"I need more candy"

After the "Happy Halloween's" and "Thank you's" were said and the doors were shut Max would run off of every door step and say I need more candy. Trick-or Treating was a great surprise for Max this year because he is old enough to know that people are giving him candy when they hand it to him but still too young to know why or to expect it. So with every door he was excited by the happy people giving him candy.

So how'd we do with the costumes?

Klinton's work gets big into the costume party, so that is how he went to work on Friday (guitar in tote). It went over well! And no I did not dress up this year...I know let me hear it, I am lame...some things you just have to cut out.

In Other exciting news:

I am so excited today because after just eight months of living here the carpet that was put in the house before we moved here has already started to wear on the stairs...and for what I thought was going to be expensive (and definitely can be) we were able to cover all of our stairs for very little! It makes me so HAPPY...(For the past while I have been trying to walk up the edge of our stairs to preserve the life of the carpet.)

HAPPY HALLOWEEN

the hat is a tiny bit girly but it completes the pumpkin look

Rainy Days...

Because of the rain and our recent self-inflicted ban from public places Max, Krieg and I found great things to do indoors today...

Courtesy of Aunt Stephanie donating her last swimming diaper to us yesterday, Max spent the entire night and morning begging to go swimming. Obviously we were not able to do that, however, Max was thrilled with the replacement swimming pool of the big bath tub...he still wore the swimming suit...not that you can tell. It was an hour before I could convince him that there were other things to do.

After appointment #3 up at Primary's I was advised to try to fatten Krieg up as much as possible (beyond what is healthy for a normal baby) in order to develop a cushion for when he inevitable becomes a picky 2 year old and lives on air and goldfish crackers. This is my 4 month old eating chicken baby food (we can't waste eating time with empty calories like green beans or rice cereal, we need to load up on meats...these baby food have 4 grams fat, 60 grams sodium, and 9 grams protein) What a different perspective...I am still having a hard time wrapping my head around this!

This is almost everything (3 prescriptions due to arrive later this week) that we use for Krieg on at least a daily basis...again 4 months old...so crazy.

Yea for the zoo!

Albeit tiny, overgrown, and generally lacking in animal excitement and variety, we work with what we have. The Hogle Zoo was a bit more exciting this time around because of the arrival of baby elephant, giraffe, orangutan, monkeys, tigers and probably more. Besides Max doesn't know any better. Also most of the animals were up walking around. Most important was that Max had a blast and Krieg loves being outside and in the stroller so we had a great time.

All I want for Christmas...

Max has officially put in his request...

"I want a track hoe mommy!"

We are getting our backyard started and little did I know when I wrote the check that I was also hiring a permanent babysitter. Ever minute they are here working Max is out on the deck watching them...even after they left last night it was hard to pull him away from the "pushing dirt" and "Blowing smoke" (when the dirt blows up he thinks it is smoke in the air).

Elephant Parade and more Scar Stories (the two incidents are not related)

Thursday was the annual Elephant Parade. The circus is in town and again and like every year they kick off the weekend with a parade of all the characters and animals around the Arena block and through the Gateway. Ever year I expect the parade to be longer than it is but it is always very short. But where else do you get to see 15 elephants walk free range in line just 4 feet away.

This is max yelling to the Elephants

Friday afternoon Klinton went into surgery to remove something growing inside his wrist...even though it was a small operation they had to put him under a general because of the major vessels nerves and what not that were running through the area. That is always fun. Here are the pictures of the scar. If you notice, you can see were the doctor came in to write "yes" on his hand to make sure they cut open the right wrist.

Max Pollock Starr at work...and His Buddha belly.

Doug Robinson on CF

Doug Robinson took some time to explain one girl's life journey so far with CF in the Deseret News on Tuesday. And he hit it pretty well on the head. Anyway, you can read this if you are looking for what life will most likely be like For Krieg. You can also vote for the girl he highlighted to win the scholarship.

The following column is a shameless, blatant, anything-but-objective solicitation for votes.
I just thought you should know.
The votes aren't for me; they're for Mandie. You and I are going to help pay for her education, but more on that later.
Look, every now and then we journalists do a story about someone who wins our heart. Like Burgon Jensen, the blind and deaf girl I wrote about on Monday. Like Chad Lewis, the big, gentle former NFL tight end.
Like Mandie Rudd.
Mandie was born was cystic fibrosis, although you wouldn't know it to look at her or talk to her. She's blonde, green-eyed, smiling and energetic. But beneath the pleasant exterior there's trouble. CF causes the body to produce a thick mucus that, among other things, clogs the lungs and leads to potentially lethal lung infections. Breathing can be arduous.
Mandie takes pills to enable her to digest food. She adds salt to everything she ingests, even Gatorade. At least once a day she straps on a special vest that uses pulsating air to pound her back and ribs to knock loose the mucus that collects in her lungs, which she then spits out. She can spit like a farmer.
When Mandie was born, the average life expectancy for CF patients was 18; she's 19. She hasn't exactly sat around waiting for trouble.
At Hillcrest High, she was an A student, a member of the National Honor Society and a three-sport athlete. She once competed in a track meet while wearing a PICC (peripherally inserted central catheter) line — a tube inserted into her arm to deliver medicine. She still competes in basketball and soccer in city and intramural leagues. She rises every morning at 6 for 90 minutes of exercise, which helps keep her lungs clearer.
"CF is part of my life, but it runs alongside me and does not stand in my way," she likes to say.
CF patients usually are hospitalized several times a year for what Mandie terms "a cleanout" — the lungs are cleared of the mucus that gradually collects there. By taking care of herself and exercising regularly, Mandie has been hospitalized only three times, including a 10-day stay last month. Every three months she takes a special medication to kill nasty bacteria that tend to infect the lungs of CF patients.
Meanwhile, Mandie lives her life. She works as a nanny and attends classes at Salt Lake Community College. She plans to become a dental hygienist, if she can afford it. This is where things get tricky.
Go figure. Only 30,000 people in the U.S. have CF — and yet two of the Rudds' three children have it (but not the parents, Dave and Aimee). What are the odds?
"My parents should never gamble, because the odds are stacked against them," says Mandie.
The expense of paying for medication and treatment of two daughters with CF — Mandie and Natalie, a student at Hillcrest — leaves little to pay for a college education.
"The only way I can do it is a scholarship," she says.
Earlier this year, Mandie applied for the SolvayCares Scholarship, sponsored by the Solvay pharmaceutical firm. Out of the hundreds of applicants, she was selected as one of 40 winners, which means she will be awarded $2,500 and becomes a finalist for the company's grand prize — the Thriving Student Achiever award, which is worth $17,000. This scholarship is selected by popular vote.
Which is where you come in. You can go online and vote for her at Solvaycaresscholarship.com — click on her name ("AMANDA" not "Mandie"). You can learn more about Mandie, Utah's only finalist, by clicking on a video clip that shows her talking about her candidacy for the award while she signs it for the deaf.
You also can read her 250-word essay and peruse her achievements. She plays piano and does volunteer work, serving as a spokeswoman for the Make-A-Wish Foundation, participating in food drives, making hygiene kits for abused women and quilts for hurricane victims and so forth.
CF is still running alongside her, but it doesn't stand in her way.

Klinton the Triathlete

Welcome to Campyuba 2009...The location for Klinton's very first triathlon. He did so great his time for the whole things was 1:39:07. It is funny because he was disappointed with this time so he said, "Now I have to do it again." He really did like it, he is just sick of training. Yesterday he said he wants to do the Olympic length, who knows. He did the sprint length which is a half mile swim, a 13 mile bike ride, and a 3.1 mile run (Olympic length is twice as long). His time really was great, but a couple of things were slower than he wanted and that was only because this was his first one and there really is no way to gauge your abilities until you do it, especially when the run was up a real hill for the middle mile. Anyway, below is the still shot highlight reel.

Well, he's just cute.

Kaylene and Krystal prepared the night before making signs and collecting bells and noise makers.

Waiting for everything to start.

Here he is (in the blue arms) thinking, "Um this water is NOT warm, why am I doing this" at least that is what I would be thinking.
I thought this picture was funny, it looks like a bunch of jumping fish.

Coming out of the swim, headed up the boat ramp to the bike portion.

The foolish grin was because he heard his mom proudly waving the very load cow bell.

I promise he is out there, look for an orange dot.

Klinton hates this picture because it caught him in the wrong position of his stride, he didn't look like he was struggling in real life, he ran straight in. Sadly this is the only picture that captured him running in.

And here is his fan club after the race.

Krieg's blessing day

Three months have come and gone. On Friday my sister Stephanie and brother Adam (who just flew in from California) came over to help me have a little photo shoot for Krieg. Then Sunday we had a family party because we blessed Krieg. He is such an angel!

Signs your kid had CF:

***Qualifier: really I am posting this with a light hearted attitude, and Krieg will be OK but***

The doctor calls you and says your 3 month old baby has a staph infection (staphylococcus aureus, MSSA), E-coli, moraxella catarrhalis, and haemophilus influenzae, and doesn't seem extraordinarily concerned.

This just means more medicine..seriously though, everyone should research getting vaccinated and immunized - do what you can to protect yourself and those who can't protect themselves.

Perfect summer nights

I don't know why, but ALL summer long I have been craving s'mores. I don't even like them, I usually roast the mallows but give them to someone else. Anyway, a couple of days ago the end cap at the wal-mart finally won me over, they had chocolate, mallows and grahams right there. I went for it.

Max is so funny, he was so excited for these but the second he got it in his hands he didn't want it because it was sticky and he hates having sticky messy hands...you wouldn't know it by the way he eats his noodles and sauce, but it is true. After some real convincing he decided he loved it. As you can see, we took the easy way out with the Coleman stove...much easier and safer with a two little babies, right by a river.

Klinton of course had to be the wild man that he is and find the highest steepest thing to climb and conquer. Max loved watching his daddy be a mountain man.

Even though the picture doesn't show Krieg was happy.

Look at those chunky little legs!! Are they brother's or what!?

If you notice these last two pictures are on the same blanket...yes they are from the same day and no it is not uncommon for completely different clothes (especially for Krieg) on the same day...let just say my washing machine is always saving us money.

Terrific Two-dollar Tuesdays

I know people are interested so medical update first: We went to Primary's on Monday, Krieg gained another 7 oz. he is just shy of 12 lbs now! And his lungs are still completely clear, because of that we are waiting one more month for chest therapy. Also, who knows what the future holds but the doctor said it is not unreasonable to see medicine to treat this disease come available by the time Krieg is 10ish. Isn't that awesome. The medical world is working so aggressively with this particular drug development because they think if they can get it to work with the CF patients the same theory can be used to treat cancer and millions of other diseases...CF is kind of the guinea pig...fine by me.

Yesterday was the final two dollar Tuesday at Thanksgiving point. I don't know how this month slipped away but I had planned to attend ever since we went last year and I almost didn't make it. On Monday I asked Max if he wanted to go to the Dinosaur museum and of course anything with dinosaur he would think is awesome, whatever that weird museum word means. He was so excited but I had to explain that he had to take a nap then play some, then go to bed, then wake up in the morning eat some breakfast then go to volleyball, then come home and eat lunch then take another nap and then we would go. He repeat the whole sequence to me and was really excited. After that conversation I didn't bring it up again. Well before I knew it we were in the middle of nap time on Tuesday and I was trying to decide how I was going to fit in the museum the gardens and feeding Kreig and Max. I started getting ready only to find out the stroller was in the back of the car that Klinton took to work because of the rain (he usually drives the scooter). Because of that, and also because I was debating the dinosaurs altogether, I decided to skip the museum and just go to the gardens. Lately Max has been terrified of anything bigger than him that isn't Human, He loves to talk about Smokey Bear - the first thing that scared him - but hates to see him in person. And I lost half the skin on my arm when the Ute Hawk came by during the parade.

Max, being the brainiac that he is, remembered our conversation and immediately asked about the dinosaur museum when he woke up from his nap. So...change of plans again. I didn't know how I was going to do it, but I had to take Max to the dinosaur museum, with Krieg and no stroller. Then my mom saved the day by offering to take Krieg so Max and I could go to the Museum and then my mom would meet us there with Krieg and my dad would meet us as well so we could all enjoy the Gardens together. What a perfect day...OK it was a little hot, but other than that everything was perfect.

Max and I had the greatest time ever, it was just the two of us, no bags, no strollers, no worries. And most importantly he did great, he was a little anxious a couple of times but after he got used to it, he was basically in heaven running free, and having my full attention and seeing all the big dinosaurs.

One of these days I am going to break down and buy a real camera, but in the mean time...
Also, I hate to stop the fun to get a better picture (I am not into the photography like everyone else in the blogosphere), so these are cell phone camera action shots with poor lighting. It works well enough I suppose.

This is how comfortable he was, he ran around and loved everything!

This was me trying to lift him with one hand and take a picture with another hand to make it look like the shark was after him...too bad I am not 12 feet tall

Just before this picture there was a pterodactyl on the ceiling that Max recognized (thanks to Little Einsteins) and everyone was so impressed by the little guy saying the names of the dinosaurs.

Who ever curated this place was funny...

Can you find the t-rex devouring the other dinosaur

One more example of morbidity...the Woolly Mammoth (another of Max's favorite animals) smashing the human

Next Step...The Gardens

Krieg is such a great baby, he is generally happy or sleeping, and big thanks to mom for finding and bringing the little stroller, it made life super easy.

These are capturing Max first successful rolling down the hill, he was so funny because he tried to get right back up and run up the hill to do it again every time, but he was always a bit dizzy.

still a poser

Five Years running...

...and we've never looked back

What we've been up to...

First things first...Medical updates:

Max: His allergy test results came back and he shows no signs of Milk allergies - this is the biggest celebration, there are milk products in EVERYTHING. My life is so much simpler now that I can give him milk products. His peanut allergy has dropped so drastically that by the time he is three there is a great chance it will be completely gone, as long as we keep him off of them until then. Peanuts aren't hard to monitor when I am around, but by the time he is in school or going to friends houses it shouldn't be a worry. Finally eggs...this is what he was most allergic to, and these too have dropped in severity. So much so, that we should be able to carefully and slowly give him flu shot doses which is important for him and especially for Krieg. The key is, that it is decreasing so there is great hope he will grow out of everything. He is still allergic to dogs though.

Krieg: Is gaining weight like a elephant. It has been 25 days, and a healthy baby gains on average an ounce a day in the first 5ish months, so 25 ounces would be a great result. Well, he has gained 39 - I can't even believe it. His body was craving nutrients and he is totally catching up. He weighs 10.14!!!!! I am jumping for joy over here. So many great miracles, I could not be happier.

Here are some fun pictures:

I spy with my little eye...a baby in a sty

Max did this

Here we are at the Alpine day's Parade, Krieg's sleeping lasted all the way until the first cannon that starts the parade

"I'm swimming mommy, I'm swimming"


And here Max is with another hat of Klinton's
he wants to be just like him.


"Big Stick"..."Very cold"
This is us at the Cedar Hills community pool
This was way too difficult to do by myself. Max kept running around, so I would have to chase after him, leaving Krieg behind. Luckily I live where I don't have to worry to much about it, but it was kind of crazy.

Guess who's who!

The first day of the rest of my life...

Wow, what a crazy whirlwind everything has been for me this last week. On July 16, the nurse from Krieg’s pediatrician’s office gave me a call around 10:00 a.m. to explain to me that Krieg’s PKU test came back with an elevated level of IRT and that is a sign of cystic fibrosis. She was calling to let me know that because of this we had an appointment set up at Primary Children’s hospital at 2 p.m. Luckily, Klinton and I already had a baby sitter for Max lined up because we were supposed to be in a private screening of Harry Potter (Klinton got the tickets from his work). Well, instead of being there, we were in the hospital learning that Krieg carried two DF508 gene mutations, one from Klinton and one from me. The weird part of this is that Cystic Fibrosis is a genetic disorder but in both Klinton and My families there is no one that we even knew that was a carrier as far back as we could trace, (apparently it is not uncommon to lie dormant for so may years though.) Thursday we talk with Dr. Chatfield the head of the CF clinic at Primary children’s hospital and Sue the main CF nurse for an hour and then hooked Krieg up to a machine with some chemical on his legs that would open his sweat glands. The machine sends electric pulses and makes your limbs fall asleep. After that they wrapped up a cotton swab on both legs, then we wrapped him in a blanket with heat packs inside to try to get him to sweat for 30 minutes. After the pulsating and leg numbing and crying the heat luckily made Krieg fall right to sleep. This test determines the level of sodium chloride in his sweat. A “mild “ (mild is the wrong word to use here) case of cystic fibrosis would come in between a number of 40-60 and 60 or above is diagnostically CF. Krieg’s sodium chloride level was 98. We heard the results of this test on Friday afternoon. Then we returned to Primary Children’s on Monday morning to get Max tested. Since it is a genetic disorder there was a 25% chance he could have had it, and he does have some of the symptoms. Luckily we found out Monday night that Max’s sodium chloride level was 19, very normal and no problems.

CF is a genetic disorder where there is a mutation in your gene that will not allow the correct amount of sodium chloride to leave the cells and creates too much salt leaving through the skin causing a great risk of dehydration, and it doesn’t allow enough sodium chloride to leave the cells in internal organs like your lungs and your pancreas, which in turn creates too much mucus. That mucus builds up in the lungs and makes getting a normal sickness very dangerous, it is harder to fight off infection and much easier to get sick. It is very hard to breath, and we have to do twice daily treatments to break up the excess mucus. The mucus also blocks the enzymes in your pancreas making it virtually impossible to absorb any fats calories proteins or nutrients from foods.

So what does this all mean? On Monday the 20th we talked to the CF nutritionist, social worker, and Dr. Chatfield and Sue again. They answered all of our questions (that we had at the time, I of course think of new ones all the time) and got us started on a plan for Krieg. They also ran more tests and checked more things. We were at the hospital for four hours. When Krieg was born he weighed 7 lbs 15 oz. Six weeks later, to the day, we weighted him at the clinic and he was 8 lbs. 7 oz. (he had gained only 8 oz.) They gave us some pork enzymes that he eats with a bite of applesauce every time before I feed him so they can break down the food and be absorbed. From that day to now (less than 10 days) he has put on over a pound close to 1.5 pounds. At this point, Krieg is also taking vitamins (they stink horribly and stain everything they touch bright orange) also we have added an 1/8th of a teaspoon of salt to his diet every day. (We mix that in throughout the day with his applesauce and enzymes.) Also Krieg just finished a round of a z-pack to help clear up some of the mucus in his nose and eyes. Next month when we go back to the CF clinic they are going to teach us a chest therapy where we pound on his chest for thirty minutes every morning and night. Once he gets to be about two there is a vest they sit in that does the work for us.

What the future holds: Right now we have no clue, mostly it will be filled with many miscellaneous medications (50 a day would not be uncommon) He will be taking enzymes with everything he ever eats the rest of his life, And he will probably have annual two week stays in the hospital to clear out the mucus and run other tests.

All this being said, the future is very optimistic, just ten years ago the life expectancy for people with this disease was around 20 but now it is at 40ish and people that are getting diagnosed with it today are being told as long as we stay on top of his medication and treatments, as long as we stay involved he will be able to lead a long normal and relatively very healthy life. There are drug trials going on right now with gene replacements that tricks the mutated gene into exited the cell membrane correctly that are having great success. Of course it is a long ways away but it could definitely happen in Krieg’s lifetime where he will have to do nothing more than take enzymes and one pill and his body will function completely normal.

As long as we are very careful to keep Krieg healthy from infections and make him gain as much weight as possible (His diet will consist of what a person without cf can only dream of. To stay healthy he needs to eat every fat, protein, salt, sugar, anything he can get his hands on.) He will be able to go to normal school and play in sports with everyone else, in fact athletics are encouraged because they help clean out the lungs, and he will lead a completely normal life.

Wow, if you made it through all of that you are amazing, no one plans to read that much on a blog. But I decided it was better to put as much as I can think of down to begin with and I will work from there. Still I left out so much. I am sure I will keep you all updated as life changes (as I know it will, we are going up to primary’s every month). Below are some pictures my dad took of our trip up there last Monday. More than anything the success that people have with this disease is directly correlated to the care they receive from the hospital and the support they have from friends and family. I am so grateful to have all of you supporting us. Since this all came crashing down on us last Thursday I have not broken down once, and that is directly because of everyone’s support, I know that what ever is going to happen I am being watched after. I know that God is watching out for our family and I know he knows what Krieg is going to have to endure. I am grateful that he has entrusted me with both Max and Krieg, and I am so grateful to be their mom. That, I cannot stress too much!

They let max walk around in the heat during his sweat test.
Krieg did great all 4 hours, he only cried when they drew two, I repeat two baby size tubes of blood.

Every mother with at least 2 kids...

In the midst of all the craziness here is a fun little ditty from this morning. As we were getting ready for the day this morning, Max climbed up in the chair to sit by Krieg, I thought it was cute and took a picture.


I ran upstairs and finished getting ready. Five minutes later I came back downstairs to this:


The picture does not do justice to the amount of rubbing in of the "bum cream" that Max coated Krieg in. Luckily Krieg slept through the entire lotioning and cleaning process.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY KLINTON

As I do every year, I pulled out all the stops (all the stops I could pull anyway) for Klinton and his birthday cake. It is kinda of a funny tradition becuase neither of us are big cake people, anyway.
The list of cakes are:
Bright blue Iron Maiden Eddie cake
Crazy 5 layer every color and two flavor awesome cake (thanks in great part to Megan Judd)
Chocolate peanut butter reses peices cake
Rocket Ship doughnut cake (Max was 12 days old)
no cake :( we actually found out we had to move on his birthday three day before
And this years...GUITAR CAKE

This one is for missionary Tyler...

Finally I am here to post picture of my house. Consider these before, after, and work in progress pictures... I posted them small because there are a billion of them. Also I took these pictures as a bit of an after thought, so sorry, but this is as good as it gets.

I don't have before pictures of outside but we added the fence...also I don't have any backyard pictures but, I will come to that at a later time.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MAX

Max is two!!!!! I know I can't believe it either. If we didn't have Krieg, I really wouldn't be able to believe time goes by so fast. Max is still talking like crazy, he says ever word there ever was. He loves baby Krieg, his favorite game is to play with him is steam roller - I however try to avoid that at all costs. Max loves playing with sidewalk chalk and bubbles and he loves basketball, soccer, golf and hockey. When it comes to T.V. he loves Little Einsteins (he calls it Rocket), and Handy Manny. His favorite movies are Cars and Finding Nemo. Max loves taking baths and big trucks. Right now he is at a stage where he is easily scared by things but the second they are gone he remembers them very well and constantly talks about them. Currently he likes to tell us about Smokey the bear and fire trucks (from the fireman's breakfast a month ago), the bulls and horses (from the rodeo) and the big trucks (doing construction on our street,,,he is not scared of those anymore though) and the monkey (a stuffed animal that is three times his size). Oh and as I am typing this, Max reminded me of the deer that was in our backyard eating our cherries. Every day Max makes everyone around him laugh, then when people laugh at Max he imitates them with his own big fake laugh. Max loves life and we love him!!!!

Here are some pictures from his party...

My First Six Days

Not much to say here, I am just so stinking cute:

every one loves my feet

I Love my big brother!!!!

KRIEG JACKSON STARR

We welcome to the the world our happy little baby Krieg Jackson Starr. He was born at 9:30 in the morning on Thursday June 4th. He was 7 lbs 15 ounces and 19 1/2 inches long.

Max LOVES his little brother and is doing great with the adjustment. He is really good at helping when we ask him to hand us stuff and he loves holding him. Max has gotten a little bit more clingy but considering the circumstances I couldn't ask for a better behaved kid.

Over all things are going great with Krieg, he lost a little bit more weight in the hospital than he should have so we are keeping an eye on that and he has a bit of jaundice so we have to go back in to the hospital on Monday to get him checked out. Overall these are minor things and we are lucky to have such a happy healthy boy. So far he hasn't spent much time crying, he sleeps a lot, but he is still brand new...that will change.

For fun comparison, I am also posting some pictures of Max. Above are pictures of Krieg my little black baby (dark skin and almost black hair) and below are my pictures of Max, my little white baby (almost see through skin and white hair). Isn't it amazing how different brothers can be.

Big Boy Monkey Bed

Seeing as the arrival of baby boy number two is looming over our heads (10ish weeks away now). Klinton and I decided to get Max switched over to his big boy bed (the monkey is added because he calls it his monkey bed). In plenty of time that not only would he be used to it and sleeping normally again, but also so that he would not have crib envy when baby brother comes (he will probably have plenty of other things to envy, he doesn't need the bed too.)

Last night was the inaugural sleep. When we set the bed up Max was so happy he wanted to keep playing in it and go to bed right away (mind you it was hardly 5 pm). After playing for a while, I didn't want to him to associate the bed with only play and not sleep so we locked him out of his room and he just sat at the door begging for monkey bed. So we had to go out for the night. Upon our arrival back home, Max was patting his head and asking for bed ***Max pats his head when it is nap and bed time, he has done it for months, bed - head - it rhymes, he put it together*** Anyway, we put him down right on time (now mind you, I have been blessed with a very good sleeper, he loves going to bed, wide awake and everything) and lo and behold, not a peep not a sound, he went straight for it. I, for other reasons, had very little sleep last night, and all night did not hear a sound from Max. This morning I was ready to jet into Max's room the second he made a sound (I was worried he would forget and try to pull himself up on the crib bars and fall flat on his face). Hilarity of all hilarity's, I walked in and he was on the ground in the exact opposite corner of the room laying on blocks, pushed up against the wall. This believe it or not was one of my fears because in his crib he always rolls till he is pushed in the corner. Anyway, I did not hear him make a peep all night but some how it happened. I just laughed at him. Overall it was considerably successful, he got a full night of sleep. We are just still working on the "bed" part. We'll see how tonight goes. Here a couple of pics of Max cheesing it on his new favorite toy.

I think it is high time we throw some random Max being Max pictures up here...as you may notice he LOVES getting his picture taken...Hopefully soon, I will buy a real camera so we don't all have to bear through cell phone pictures...

Max loves to cook, he also loves to pull all the pans out of the drawer and climb in...you can't teach these thingsHere he is trying to be like daddy, he prefers to play the guitar with the strap on.

Yes he did somehow climb up there all by himself, with no supervision...oops

A tribute to my brother and sister

So this is what happens when I leave Max to be babysat by his Uncle Adam and Aunt Melody...OK truthfully I don't think I would have stopped Max any sooner than they did. Anyway this is a little diddy I copied off of Adam's awesome blog

Max's interesting food selection keeps getting more interesting. Here he was making salt water:
Here he is trying it:

And here he is deciding he really liked it so he went back for more. But this time with a greater salt concentration. he kept on going for a bit and would have drank all the salt if we had not stopped him:

p.s. Adam's blog does show his true awesomeness if you wanna check it out here is the link: http://adambowenwood.blogspot.com/

And the winner is....

All the girls in all the world.

Well the babies anyway. Because we are having another BOY!!! Funny story, this pregnancy has been a complete opposite of Max's, from how I am feeling, what I have been craving, to EVERYTHING. Because of that I thought, well it's 50/50 chance but maybe we have a girl. Then at the end of January we went to the doctor and this little baby would not help us out in any kind of way, finally the doctor said, I really think you've got a girl there, after much prodding and pushing he settled on a 85% girl verdict. But made sure to cover his bases by saying don't go painting any rooms yet (GREAT, I am in the middle of painting a house and need to know what color to buy). One month passes and we are back at the doctor. Baby decided not to be so shy and without a doubt we got two separate but conclusive views. Max Is going to have a little brother. I AM SO EXCITED FOR THE FUN THAT THEY ARE GOING TO HAVE!!!! So now we are painting the room.

The house is getting closer to being done. As soon as we finish I will take pictures and post all the before and afters. The painting is more than halfway done and it is looking awesome!!!!! All the other projects are coming along as well. It is of course a slow process...Maybe we will flip this house and keep going. We'll just have to see.

Ahh, to be in debt again...

Whelp, all things are true. We finally found a great house right in the middle of Cedar Hills. So we are once again homeowners, only this time we didn't mess around with that lousy townhouse mess, we have our own land and our own four walls and it is all fenced it (with a fabulous view as well). We are taking the chance to paint everything inside and finish one room before we actually move in...once we do though you are all invited.

P.S. We get to find out what color of baby we are having next Wednesday morning...any guesses??

playing catch up...

Hey remember us, well, in the last couple of weeks we finally found an AWESOME house that we liked and all my time has been focused on that. Then we have been busy with fun Christmas celebrations and a small family vacations. We close on our house in less than one week, so if everything goes through with that, I will let you all know about that then.

On Friday the 26th we got up (not as early as we wanted, because of the crazy snow storm) and drove to San Diego. We spent A week at the zoo and wild animal kingdom and the beaches and sea world. It was sunny and warm and fabulous. All except for the drunken crazy scary party in our "fun" (code for worst EVER) hotel. With a quick 1 mile and bit of extra money hotel change we were right back on track and better than ever.

Here are some fun pictures of the trip

Max loved the fishies and sharks

He also still loves cheesing it for the camera

Quite possibly my favorite animal ever, that I finally got to see up close and enjoy, They are so beautiful and huge and awesome.

Max kept trying to run straight into the water...it was a bit cold for that

Here are a couple of my favorite Christmas highlights

Max got his first haircut over a month ago now, but everyone laughs because he has no hair but it was getting a bit mullet-ee in the back. We cleaned it up though, and he loved the razor!

this is only a before picture, all the after pictures came out blurry

Here is a fun picture of Max helping me rake the leaves.

dadadadadadadadadadadada (that's a drum roll)

Wahoo :)

Max, has no clue, but he is excited. Baby number 2 is expected to arrive on June 11 (although, for Stephaine and Camber, the baby's measurement due date was June 9th).

Here are a couple other pictures from our little photo shoot. Max LOVES getting his picture taken, he loves attention.

Real Salt Lake's Inaugural Game

The blue arrow points out our seats only about half way down the concourse in the SOLD OUT stadium. We thought the game was sold out and I called around to all the KFC with in 50 miles and finally found 5 tickets left for only $14 buck a pop in sandy only to find out they were vouchers for any game not actual tickets, so i got worried they were already sold out, luckily it was 10 am the day before and not everyone had exchanged their vouchers yet so I drove straight up to salt lake to exchange them for what turned out to be great tickets. the game night was freezing but we were all bundled sufficiently and it so SUCH a blast, kind of sad that it had to end in a tie, we played so much better than them in all areas but one, we were awful at defending corner kick, and well they had about15 corners so it was just about inevitable that they got one in, sad that we only got one goal though.


We looked cold but i think everyone was sufficently wrapped and warm.
p.s. The dreaded parking sittuation that everyone was rightfully talking about turned out to be a breeze for us, we ran into almost ZERO traffic and parked at Jordan high school took the shuttle in and had NO HANG UPS whatsoever. I can't wait to go again.

Then the following night Klinton and Max and I went to the E center for a free Grizzles Hockey scrimmage and right as we pulled up The Cousins family was jumping out of their car, small world?? I think so (only Stephanie is the one that told me about it so i knew they would be there). We had fun, no one was there, the team looks GREAT for a high school league maybe. And we didn't really take any pictures but this one of Stephanie's boys Garrett and Weston was funny.

The Elephant Parade

Every year when the circus comes to town they parade the whole group around the ESA and Gateway. This year Max and I went up with my sister Stephanie and her two youngest kids Garrett and Lydia to see the elephants. Here are a couple of highlight pictures...if anyone wants to join me next year, let me know, it is a blast.



A couple of weeks ago our whole family went through the worst stomach flu ever. On this particular morning I went to get Max out of his crib only to find him covered in dry throw up the he rolled all over in. That apparently didn't wake him up, good thing he got it all out of his mouth. However, the diaper that was not stopping the leaking everywhere did wake him (I'm sorry this is so gross). Anyway after a big load of laundry and a wonderful bath I got him dressed with long thick sock and some sweats and was rocking him in the chair and he threw up over everything again. I dressed him down to his onesie and big socks. A bit later he brought me his sandals and after I put them on he headed for the door. The picture I took actually turned out much cuter than I thought, I took the picture because he looked so funny tromping around. He always make me laugh, even when he is sick.
p.s. he is all better now and he just went in for his 15 month check up. And the kid is still small he was 1/2 an inch short of 30 inches and 1 ounce shy of 20 pounds. Still sitting at about the 5%. At least he is growing though. So no need to be alarmed. He is however a VERY VERY VERY picky eater, which makes it hard because his food choice is limited to begin with. I recently bought Max some "Tuffutti" (made with tofu) cream cheese and ice cream sandwiches, he likes both. WAHOO!! Here's a weird one, they make plenty of of soy and rice based cheeses but they all have whey and/or casein proteins in them. I don't understand the logic behind that at all, why would anyone eat them, they are pointless for vegans, vegetarians, and allergy sufferers. It's a wonder?

STAYCATION

Getting away for the weekend has become increasingly difficult for us. We teach primary so we need to be around for every Sunday, and Klinton has started school again so he is going to get increasingly busy with the extra workload. Last Sunday we had a break from primary and no homework yet so we decided to get out of town. After much deliberation about driving times and gas prices etc etc, we decided to get a hotel in town and enjoy a staycation. Who knew you could find plenty of things to do just up in Salt Lake. We played in the gateway fountain, when swimming in the hotel pool, went to the capital building, played at the park, went to the state fair, and a bunch of other stuff. When we ate dinner at Biaggi's we were able to order Max's very first own meal he had fries and chicken fingers and apple juice, only we replaced the chicken fingers with a plain chicken breast and the meal was "Max-kosher." Actually, it came with ice cream as well, so his mom and dad sacrificed and ate that for him. It actually was a bit of a sacrifice because then we didn't have an excuse to order room service dessert later that night. We had never done that before but tried it the night before and loved it, it could definitely be something addicting, if it weren't so expensive that is. Anyway here are some highlight pictures:

Max Morris and Matilda Mae

Although it is from a cell phone, these pictures of Max with his youngest and most distant cousin are so cute, she is property of Aaron and Melissa who are living in San Antonio and she is 10 months younger (4 months old).

While Matilda and her mom Melissa were out visiting we took the oppurtunity to go to The Thanksgiving gardens on two dollar Tuesday (that was only in August). Those gardens really are beautiful and the waterfall IS huge, whoda thunk?

Playing catch up

Minus the quick pictures I posted on the 14th, it has been almost a month since the last post. I am getting pretty bad at the blog game so I will try to commit to updating more frequently.

I think Max is going to be an Olympian because he finally got up enough courage to realize he can walk on his own during the open ceremonies. He has been able to do it for months but he finally took off for real on the lucky day of 08.08.08

This isn't a very good shot of Max walking but he is so cute, he loves that little pool.

At the begining of the month we went to the Living Planet Aquarium up in Sandy, which by the way is half price on the first monday evening of every month. That is pretty much the only time it is worth it, after all we are landlocked and you can see half the stuff in there at Cabela's for free and in much better lighting. But they do have some Nemo's and Dory's some sharks and seahorse and octupus and a place to pet the stingray's.

Max loved it becuase he is really into pointing and "oohing" and "aahing" and this gave him plenty of oppurtunities
We forgot a camera and took cellphone pictures and I forgot to turn my flash on so this is what you get.

This is Max Pointing and ooh ooh ooh - ing

Max likes drawing a lot now, so our latest activity is saidewalk chalk fun.

Happy four years

Update from the blood test results

Well, this was supposed to be a great report but alas, it is not. The results for Max's test seemed promising, he tested positive for egg allergies. At a level of 5.73 the doctor said definitely be careful around eggs, and that is was a high result, but if he is down to a level of 2 by the time he is 2 years old he has a 90% chance of growing out of them completely.

For the peanuts he tested positive at 1.97 which apparently is pretty significant. but for every other tree nut he was completely negative. But we should avoid them in general because of the high likelihood they come in contact with peanuts.

And for Milk he only tested at a .15 which is low. In fact .35 and lower used to be considered a negative result but the raised the bar and now only .1 and lower is considered negative. But over all he is 99% allergy FREE with milk, so the doctor and I decided to SLOWLY introduce milk into is diet and see how he does.

Overall there are great results, of all the allergies the milk is the biggest pain to deal with.

Yesterday we celebrated with Max's first staple of food that every little kid loves. I bought his some "Sunbutter" (peanut butter made with sunflower seed instead of peanuts) and made him and sunbutter and jelly sandwich. And he LOVED LOVED LOVED it. He was so happy, it was so great. However, we also used his first piece of regular store bought bread with a little bit of Milk proteins. No big deal right? Well, this morning Max woke up with tiny red dots all over his face a back, from one tiny piece of bread.

Back to square one again. I will wait for this rash to clear up and then try something tiny again and see how he reacts. WAHOO!

We are learning :)

TERRIBLE, HORRIBLE, NO GOOD, VERY BAD DAY

Max went into the pediatric allergist Wednesday to get rechecked up in Salt Lake City. The doctor was great and Max was brave but the nature of the appointment was no fun. He got to do the prick test again with beef, chicken, turkey, eggs, two kinds of milk, dogs, cats, bees, seafoods, different grains and more. That of course was no fun. Imagine being pricked 20 times in your back. By this time Max was tired and done but we needed to get blood drawn for some more accurate results on the major allergies. Luckily this office had a lab right? Wrong. I held Max tightly and tried to comfort him while three nurses put tourniquets on Max's arms back and forth trying to find a vein. After switching back and forth a bunch they went for it. But before poking him they of course wanted to clean the area. Because of Max's eczema in his elbow creases, they didn't use alcohol but chloro-prop so it wouldn't sting -- well, that ended up stinging him very bad so he was screaming before they even poked him. They stuck the needle in but no blood, the nurse turned and twisted inside trying to hit a vein but never could, and finally pulled out and bandaged him up. Nurse number two tried the other arm again and poked in, she found a vein but his blood wouldn't flow. After all that effort we had nothing, and I was ready to take Max home and not feed him anything that he might be allergic to ever again. But we were tough and went up to Primary Children's Hospital to have them do the blood work up there. After finding our way to the hospital and the lab inside, we were joined with two new nurses and their fancy lighting equipment to show where Max's veins are. The nurse decide to poke his hand, to avoid the already punctured elbows and eczema, however, once she got the needle in she pulled in right back out (on accident) so back to the elbow they go. They tourniqueted both sides and again. After so much trial they finally found a vain in the middle of his forearm and toke plenty of blood so we wouldn't have to come back for more. Max was wrapped up and given a new little "Cars" toy to play with on the way home which he did for maybe one second before he fell asleep for the whole ride home. When we got home, Max was no worse for wear, and was his happy little self again. We get his results back on Tuesday, but for now we are still carefully avoiding Milk, Eggs, Peanuts, Dogs and all things related and made near these products. (not pictured are his three other bandages from puncture wounds and his hives on his back from the prick test and his big bruises in his elbows)

And, in honor of "The Dark Knight" here's: NA NA NA NA NA NA NA NA BATMAN

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MAX

OK I have posted a lot so scroll down through everything, here are some highlights from Max's first birthday party:

Highlights from June

In June we had a Wood Family reunion and did a very bad job of taking pictures. But we had a blast camping up at Wasatch State Park. We played at a park and Max got to swing all by him self, he was loving it and "WHEEEE"-ing back and forth up and down, and laughing. We also sent him down a slide all by himself. We went golfing, hiking, had campfires, it was a blast.

If you didn't notice I chopped off some 18 inches of my hair, first time it's been short in years, but I like it. Also in June we pulled out Max's new swimming pool, and let him play in it with his cousins Garrett and Lydia (and his aunt Melody) he was loving life...if you notice on the side of the little wall of the pool, for saftey's sake it warns "No Diving" that was our favorite part! Also the sprinkler inside can squirt some 20 odd feet into the air. What a deal, this pool goes into the greatest cheap purchases ever category!

Highlights from May

I have been a very bad blogger and avoided this thing for so long and the longer you put it off the further you get behind and the harder it gets to post. Since the last post we have figure out Max's skin problem he is allergic to everything dairy and eggs, this completely limits his food choices and is hard, but we are learning to cope and not only that he is one of the unlucky ones who is fatally allergic to peanuts, according to the test if he even breaths peanut dust in the air or touches something that sometime in it's previous life touched something that touched a peanut he could have a very bad - end up in the hospital - reaction. I however am not sure it is that bad because I know he has not eaten, but been around peanuts before and we've all been fine. I am going to "the world's best pediatric allergist" on July 16th to get him retested. In the mean time we are being ultra careful. That being said, finally after many months my baby finally has baby soft skin again and it is wonderful!!!
Now to more exciting things. In May, Max and I traveled to San Antonio with my Mom to play with Max's brand new cousin Matilda Mae...














Max really liked playing with Matilda and she was pretty brave around him, they had a good time.

Then later that month Max and I hopped on a plane again (Max by the way is an excellent flyer, he loved looking out the window and playing with all the flight attendants and old ladies that would talk to him) this time with Klinton joined us, and we headed to Arizona to fulfill a life long dream on Klinton's. We saw Iron Maiden in concert, oh man do they put on one crazy show, those guys are old and they rocked hard. It was the coolest thing ever. Max was great too, he was happy and playing then he fell asleep and slept through Maiden's entire set, the drunk guy next to me could not get over how cool it was that Max was sleeping through the noise. We had a blast. Lucky for us Klinton's sister Karena lives in Arizona so we crashed at her place and played with her. It was a great little trip.


These first two pictures are the concert. The middle picture is at the Mesa, AZ temple and the last pictures are in the "Colossal Cave"

Figuring things out

First and sadly my camera is broken so I don't have any fun pictures but I thought I'd post a quick note of how funny Max is. He does things that crack me up every day...for example: tonight after climbing up the stairs and darting to the bathroom in hyper speed, before I could stop him (he loves the bath so he loves to try to play in the bathroom when ever he can) he laughed all the way in because I let him go. In the corner just out side the tub was the pile of Max's bath toys, Max then proceeded to bend down and pick up all 26 letters and 10 number and five dinosaurs and one rubber ducky one by one and drop them in the tub.

Later this evening, max was well into his usual favorite activity of pulling everything off the bookshelf and dropping it on and around his feet, at this point he was sitting back down and found a small terracotta pot that we keep pens in. He was attempting to drink out if it (which he also loves doing...he always lets me know quite vocally that I need to share my drink with him) and then started a new game where he picked up his "suckie" - or - "pacifiers" - or - "binki" and put it in the pot then pulled it out and put it in his mouth and then pull it out and back in the pot again, only to pick it out and stick it back in his mouth...only for a moment. He continued this game for a solid 3 minutes before he even thought of moving on to something new.

I can't wait until Max starts talking so I can start to find out what is going on in that crazy head of his!!! He cracks me up, always doing something new and funny.

ECZEMA question

on a less fun note, Max has the worst eczema ever, and everything I have tried has not worked...any suggestions would be awesome :)

Our house is for sale!!

Calling on all bloggers!!! Our Pleasant Grove townhome is for sale! ...And I need reinforcements, I have crated an advertisement page for it. Check it out http://www.1855w800n.blogspot.com/

Most importantly if you all could tell your firends that are looking for a place to check this out, if you want to post a link to this blog on your blog's I would appreciate it.

Finally, I am looking for suggestions. I am open to any great ideas, tips, experiance on selling a house. The place we are in is fabulous, but lets face it my Husband is a "project" kind of guy and he needs a garage...we need more space.

p.s. let me know what you think of the house blog :)

The Moab

Max went on his first camping trip this weekend, and he did great with it. We took a trip down to "The Moab" (Bear Gryills adds "the" so we do too) and Arches. Although I don't think Max appreciated the wonder and beauty of the desert like Klinton and I did. We "kamped" at the KOA where we were lucky enough to have the cleanest camping bathrooms and showers I have ever had the pleasure of using. It was incredibly windy the entire trip, and it only took half a day for us to realize that all these cool mountains are here for a large part because of wind erosion, so a windy weekend shouldn't be too out of the ordinary. That aside, we had a blast, and of course we were excited to step out of the car back home in windy weather -- YES!

A note on the pictures...Max has figured out what to do with a camera in front of his face and pulls the same face every time we take a picture...that kid cracks me up!!

(notice the dinosaur shirt and the dinosaur tracks that max is sitting on)

"My back doesn't hurt at all right now"

Klinton is what we like to call a do it your self-er -- and an economical one at that. His latest project is putting a lift on our Pathfinder, at the same time he has re-engineered the complete steering system and other parts as well. On Saturday he was at one of his favorite places "Kurt's auto wrecking" to do a little research. He likes to tear apart the cars there so he knows what parts he needs and finds the weak points with out disassembling or destroying our perfectly well running vehicles. As with every other things Klinton does, he is way to strong for his own good and as he was taking off the controller arm he smashed his finger. He got home and all he said was "I don't want to look at it." Apparently when it happened, right away blood started pouring out around the entire diameter of his fingernail, he said it looked like jello because it was clotting so fast. We went to the doctor because his finger kept getting bigger with blood that had no where to escape. With a wood burner-like tool the burned 3 holes through his nail so the blood had somewhere to escape. Needless to say this was a rather disgusting experience. we decided not to have the finger nail taken off because they would have sewn it right back on anyway to protect your hamburger like skin under the nail. It will fall off though in a short while. Sadly, I am not a good documentar (sp) so I only have pictures of the day after once we got it all cleaned up. Also, you can't take good close ups with a digital camera. Just know that it was gross. Oh, and it is still oozing blood and goo.

My Daddy, My Daddy and Me

Hill Air Force Base Museum
Playing pac-man
I did not arrange this picture, Klinton was doing push-up and max crawled over there just like that...I love it when the camera happen to be close by
Just Chillin'

HOW CUTE ARE THEY!!

Break me off a piece of that!

Max, as he does with everything these days, got really excited when he saw me opening a kitkat bar, so I gave him a bite and faster than a cheetah he grabbed the whole thing from me and went to town on it. He really enjoyed his first candy bar! He got much messier after this picture too.

HAPPY BELATED ST. PADDY'S DAY

I Made brownies on St. Patrick's day and new I couldn't dye them green like I did the pancakes and eggs and milk that I made for breakfast so I decorated the top instead...green brownies would just come out blackies.


MAX UPDATE: Max is all better from getting Roseola he was really sick and that of course was sad. While he was sick, before we knew what was wrong he had a swollen throat and because of that choked on a piece of cracker he has never had a problem with before. That was the scariest moment ever and I am so glad Klinton was home from work, Max stopped breathing and was turning blue, I was ready to call 911 and drive to the hospital just as Klinton was finally able to dislodge the piece that got stuck. That was the scariest moment of my life!! His fourth tooth finally after 4 weeks of threatening to come in poked through. He is having no problem crawling hand and foot and he can get anywhere he wants. His favorite place to play is on the first two stairs...he hasn't pulled his body up a stair yet but he likes stand up there. In the last week he has become very independent and can do anything he wants now. We had to lower his crib because he pulls himself up on anything he likes "cruising" around our coffee table and the chair and couch. It is so fun to watch his little body and mind get ready for the jump from one object to the next. Max is the best!!! We love him.

How I did the letters...

I don't know that it was the best way to go about things but all I did was:

1. Buy wooden letters from craft store
2. Paint the letter - couple of coats
3. Rub on stickers
4. Tie a bow in the ribbon and stick the ribbon to the back of the letters with two sided tape and a heavy duty stapler
5. Center on the wall and hang ribbon on two nails each so they wouldn't slack to one side.

I didn't know what I was doing but just kept trying stuff that kind of worked.

MAX

After seeing so many of my friends cute baby rooms and realized that I was a lame mom for not doing anything in Max's room so I put on my craft hat yesterday and this is what I came up with. It is fun and Max likes looking at it so that is good!

-- It matches his crib...

MY JAZZ

We took Max to the Jazz game and brought the shooting headphone to mute the sound, Max actually wasn't bothered by them at all. And he LOVED the game, he is usually such a squirm worm but at the game he sat in my lap and watched intently the entire time. We had a blast. This is actually Max's Second Jazz Game...Both times I forgot a camera but thanks to cellphones we could still capture how funny this was. (sorry about the poor picture quality).

Doctor's Orders

The Doctor said Max needed to eat Bananas but they are not nearly as fun to eat as they are to play with!!

Just like Rothko...right?

My flourishing artistic abilities :)

New Year, New Tooth

Just three days after Max's 6 month birthday he got his first tooth. Yesterday Max was Chomping on my finger and I realized it was awful sharp. What do you know -- a tooth. He was such a good boy too, he wasn't fussy or anything as it was coming in. Hopefully it is that way for the rest as well.

Well, after a full six months and first tooth, I thought I would take a minute to say just how great life is. Max is so much fun and he is not a tiny little baby anymore he has turned into this fun little boy who Klinton and I love to play with. He has so much personality and being his mom is the best blessing in the world. Klinton might not admit to it but he loves being his dad and loves messing around with him already. Life is so great with Max in it and even though life was great before Max was in it, I couldn't dream of returning to the way things were before that.

Everyday is a new adventure and everyday we learn new things.