Nutrition Facts According to Zack

Sam loves to read the nutrition facts on everything - especially cereal boxes.

Zack caught on to the craze around here. I just about died laughing. Check this out...

Letter to Jake

Who flew from the MTC in Provo, UT to Dallas, TX this past week...

Sam wanted to draw Jake a picture and drew this completely by himself! Nice, huh? Obviously, I made comments below...

Interview with Sam (and a little from Zack)

** There was no prompting, hinting, or helping with answers. Straight from Sam...**

What is your favorite color? Blue. Zack says, "blue and red."

What is your favorite number? 4, Actually I don’t like 4, I like 1. I like 4 AND 1. Zack says, "Goo goo."

Who is your best friend? I have three best friends. FOUR best friends! They are Tiger, Max, Audrey, Mommy, and Daddy, and Zack. Actually SIX.

Zack says, “Sam”

Who do you like to play with? Tiger. Zack says, “Mommy”

Where do we live? Utah. Zack says, “Ukahhh.”

What don't you like? I do not like signs. Zack says, “Choo choos. Mommy’s a choo choo!”

What is your favorite thing to do? I always like to go to Moab now. Zack says, “Choo choos. Choo choos? No, googaks!”

What is your favorite thing to eat? I like to eat watermelon and chips.

Zack says, “Moo Moo Moo Quack Quack and Dog Train.”

What do you not like to eat? I do not like to eat carrots because I’m allergic to them, and pineapple. Because I’m allergic to them! And grass! Because I’m allergic to them too! And we knew and definitely TREE NUTS! Because I’m allergic to them! (Zack ran off to play)

What is cool? When Tiger says, “Ooooh yaaaah, tough guy???”

What is cute? You. (Mommy)

What is your favorite toy? Oh I like this one, the huge lego dump truck. Tiger calls it the rescue truck.

What is your favorite show? My favorite show is Super Why and Word World too.

What is your favorite movie? Lightning McQueen

What is your favorite snack? My favorite snack is… I think I probably like corn chex the best. (Rachel watched the boys last Saturday and brought corn chex for breakfast since she’s gluten-free. She shared with the boys and apparently, Sam loves them!)

What does daddy do at work? Lots of work. And work for our family, actually. He calls us from work. And when he takes me to work, he sometimes gets me some candy from the candy closet.

What does mommy do at work? Work at home. Clear the dishes.

What makes you happy? To eat healthy food. With lots of dietary fiber. With like 8 grams. Or protein.

What is your favorite animal? Giraffes. Zack says, “I like giraffes too.”

What makes you sad? If somebody hits me. Like Zack. While we were watching a show.

What makes you tired? Well… when somebody I don’t know has a playdate.

What do you love? I love MOMMY! Zack says, “I love Aaaahhhh!” (means his sippy cup of rice milk)

Do you like it when it is rainy, or snowy, or sunny? Sunny

Do you like to play outside or inside? Inside. Because there’s lots of toys and I can play with Buzz and Woody.

How old are you when you're big? 8 to get baptized.

How old are you? 4 1/2

How old will you be on your next birthday? 5

How old am I? 29 1/2

How old is daddy? 35

What is funny? Funny is when Zack just goes like “baah baah bah!!!” and I totally crack up like this, “haa ha aahaaa haaaa!”

What is your favorite thing to do with mommy? Snuggle

What is your favorite thing to do with daddy? Snuggle AND get slurpees and donuts. (and read books)

What kinds of things do you learn in preschool? Learn to do paper rockets and do craters, and that’s all.

What do you learn in primary? Ohhh, a lot of things. Get fruit snacks. And learn about the prophets and it helps me learn about Jesus.

Why do we have to go to bed? Because then if we stay up then we’ll be super super super super super tired.

What is your favorite book? My favorite book is The Monster Who Ate Darkness and the Transformers books.

What is your favorite song? The superheroes songs and the Lightning McQueen songs.

What are your favorite clothes to wear? My superman shirt and my batman pajamas and my spiderman shirt and my spiderman pants and my jake shorts. And my jake pants.

What are you going to do when you are a grown up? Be an airplane driver. A pilot. And an astronaut. FLY IN SPACE! Go see the sun and the sunspots, Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, the asteroid belt, and then Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto. That’s all. And I want to play tackle basketball. (with these two uncles)

Thanks for the idea, Corinne. :) Love recording these answers. I think I'll interview my kids often. I love hearing what they have to say.

Alex + Twitch = FANTASTICO

Hooray for hip hop. Hooray for the funny backstory about a recovering ballet dancer. Hooray for a routine that is about something other than the nauseatingly overdone boy/girl relationship drama on SYTYCD!

Love this dance. So does Sam. Wish I could do what they do...

(This was by far the best quality video I could find. Fast forward past his "inspiration" to the dance. About 1:11 into it...)

Lessons Learned

Lesson #1

When painting your interior doors and trim, two-year-olds do NOT make good helpers.

No matter how adorable you think those mini rollers are.(Now if someone can help me get the paint off the carpet, the doorknob, cover up the paint on the walls, and get it out of both my hair and ZACK's.... we'd be good.)See those frosted tips in his hair? Yep. Still there two days later.

Lesson #2

Apparently our family wears out pants.

In the right knees only.

Know of anywhere I can buy right-knee-reinforced pants?? :)

Keep Your Eye On the Drummer

I haven't laughed this hard at a youtube video in a while. HILARIOUS.

Allergies...

Name: Zack

Allergies: Dairy, egg, and peanuts

Update: Skin test NEGATIVE for all three. As long as the blood test comes back negative we can slowly reintroduce dairy, eggs, and peanuts into his diet!!!

Name: Sam
Allergies: Mixed grass, carrot, pineapple, and severely allergic to tree nuts
Update: Possibly also has food allergy syndrome and/or eosinophilic esophagitis. More on that below...
Name: Matt
Allergies: Severe shellfish allergy, also environmental allergies - pollen, etc.
Update: Nothing new here...

Name: Marci
Allergies: NONE
Update: I just married into this mess. :)

We went to see the allergist on Thursday of last week. The prognosis was both good and bad.

Zack's future looks promising as long as the blood test comes back negative. I'll find out tomorrow . I am SO EXCITED at the possibility to reintroduce those foods. Oh- just give me eggs back! There really is no good substitute!!!

Sam's diagnosis is more mixed and unclear right now.

What we know: He is definitely severely allergic to tree nuts. I was surprised to find out that he is also allergic to carrots, pineapple, and mixed grass. It is possible that his blood test will show more allergies. The allergist wants to skin test him for other allergies now that so many of these came back positive.

What might be likely other allergies due to his reactions? Celery, tomatoes, potatoes, shellfish, and/or salmon. And maybe more than that.

See his skin test below. The top left is the control (the plus and minus sign). #1 was a 10% diluted solution of hazelnuts. HUGE welt. #3 was carrots. This picture doesn't really do that one justice, but it was also a welt. #4 was pineapple. Very allergic, although not as badly as tree nuts. And #5 was mixed grass. Smaller welt, but a reaction all the same.

Poor Sam. This was a miserable itchy experience for him...

He has always complained about food being "stuck" in his throat. He started scratching at his throat when eating at about 9 months old when we introduced various solid food. We went the dysphagia route for a while and that didn't really explain things (although I don't rule that out yet).

The allergist thinks Sam has one or both of the following:
Food Allergy Syndrome (also known as Oral Allergy Syndrome) - a non-anaphylactic allergy where raw fruits and vegetables cause an allergic reaction in the lips, mouth, or throat. BUT, they can handle them cooked.
Eosinophilic Esophagitis - an inflammatory condition where the wall of the esophagus is lined with eosinophils (a type of white blood cell that registers inflammation due to allergies). They don't exist in the esophagus on a healthy person. It basically feels like your throat is inflamed, irritated, or that food "gets stuck" anytime you eat something that causes a reaction.

The bad news: The only way to diagnose or track EE is by doing an endoscopy. So... I have been researching pediatric GI doctors and need to make an appt so that Sam can have an endoscopy.

Personally, I think Sam has EE. Maybe also FAS. Either way, my little 4 year old needs some more research before we know what's going on with him. Maybe when we figure this out, he'll actually eat more!!!

Of Stuffed Animals and More

Up to recently, I have "named" all of Sam's stuffed animals.

I was highly original.

Meet "Little Koala".
And "Big Doggy".
Not to be confused with (Big Doggy,) Al, Kanga, Little Koala again, Little Doggy, Elephant, and Blue Bear.
This boy loves his stuffed animals.
See just how creative and original I've been in naming these?

Well, last Christmas, Sam got another stuffed animal. A monster.
And for the first time, he named his own stuffed animal.

Ladies and Gentlemen... I'd like to introduce you to...

Drum roll please...

MORE. Yep. This monster's name is More.

And I have no more to say...

Zoo and Wheeler Farm

Our Joyschool is coming to a close next week! So sad! Each week, we have preschool on Mondays and Wednesdays. Then, we have Field Trip Fridays. It has been such fun to go see museums, parks, candy factories, fire stations, and everything else there is to do here.

Lately, we've gone to the zoo and Wheeler Farm. This first trip to the zoo was with some other friends too.
Three buddies
Zack and Sam. Zack was enamored with the elephants and couldn't bother to look at the camera.
At the giraffes

These two have become best buddies. Just ask them. They'll tell you that they are twins!

Measuring up.
Tori and I took our boys on a train ride at the end.
Here's our joyschool at Wheeler Farm
Buddies again.
All the kiddos looking at the horses. There are only 5 kids in our joyschool, but siblings always join us on our field trips.
On the tractor ride. Sam and Zack LOVE this part.

Back at the zoo with just our joyschool. I love these kids! Front row was our whole joyschool. It was such a fabulous group - moms included!
Partners in crime, these three...
Sam, Tiger and Max were in LOVE with the map. They would check it after seeing each animal.
Checking the map after the rhinos
and by the monkeys
and after the penguins
and by the giraffes!
Riding the carousel.
And of course... we finished with a train ride!
For some reason Zack was scared of the train this trip... but has since gotten over that silly fear.

I LOVE getting out and about and will miss our field trip Fridays! I'm going to have to start planning some more for summertime!

Lately

We've had some beautiful days, but a lot of rainy cold days here lately. So, we've been playing indoors when we can't go outside. These two have turned into such good buddies.

Playing with my laundry sorter

Playing with diggers in cornmeal. (Genius. Thanks for the tip Heidi.)

We've seen a lot of these smiles.

A lot of family visited us over Easter where we decorated sugar cookies.

Sam LOVED the sprinkles.

Really loved sprinkles.

And when his cookie was gone? Don't worry... he found MORE sprinkles!

Check out that sugary smile!

Easter happened. And Sam was quite done with me trying to get a picture of BOTH of them looking at the camera and smiling...

Sam has logged a LOT of hours playing with this uncle.

One day, the boys were supposed to be playing in the toy room while Nate and Jake were studying for their final in the basement. Well... it became a little too quiet. I found them "studying physical science" too. Sam wanted to read Jake's textbook!

When Matt was working late and my brothers were around, they often would read books to Sam.

He LOVED it.

We went to Kangaroo Zoo with Grandma and Lindsey. ALWAYS a fun time.

Lindsey and Sam were buddies the whole time!

My mom even took Zack on the slides!

Zack LOVED it there.

And now, we're hoping for warmer weather... so that we can do more of this!