we decided to try the same thing on Kails helmet.  That being said good luck finding a place local to buy small custom decals.  We ended up at 102000 south at the only place we could find that would do it.  Then we bought the paint.  We decided on spray paint as we thought this would dry quickly and go on easily.  So here is what actually happened.

1. Turns out spray paint doesn't dry quickly AT ALL and what we thought would be 2-3 hrs turned into 24. 
2. Turns out spray paint tends to bubble up if you spray it over other spray paint, so no it doesn't go on easily.
3. Turns out spray paint douse not like to stick to plastic and can melt it . . . and that's what his helmet is made out of.

I had plans to take pictures of each step of the process but as each step was quickly followed by an utter panic moment (or hour) that just didn't happen.  My favorite panic moment was when we were almost done (ie hours and hours into the project) but it needed a little paint brush touch up.  So I took the spray paint and sprayed into some plastic cups which then melted in my kitchen sink not only painting the kitchen sink but making us realize that we may have just melted this very expensive little helmet.  The helmet has not turned into a puddle of plastic goo on this head so I think we are OK, though we still worry that it doesn't fit exactly the way it used to.  Not sure if it really changed or if we are just being paranoid. 

So now for some pictures.  Before the art project (and before the teck cut the helmet just a little so the eye line let him see better):

At the end of the first day we got it back on him so he could sleep in it but we were not able to seal it yet and it was still shinny.

And so of course during the night Kail decided to use his nails and scratch up the only part of the paint job that was perfect but oh well, it now has some texture on the side.  and Now that its all sealed I think it turned out pretty good for all of our panic.  And Yes Kail seems happy in it.

Helmet Baby

We have a helmet baby!

Kail got his helmet today (4/21/2016).  We have known this was coming for a while now.  Unfortunately Kail has a rather large head (which as Kail is Jordan's clone is all Jordan's fault).  

To be honest sometimes when I look at certain photo's the "head" rant from "So I Married an Axe Murderer" starts running through my head.  (If you haven't seen the movie, you need to. Head Rant, come on people my kid has a flat head, we have already established I'm a bad mom).  Dont get me wrong our little man is the most adorable thing I've ever seen but he does have a big head (again this is Jordan's fault).

Due to the fact that he spent a good amount of time in the first few months laying on the back of his head (again, yes I'm a bad mom) in ether his swing or his crib he has developed what they call Brachycephaly.  In other words his head is very flat in the back and rather tall because it has been pushed up.  This next shot is from this morning as our "before" shot.



 

After a few days of adjustment he will end up wearing his helmet 23 hrs a day for about 3 months. The one hour of freedom is really just so we can clean him and it.  We know it sounds extreme, and yes many kids get flat spots but as you can tell from this photo, his is a bit noticeable.  After a lot of heartache and research we decided it was what is best for him.  Yes its a purely cosmetic issue.  The flat, tall head will not affect his brain growth, his brain will just grow to match his head shape without the helmet.  But I dare anyone to argue that cosmetics do not affect nearly every step of your life from friends, to dating, to job opportunities.  Having your skull misshaped can also affect things like your vision, as when your eyes are not inline or your ears are not inline, then glasses don't sit correctly.  It can also affect jaw placement, and for anyone who knows about my issues with my jaw, you should know I will do everything in my power to make sure Kail does not suffer from the same problem.  Not even my amazing insurance covers this little helmet so its been a rather expensive decision as well, but three months of wearing it, which he wont remember, is worth avoiding future complications.

As the helmet screams for attention anyway, we decided to make the best of it and make it cute. Lots of people decorate the helmets with stickers and glitter and whatnot.  But as I had some time to research it I found out that most car wrap companies will actually wrap these helmets for free.  Its smart really, you have these little cute very noticeable billboards walking/crawling/being carried around with your handy work for three months, while everyone asks who decorated it and you get to write it off your taxes as charity.  Jordan has already taken him in to get the design in motion so stay tuned for much cuter pictures, as Kail was not in the mood to alleviate mom's guilt, by giving her cute pictures.  He really just wanted to ether play with dads phone or sleep.

  

Great Uncle Kevin's Baby Goats

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My dad's brother Kevin lives up in Evenston WY on a farm.  He has tons of animals including cows, chickens, sheep, ducks and lots of goats.  He was nice enough to invite our family up to come play with all of his baby animals last weekend.  (Yes this is when I was carrying Hand Foot and Mouth).  So we made the drive and met my dad, and brothers family up there, where we spent the day having our clothes eaten and and shoes untied by what seemed to be a million baby goats.  Really it was probably around 30-40 but they were EVERYWHERE!  These pictures make it seem like the goats were on the other side of a fence but that's just because I was too busy trying to get them to stop eating my coat and untying my shoes to take pictures inside the pen.

Uncle Keven even had some brand new ones that were just born and were in a warming tub that the kids got to feed.

My Brother Dan and his wife Laurelin brought a great lunch.  It was a really pretty day even if the wind was a bit cold for Kail, and we all had a lot of fun.  And of course Jordan got to buy some more fireworks before we headed home.  Thank you uncle Kevin!

Hand Foot & Mouth Desease

For those of you without young children, no, Hand Foot & Mouth disease is not a livestock disease.  It is in fact much like chicken pox, an annoying itchy rash virus. There is no drug to make it go away, you just have to wait it out.  It is  mostly passed between children under the age of 5 and due to chickenpox now having a vaccine, is more common.  It turns out it runs pretty rampant in daycare's especially in the baby rooms where kids drool on everything as its passed through bodily fluid contact.  And yes not only can they get it more then once as there are different strains of the virus but adults, much to my horror can catch it too.  So the Sunday before last, Kail came down with a low grade fervor.  This has been happening off and on due to his teeth coming in, so Jordan and I didn't think much of it.  He also go fussier then normal, again we thought teething.  Monday he got his first diaper rash . .. OK normal for a baby starting solid foods.  Then Tuesday night we were bathing him and found what we thought were bug bites on his hands and a rash on his legs.  So at this point we are thinking bug bites or food allergy as I had just started mangoes.  Jordan even mentioned chicken pox which I of course laughed off . . . ya OK I should stop doing that. 

So the next day I go into daycare and again as I'm a first timer and they have seen everything I ask the director if she thinks its a food allergy.  And that  is when everything hit the fan.  "No that is not a food allergy, that is Hand Foot & Mouth, he has to leave right now and can't come back until they are scabbed over."  "well how long is that usually?" I ask starting to panic.  "Could be a couple of days to a couple of weeks, depends on the kid, the fervor this weekend, and butt rash were all things leading up to this, give him lots of Tylenol as he is going to be in a lot of pain" . . . . and out the door I go. 

Well so now what am I going to do, biggest problem is that this is VERY contagious as he has no teeth and slobbers on EVERYTHING.  And he cant be around other kids so my backups are out.  So for the next three days Jordan and I traded off staying home.  The funny thing was he was perfectly happy the entire time.



In fact he was so happy I actually took him to the Dr to make sure he had this "terribly painful virus".  the Dr confirmed it and also said it was very unusual for a kid to be so happy with it.  Kail likes his Dr a lot and will often give him a huge grin as soon as Adam walks in the door. 

Luckily Kail had a very minor outbreak with only a few blisters on each hand and foot and only two in the back of his throat which I think were the ones that hurt the most because he had to eat.  He was all scabbed up and back at daycare on Monday.

His mom on the other hand got it after she thought she was out of the incubation stage (huge and many apologizes to my family who I unintentionally was around probably while I was contagious. On the up side I don't slobber like Kail does) and ended up having what the InstaCare doctor said was a "sever allergic reaction" to the virus.  Something about having a hyper active immune system. I wasn't paying all that much attention, I just wanted the massive disfiguring  hives that covered me from head to foot to stop inching like a million bee stings. Needles to say Kail was much braver and handled it a lot better then his mom did.

Kails Rash:

Mom's Rash: