January

Excited for a new year! 

My photographic eye has been lacking lately, so I was playing around with the camera a bit one day. 

Zoe is so silly! And she is loving carrot sticks (and bell pepper sticks) lately. We don't usually put her in shoes since she's not walking and they just fall off - she looks so grown up here with shoes on! 

Tatum was too excited to model for me :) 

Zoe continues to be a great eater. She loves chicken and ground beef, chunks of veggies. We will spoon feed her some, but she prefers finger foods. 

We have been giving our kids "kindness coins" any time they do something really kind for someone else. After they accumulate 10 coins, they can go on a date with either myself or Ty. It's a game we all enjoy! This time, they all ended up with 10 coins on the same day and chose to go to Amy's Ice Cream with me! 

This was also the day before we (ok, mostly I… Ty just went along for the ride and supported) chose for our whole family to go sugar-free/grain-free for 6 weeks. I had been having some stomach issues which resolved quickly on this diet. Levi has some intense asthmatic episodes which gave him no issue during this time of no sugar/grains! I was suspecting those might be the results, but one unexpected consequence was that Colt's focus dramatically improved. And I had more energy in the afternoons. 

Anyway, it was a very big challenge to eat this way in our society. We went through about 3 very grouchy days of withdrawal. The hardest part was that we couldn't eat out much so I spent most of the day in the kitchen. We would make our own sweets to take to birthday parties and snacks to school and church. Surprisingly, the kids didn't complain after the first 3 days! One day we were at Costco and an employee offered the kids a sample of chocolate. I was expecting a negotiation session of some sort but the kids simply said, "No thank you. We can't have sugar until Valentine's Day." I was blown away but proud! I think it helped to have an end date in mind. We are now trying to eat gluten-free (so we can have rice and corn products- GMO free if possible!) and limit sugar to one time a week. Some weeks we do better than others! I can definitely tell when I've had too much gluten to eat and can see a difference in Colt as well. After our gluten/sugar-filled trip to Disney in March, Levi definitely had another quick-onset asthma attack. While I don't like the negative side-effects of this food, I believe that food is medicine which is good motivation to try to put the best of it in us, even when it's SO hard, in order to help my kids live the healthiest lives possible. Fortunately, their school teachers and our care group are fully on board to help with this - they are the best! 

Since Colt's birthday is in July, his teacher allowed him to celebrate his half-birthday at school. This picture is of Colt and his teacher's aide/music teacher, Mrs. Caldwell. She is his favorite person at school and popped in during his party to say Happy Birthday. We made strawberry cupcakes topped with a whipped cream topping (made with coconut flour and sweetened with honey since this was at the beginning of our sugar fast). I was worried his classmates wouldn't like them, but most kids asked for seconds :) This was a fun day for Colt b/c he's never been able to celebrate his birthday at school before! 

Sweet Hazel at 11 months

Eliza turned 3! She's getting so big now! 

Ty and I started doing the new P90X3 workout. It's only 30 minutes compared to their normal hour workouts. All of the kids have been joining in with us, but Levi especially has taken a liking to these exercises. 

Tatum loves dressing up! This is her Mary costume (with princess shoes on that are hard to see). 

January was a fun month! It was the first in quite a while where things calmed down in our busy schedule. And Zoe started waking up less at night, which meant we all got more sleep, so maybe that helped make the month great too :)