Eli's first birthday

Eli Thomas is 1! Eli weighs 25.4 lbs (75% percentile) and is 31 1/4 inches (75%). This is day three of complete weaning .. no bottle!  He is doing well but has been a little fussier than usual the past few days. Hopefully he will forget about the bottle soon. Eli loves all foods.. so I can't reallly pick one that is his favorite. He is on the run.. anywhere and everywhere! His new word today was an approximation of 'stinky' I was changing him saying "stinky, stinky, stinky" and he imitated it back! He has a new trick.. he can point to my nose and mouth when asked... I love it!  He is still pretty hairless.. he does a a few curls on the back of his head though!

We had Eli's first birthday at the Train Depot here in town with a jungle animal theme. I will post some pictures of his party later. He loved his cake and had chocolate all over him! We had lots of friends and family to help us celebrate.

This year has flown by...it has been mark by heart renching sadness... I remember last year at this time my dad being at the hospital when his namesake, Eli Thomas was born and coming to our house to hold him after he came home. I would have never imagined that he wouldn't be here to celebrate Eli's first birthday. We have had sorrow, but I am so thankful that God has given us joy in this year of firsts for Eli.


I look like my daddy!



What is that thing you are pointing at me?



Love to  clap

Health updates

Well the oncologist diagnosed my aunt with stage III A cancer.. that was definitely hard to hear. They put her port in yesterday and she starts chemo March 28th. She will take chemo until August 1st. Here is a link about her type of cancer.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixed_M%C3%BCllerian_tumor

I went to the doctor for strep throat and ended up telling them about my heart racing and feeling tight so the Dr. ordered a holter monitor for 24 hours. When they reviwed the findings I showed a run of v-tach (ventricular tachycardia) so he put me on a beta blocker and ordered a echo and a stress echo. The results of the echo and stress echo were normal so I really think it is stress related. Anyway I have to take the beta blocker for a while and then follow up in two weeks. The sad part is that I had to stop nursing because the beta blocker slows down the heart and can pass through breast milk.... which wouldn't be good for Eli. Eli has been fine.. I think he was pretty much ready to be weaned.

On a positive note we met with our builder Tuesday night and are trying to get our house plan finalized! We have had a lot of rain lately so our grader hasn't been able to do much with our driveway. Hopefully it will dry out soon. I will say it has been a headache trying to get a power pole moved- it was right in the middle of our right away. I have called the power company, phone company and cable company so many times! The cable company said the job had been completed (aka.. moving their stuff to the new pole) when in actuality they canceled the order and sent it to a contractor. I was hot to trot so I told them the pole was going to be bull dozed and they better move the cable or they would have some angry customers. That got them moving and they were out there that night moving the cable! A little pressure is all it takes :)

Llama Llama Red Pajama

Eli loves this book. For all you mommies you should go check it out. It is about a little llama that wants his mama and he pitches a fit when she doesn't come right away!

baby wash.......

OKay so I was scrolling through blogs when I should be asleep and I came across this website that shows baby products and other cosmetics and rates them on a scale in regards to health hazard. Pretty scary!
http://www.cosmeticdatabase.com/browse.php?maincat=skin+care+%28baby%29


 I love Johnson's lavender baby wash but this website shows that..

Ingredients in this product are linked to:
	Cancer
	Developmental/reproductive toxicity
	Allergies/immunotoxicity
	Use restrictions
	Other concerns for ingredients used in this product: Neurotoxicity, Organ system toxicity (non-reproductive),Miscellaneous, Multiple, additive exposure sources,Irritation (skin, eyes, or lungs), Enhanced skin absorption,Contamination concerns, Occupational hazards

11 months....Eli is almost one!

Eli's 11 month update:

Length: Long
Weight: HEAVY
Shoe size: 5 1/2
Clothes size: 18 months
Eli is walking everywhere and into everything. He is a sweet, well natured baby. He hasn't added too many new words lately because he has been so focused on walking. He does like to say an approximation of 'woof woof' when you say what does the dog say. He also likes his Papa Jim to sing  "Who let the dogs out" and he responds "woof woof". He loves trucks and balls. He will push trucks around the living room making 'vrrmm vrmmm' noises. He says 'ball' a lot! He can kick a ball and throw a ball. It is so funny how boys seem to gravitate towards 'boy' toys. Eli is eating mostly table food, some baby food, formula and breast milk. I did buy organic whole milk and have been giving him a few ounces mixed in to get him used to the taste. My milk supply is about dry.. he only nurses morning and night. I wanted to nurse longer but I am thankful we have made it to a year. I have been supplementing since my dad died because my supply plummeted. I am very thankful we have not had to buy formula until recently.. wow that stuff is expensive! He continues to sleep through the night which I am very, very thankful for. I left him for the first time this past weekend to go take care of my Aunt Jane in Georgia. I was gone Friday through Monday night and Josh had the boys all to himself. He did take Eli over to his mom's on Saturday afternoon for a few hours while he "cleaned house and went to the grocery store" napped. He told me that he would never take me for granted so hopefully he won't forget that experience for a while.

Eli fed himself applesauce with a spoon.. then he saw my spoon and tried that one....

then he decided spoons were for the birds and used his mouth!

Part time... whooohooo

This is my last full week of work! Starting next week I will be working part time :) I have decided I want to work Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. This will give me a looooong weekend. I really just decided that in order for me to keep my sanity I needed to give up something... so work it is! I am excited that I will get two extra days with Eli.

Cancer Be-Gone!

We found out last Friday that my Aunt Jane (my dad's sister) has a rare aggressive uterine cancer... it is called a mixed mullerian tumor. It is unbelievable that we are dealing with cancer again... I think we are all in shock. She left this past weekend to go back to Georgia and to start treatment. Aunt Jane has been up since we found out Daddy had lung cancer- taking care of him and then taking care of Dad's estate for us. She has been a wonderful sister to my dad- they were so close and loved each other dearly. Besides being such a great sister to my dad she is our only Aunt and a terrific one at that. Audra and I have been like Aunt Jane's own children and she has spoiled us rotten since the day we were born. We love to travel with Aunt Jane, we have been to: NYC, Bermuda, Alaska, Hawaii, the Bahamas, Canada (Quebec, and Prince Edward Island), out West, up North, and she took Audra and I to Ireland when I graduated with my masters and Audra finished her BS. It has been such a blow for Aunt Jane but she is so strong. We lost my grandmother a year ago and then Dad on January 3rd. Plus her mother-in-law has terminal cancer right now.  She needs lots of prayers and encouragement. If you would like to send her a card please message me and I will send you her address. Please pray that the doctors can remove all the cancer and she will be healthy!


http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/janeboydhamilton

Isaac the Anchor

Isaac is part of the WGLN news team at his elementary school. Here is a clip from the morning announcements. He has always been so animated... I think he would do well on TV! Sorry for the poor quality of the video.. for some reason my phone did not want to record this.

Views from our future home

We picked out the spot for our house!

Eli's 10th month

Eli weighs 22.8 lbs and is in 18 month clothing.... yes he is a big boy! Unfortunately Carter and Eli are in the same size clothing now so we don't get all those cute hand me down Janie and Jack outfits.. bummer! I am boxing up all the outgrown clothes because we just found out that.............. another baby is on the way. I  am getting a new nephew/niece :O  I am hoping for a niece... I love these sweet boys but it would be nice to see a bit of estrogen in the family. My sis is due around October 3rd. She is trying to get Josh and I to have another one so her baby will have a playmate the same age but I said absolutely not. We have no space and I have just now (3 months ago) started enjoying a full nights rest. Let's see what else... oh yeah.. Eli can walk... he walked across the living room the other day all by himself; still major wobbly and can get around much faster crawling. He is so proud of himself when he walks and just grins and beams up at you. He continues to learn new words.. today he said "a". He has a Leap Frog toy that says the alphabet and he loves to push the button and listen to the alphabet song. His favorite word right now is 'ball'.  He says 'ball' all day and loves to go find, throw, and carry all the balls. My milk supply has significantly decreased but I am still trying to hold out until a year. After much prodding on my part, the little guy has learned how to drink of out a straw.. and finally mastered the straw sippy cup. I thought he was never going to get the hang of the straw.. he just kept wanting to bite it. I ordered his party stuff this week... it is hard to believe that we will be celebrating his first birthday soon!



Sweet chubby hands