Wheat Gluten, Solid Food, and a 5K

Well I figured it was time to update again, pretty interesting stuff going on for Team Ferrell!

Maizy has started eating solid food, she is doing pretty well with it, alot of time babies who have been intubated have a texture aversion, but Maizy is doing great with it.  She is also sitting up and doing awesome at that as well, she isn't a giant fan of sitting, as she would rather try to stand!  She is also dominating her jump-a-roo.  She goes nuts in that thing, jumping and flailing her arms in the air.  I can't help but sing the House of Pain hit "Jump Around" when I see her doing it. 

Piper had some big news recently, we had noticed that she really was a very small kid, full of energy and very smart...but very small as well!  Her doctor charted out her growth since she was born and noticed that since she stopped breastfeeding she had fallen off the growth chart.  After consulting with Piper's doctor, who may I add is awsome by the way, we started to think that perhaps Piper was not getting enough animal protein which is the most "complete" protein you can eat.  Piper eats alot of fruit, vegetables and beans so we thought that could be it.  While we thought we had pinpointed it, we still decided to do some blood tests to make sure that there was no thyroid, kidney problem, or anything of that nature. 

Well we got the results back and everything is fine with her kidneys, thryoid, etc.  However the tests did overwhelmingly find something, something that explained the stunted growth, lack of weight gain, and her giant albeit cute belly....Piper has Celiac Disease.  Celiac is an allergy to wheat gluten that causes in children all the issues she had been having with growth, her belly and "her digestion."

I must admit though I had some pre-concieved notions of Celiac....or the whole wheat gluten fad is probably the better way of putting it.  I thought it was a load of bullshit.  Everyone today has some "intolerance" to something, wheat gluten, peanuts, lactose, exercise, guns, common courtesy, clowns...the list goes on.  Most of it is a load of steaming horse turds.  If your tum-tum hurts after you eat something, it doesn't mean you are intolerant to it...everyone needs a cause/disabilty/allergy/etc now days. 

Well guess what Celiac is real and good old Piper has it, I still wasn't 100% convinced until I saw the test results that were incredibly high in indicating Celiac...and even more convincing are the changes already being noticed in short period of time Piper has been gluten free.  She has gained two pounds and grown an inch in a month.   Traci actually saw a study that indicated that some children after going gluten free will grow 5 inches in a year! 

So yes Piper has Celiac and Maizy has a heart condition...so if you believe in past life stuff, and Karma...I apparently punched Moses in the mouth, or sold my family for whiskey, or something in a past life.  Of course I am kidding, it could be much worse and Piper is as smart, energetic and wonderful as always, Maizy is rocking and rolling, and we can handle this just like we have everything else.  There is no need to feel sorry for ourselves, post sad bastard messages of Facebook, or anything like that because when it comes down to it...nothing is a disability unless you make it one.  You just buck up and do what needs to be done!  Plus now she can be that hip kid that doesn't eat gluten.  It's a health fad right now to you know!!

One last thing before I wrap this up, at the end of February we are doing the Red Dress Run in Minneapolis KS.  February is Congenital Heart Defect Month, and we think you should be running the race too!!  Here is a link, we will be the people wearing the shirts that say "Team Maizy!"  Here is the link if you are interested.
http://www.ottawacountyhealthcenter.com/Red-Dress-Run.html

I hope all of you are well, and remember LIFE IS GOOD!!!

More pics!!

You are coming with me kitty!

Kitty shot put!!

Deeter the cat is the labrador of cats.

Ok kid...no more playing

Love = Kitty headlocks

Hello everyone!

Just doing some light reading

Is this Hemingway....it has to be...it's brilliant

Add caption

Going for a jog in this beautiful weather

Holy shit I need a rest...wait is that a rock?

Back at it!!!

I need a drink!

Champion!!

Mommy had a meeting

Well tonight Traci had a meeting so I was given the evening to hang out with the girls, and when I say evening it was about an hour, and when I say hang out...I mean lets see how bad we can screw with dad.

First off we finished up dinner and that seemed to be going okay....maybe this will turn okay for me.

Next off bathtime...that went okay, after we got out I was getting Maizy ready while Piper waited patiently wrapped up in her towel.  Then I heard "Hey daddy....." I turned my head to see Piper smirking at me just long enough to toss off her towel and take off running naked out of the bathroom...."bye daddy!" she screamed.  Okay so I at least have one child dressed.

 So I went out into the family to tell Piper I needed to try to put Maizy to sleep..."Okay daddy I will help you."  I told her that the best way to help was to stay in the family room and play quietly with her princess castle.  "Okay but I don't want to wear any clothes..."  I reluctantly agreed because I knew she knew that I was holding a 7 month old and she was going to get to do whatever the hell she wanted.  Plus sometimes you just need to run around naked.

So I went to Maizy's room and started to give her a bottle and get her to sleep....that was when things got quiet in the family room....not like a "please be quiet" kind of quiet....but more like a property damage/daddy I broke my leg/I think this is on fire kind of quiet.  That was when I realized something....I had not taken Piper to the bathroom after her bath.  See Piper has been potty trained since before she was two...she took to it fast, which was awesome and spearheaded by Traci, but sometimes when she gets to playing, and having fun you need to make sure she goes potty.  Well she had a lot to drink today and I made a mental note before bathtime to make her go potty when she got out of the tub...that mental note was apparently written in Chinese because I completely missed it. 

So just as Maizy closes her eyes, the silence is broken in the family room..."UH OH DADDY I NEED HELP...I HAVE TO PEE!"  The only thing that came into my head was "Oh shit, please don't pee on the carpet...mom's only been gone for 40 minutes."  She came running in the room...."Daddy I peed...sorry....I told you I had to go...." then she ran out.  Oh great.  So I put Maizy in bed...she was asleep at least so I hadn't completely failed at getting the girls tended to while mom was gone. 

I came out of the room just in time to see the headlights of Traci's car coming up the driveway.  So I had to move quick to find the place Piper peed in an attempt to make it look like all hell had not broken loose the hour she was gone.  It was pretty easy to find where Piper peed...somehow she was able to piss all over a throw pillow that was on the floor...not a drop on the carpet....well played Piper, well played.  I quickly picked up the pillow as Traci came walking through the door...first thing out of Piper's mouth was "Mommy I peed on the pillow." "It's okay" I said "I got Maizy into bed and asleep and Piper had an accident while I was in Maizy's room." 

Traci then went into the Maizy's room to check on her, and was that sweet little girl who was asleep two minutes earlier still asleep?  Oh no...she was wide awake smiling as if to say "Hey mom, I pretended to be asleep because I wanted to f*ck with daddy!"

So in review....Traci left for roughly an hour for a meeting, Piper ran around naked, Maizy faked sleeping, Piper pissed on a pillow...and Traci just kind of smiled at me like the slow kid in 5th grade who finally stopped eating glue. 

Kids 1  Dad 0

But hey if it wasn't for this kind of stuff, life would certainly be boring...and not smell like pee.  LIFE IS GOOD!

Pics!

Just holding my bottle...no biggie

What are you doing out there Scout?

Hey what's up?!?!

I'm in a band!

Maizy's DJ table...spinnin' beats!

Hi there Mr. Bear!

Where did you go?!?!?!?!

Treadmills and teeth!

Hello everyone!  I trust all is well in your home, things are going great here as well!

Traci and I have recently started our half marathon training for the Abilene Marathon.  I have run this race the past two years and Traci has run it as well.  They offer a 5k, 10k, half marathon, and full marathon.  Neither of us have ventured into the arena of full marathons yet, so we are doing the half this year.  The weather has no allowed us to do our training runs outside very often so we have been forced inside and onto the treadmill.  If you know our family you know that running inside on a treadmill is not ideal, we would rather be outside.  So we have been doing our runs inside, which has led to Piper discovering the wonders of the treadmill.

One day as I was running inside, I had that feeling like someone was watching me...sure enough someone was..."Hey...what are you doing daddy?" Piper asked.  "I am running" I said, Piper looked at me like I was crazy.  "What are you running on, daddy?" Piper asked.  "I am running on a treadmill" I said.  "Oh...let me try" Piper says....thus began Piper's love affair with the treadmill.  She routinely asks now to run on the treadmill, so I place her on the treadmill and hold her hands as she walks on it, then she will demand to go faster and faster.  Granted the treadmill is set at 1.4 which is very slow for an average sized adult, for a child the size of Piper it's an all out sprint.  She loves it.  She will tell me "Daddy, I am tired, I am all done," so I will take her off the treadmill and she will immediately ask me if she's sweating.  She thinks she is sweating because she ran alot, and she is training for a race too!  Needless to say its entertaining in our house as usual.

Maizy's teeth finally broke through so she now has too little sharp teeth on her bottom gums right in the front, it's pretty adorable...and it's pretty painful.  She decided the other day when I was coming in for a kiss to show me just how efficient she was with her teeth, and she latched onto my nose.  Yeah they are sharp, yep they hurt....and hell yes she thought it was hilarious.  It now appears by all accounts the she is getting more teeth, which means she will now have a better chance of instilling more damage on my nose in the future. 

Well thats about all for now, I trust everyone is happy and well.  Life is Good!!

New teeth, the Battle of the Paci, and sledding

Hello all, well this is has been one heck of a week or so, a lot of very significant things have taken place in the Ferrell home.

First off Maizy finally has a tooth that has broken through, that's right our little one has a nice piece of jagged enamel poking through her gums!  It seemed to take forever, but that damn thing broke through.  While I do not remember how teething was when I was an infant, I can only imagine it sucked...alot...I mean epic suckiness.  The poor girl was flushed, had a horrible diaper rash, and seemed to be crapping at an alarming rate...but no worries the tooth broke through, and everything seemed to be just fine...only 100 more to go...kids have a 100 teeth right?

Next up, Traci decided that now was a good time to attempt to ween Piper off her pacifer, or as she calls it her "that" which was a name picked up from us at some point when we asked each other to pick "that" up and give it to her.  I imagine it was probably me half crying asking Traci just to give "that" to her so she would stop crying and I could go back to sleep...I am tough like that you know.

Anyway, so one Monday night Traci decides to try to put Piper to bed withough a pacifer, her reasoning being if she has to take out her pacifer to talk to us then she is too old for it, albeit she is only 2 1/2 years old.  See Piper didn't even take a pacifer until after she was a year old, so we thought it was time to just get her to stop taking the thing.  Piper only took her pacifer at nap and bedtime so Traci decided to try to see if we could get her to bed without the pacifer.  You may have noticed by now that I continue to refer to Traci and her decisions in this endeavor...why do you ask am I doing this?  Well it was her idea...I was just along for the ride, thanking God that I had to leave that next morning for work, and would not return for a couple days.  

The pacifer weening is best described as an epic battle...lets call it "The Battle of the Paci" Traci is the United States, tenacious and ready to battle no matter the odds, as Piper was crying for her pacifer she simply states "We will get through this she needs to just figure this out."  I am more like the French..as soon as Piper cried for her pacifer, I immediately surrendered...explaining to Traci "for Christ sake just give her the damn pacifer!"  Which may I add was roughly 10 minutes into the battle.  

Well it went much better than I thought it would, bedtime that night was a bit tough, she cried and wanted her pacifer for a little bit, and was convinced that we had lost it, and needed to find it.  So she kept volunteering to get up and help us look for it.  She cried for a bit but ultimately fell asleep.  Magically she hasn't asked for her pacifer since that night, it still takes a bit more time to get her to sleep but she is sans pacifer at night and at naps.  So I call that a success, one that I really had no hand in....but hey....whatever.

Maizy also had her 6 month appt and is growing and gaining weight just as she should be, so we are very happy and thankful for that!  She now weighs 12 lbs 15oz!  Good job kiddo!

Also we got about 8 inches of snow here on New Years Eve, so recently we decided that we should go sledding at Traci's parents house, Piper and I had been sledding quite a bit at our house so we thought that sledding at Traci's parents house would be a great time.  I guess it's worth noting that Papa and RaRa live on the HIGHEST POINT IN OTTAWA COUNTY!!!!  So Piper and I pulled out a sled, sat down and took off....Piper had a great time...she loved it...I think I shit my pants. 

That hill was steep, lots of jumps and apparently some rocks...which is evidenced by the massive bruise on my ass.  But Piper laughed all the way down and when we would crash she would say "Oh man...wipe out" or "Oh wow that was a great crash daddy."  What can I say she gets her toughness from me. 

Well that's enough for now, hope all is well with everyone and remember...LIFE IS GOOD!!!  

Happy New Year Everybody!

Well NYE has come and gone and I must say that this year was the first time in a very long time that I woke up on New Years Day without a headache and a fragmented memory of what happened the night before.

Traci, the girls and I had a movie night at our house, we watched Enchanted, which of course is a princess movie which works well since I live with three of them.  Dad gets overruled when he wants to watch James Bond, Star Wars, or my all time favorite the Thomas Crown Affair.  So princess movies it is!

As I laid on the floor cuddled up with my girls I quickly realized that this was by far the very best NYE I had ever had!  Being there with them was all I needed.  Everything was perfect. 

Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed myself when I rocked out on NYE, we all did.  But there reaches a time when ringing in the new year puking in bushes, getting your head closed in a car door, and passing out with a lit cigarette in a recliner just doesn't seem as much fun as it used to be.  The past few previous NYE I had drank my weight in whiskey and dominated Band Hero with our good friends in Concordia.  Apparently I do a pretty mean rendition of "Santa Monica" by Everclear.  Do I think I will do it again, maybe the band hero, but I try to not puke in public anymore, and I quit smoking a long time ago.

My goal this year is to strive to be a better father, husband and man.  I think we can all strive to be better people to one another.  This world is a tough, angry place...one less angry person would do the world a lot of good.

So with that being said I have compiled a list of things I think would make 2013 a better year!  Drum roll please!

1. Stop fighting with your baby mama or baby daddy on facebook.  No one besides your family, and the court system give a sh*t if that person is a worthless dead beat, dates skanks/thugs, or just bought a 90 Toyota Tercel, but still hasn't paid child support.
2. Quit looking for sympathy on facebook, sure people may tell you to "stay strong" "your day will come" or "You are the world's greated person" but really they are silently hoping you stop posting about how lonely, broke or horny you are.
3. Eat better and exercise.  Yep everyone has this resolution at some point, very few of us keep it, and then we spend the rest of the year being made because we are fat.  Get a simple plan, and stick to it, before too long it becomes a routine.  Trust me I know from experience its tough to do...it took Traci roughly 3 years to get me to care about my health.  I do now, and it feels great. 
4. Eat more vegetables
5. If you are over the 30 years old and don't have a record deal...you probably never will.  Give it up and get a real job.
6. Smile a little more, even if they glare back at you..just do it.  I was startled when we moved to Concordia how many people wave at one another as they drive by...its old school kindness...I like it.  Keep it up or start doing it.  I sometimes do it while I am working in bigger areas in Kansas...most of the time I figure those folks are trying to figure out for a good 20 minutes if they knew that guy that just waved at them.
7. Go outside more, put down the video games, the remote, the computer whatever.  Go outside and get some fresh air...heck maybe talk to someone face to face instead of over text message, email, or battling them on some online video game.  Human interaction is a necessity, and we are lacking that greatly.
8. Try a little harder, do something outside your comfort zone...or just get a job. 
9. Don't be so serious, everytime I turn around someone is bent out of shape and offended by something said by someone else.  We are by far the most sensitive generation to ever inhabit this planet.  Lighten up you self absorbed babies.
10. And finally...just be good to one another.  We are all in this together.

Good luck in 2013!