Take a hike!

It was a nice day to go for a hike, so we went to Cheyenne Mountain State Park. It's pretty much in our back yard. We hiked somewhere between 4-5 miles. Mia wasn't as into it as we were so she was on Gary's shoulders for quite a bit of the trek.

Little Miss Sassafrass!

I've had two other moms describe their daughters as "sassy", and it seems to be too fitting for this age. Apparently, she has decided that she shall be doing the bossing from here on out. We've had several talks, time out sittings and practices with being polite. I'm well aware that it's my own tone that also needs to be tweaked, after all, who else tells her what to do for most of the day? I can probably only speak for myself when I say "we" have been trying hard to use a nice voice more often. It's funny, you have grand plans of raising a gracious and polite child and when it backfires, you realise that it's yourself you are seeing in this tiny little person!

She had a big day. We've been trialing quinoa (keen-wah) for four days now with no immediate (IgE mediated) reaction, but she's a slow fail when it comes to non-IgE mediated and eosinophilic reactions. We have not seen anything bad on the bathroom front, but her behavior has certainly changed today. I added an eighth of a teaspoon of flax seed oil to each serving, perhaps that should stop. She actually refused to finish her bowl tonight, which is very out of character since she cries and badgers me for more!

Daddy and our newly appointed handyman have spent the day replacing our front door with a new one, so that our renters will be happy with the heating bills! The old one was probably the original and needed to come out. We know that too much heat was escaping through it over the winter. Mia and I blew bubbles for a while on the lawn, where she suddenly decided that she was tired and would "lay down on mommy" for...oh half a second. After the work began on the door, we loaded up our fifty million pounds of library books and headed to the library to get another half ton!
Mia absolutely LOVES the library. They have a great little hidey hole cushioned area and she makes a beeline for it every time. She'll sit with a book and "read" while I fill the bag with books. She helps sometimes, mostly trusting my judgment. On occasion I have enough patience left on the Mia Card to grab a book for myself (not that I'll ever get to finish one for the next 23 years!)

After stuffing the book bag into the car we walked next door to the thrift shop run by the local catholic church. I have been on a mission to find My First Leap Pad books and cartridges since we just got one of the pads for the trip. I bid on a lot of 4 books on Ebay, thinking surely they had their cartridges, but after the auction ended, I got four books without them. I went back to the listing and it appears that it was not mentioned until someone asked the seller AFTER I bid. Shame on me for not asking myself, but now I have four useless books. ANYWAY, I walk in and there on the shelf are three sets! We were pretty excited (well, I was, she was more impressed with the ziplock bags they were in) and thought we'd see if our luck extended to the Salvation Army a couple of blocks down. It didn't, but I did finally find an ipod cover and a belt to hold up my pants that have somehow become too big. She was very well behaved in the stores.

Perhaps that is why we had a little squirmy worm on our hands for the potato bake that the church held for the new library. They are moving and the youth at church wanted to help with funds, so they baked potatoes and set up bowls and bowls of yummy toppings. Mia had her quinoa but didn't eat very much of it. She was unusually whiny (okay, toddlers are whiny but she was VERY whiny) and when we went home to read Babar before bed, she fell asleep before I even finished! We didn't even do our goodnight song and prayers because she was sawing logs as I lay her down.

I wish I were as tired. I'm antsy and wired, but not in a productive way. It's the run-in-circles bat-crazy kind of wired. I should start on that car seat cover, because they certainly aren't getting cheaper on ebay!

No Transfusion!

We don't have to do a transfusion after all! We met with a hematologist yesterday. She said that the levels in the blood are definitely low and she is certainly anemic. She understands why the regular pediatricians were having fits but she, being a blood doctor, she said that she does not usually transfuse until "10 points lower" than where Mia is currently. She thinks that intensive iron supplementation will help since it is clearly nutritional and we know how it happened. Her gut had a bleed, didn’t absorb properly and even though it seems to have calmed down, she has never had more than the recommended daily value for iron, not enough to catch up to what she lost. It also happens slowly so that kids just adjust to the miserly feelings that adults complain about, and before you know it you have a cranky hyperactive kid. We are beyond happy that this is fixable with our original plan of an iron infusion with next week’s IVIG.

We heard yesterday that the request packet has made it all the way up to the Department of the Army, so we should hear something soon. I know I’ve been saying that a lot, but it’s honestly closer this time. We will definitely hear about whether or not it was granted quickly, but as for the actual assignment it will probably take longer. Gary spoke with the assignment manager and she wasn’t optimistic about Colorado Springs because it’s apparently pretty full and would require a lot of shuffling. She asked if we have a second choice, and that is where we are torn. We have a couple of ideas, but both of them would cause delays or worse with getting into Denver’s Eos program. We do know that anywhere would likely be better for Mia than Anchorage right now, but the more I can keep her off of an airplane, the better. Our favorite airline (which really wasn’t stellar, in the grand scheme of things, if that tells you anything) just merged with Delta, so we are hosed as far as allergy support and understanding at 30,000 feet!

The weather has me supremely confused and ticked off. The first few pictures are of Mia playing in our beautiful almost 60* sunshine... The last one shows half of our snow dump from today. I think we can say it's nearing a foot, up to 8" more expected by tomorrow morning! It's better than rain, but I was ready for spring! It's pretty, but really, I'm over it.

She likes to dress herself!

Excelent bubble weather

Aaaaaaaand I'm done.