One Day at a Time: August 2011

Saturday, August 27, 2011

Baby's Name!

Isn't choosing a name fun? I love names. With Madelyn, we especially struggled to find a name both Jason and I loved. I still love her name now and how we spelled it. Her middle name is Alyssa, after my sister. I had wanted to use the name Caroline for Madelyn. Jason was not crazy about it when Madelyn was born but it had grown on him. We had trouble deciding on a middle name for Caroline because we wanted a family name but didn't really like the sound of them with Caroline. Her middle name is Jaye. Caroline is kind of after Cara and Jaye for Jason.

Through both pregnancies with the girls, we always had our boy name picked out. It was Charles Isaac. When Silas came along, the adoption agency had named him Silas. We called him Silas for months as we were making the adoption decision and he just wasn't a "Charlie" to me at that point. He was Silas. Thankfully I like that name too! We used Charles for Silas' middle name after Jason's dad. Jason's middle name is also Charles. We also used Silas' Chinese nickname Tuan as a second middle name.

Now on to the new baby. We talked and the kids contributed names they liked (usually a friends name!). One day her name came to me and Jason loved it too. The kids all approved and we can't wait to meet our newest family member.

Anna-Grace Ellen

Anna-Grace because we love the name. Jason's sister Kristyn's middle name is Anne. Ellen is my mom's name and my grandmothers middle name. We will call her Anna-Grace!

Madelyn Alyssa

Caroline Jaye

Silas Charles Tuan

Anna-Grace Ellen

Love them all!

Monday, August 22, 2011

T-ball

Yesterday was Silas and Caroline's first t-ball practice! They both did great! I'm glad we waited until Silas was 5 (in a few days!) to try a team sport. He is ready now. He was able to listen to his coach and participated. He was SO proud of himself. I am a little worried about his ears. I'm afraid a fast ball will hit him and injure it. I guess I will always be afraid of something like that happening...

I was talking to Caroline before practice yesterday, preparing her that the team would probably be mainly boys. I told her there might be one or two other girls, or that she might be the only one. I said, you can handle it though! She looked at me and said, "Mom, I can handle it. I handle all the boys at school!" On the way to practice she told us she hoped she was the only girl on the team. Lol! She IS the only girl, but that didn't slow her down at all. Love her little spirit!

Thursday, August 11, 2011

First Day of School!

My sweet 1st and 3rd graders!

New fancy shoes!

The girls had a fantastic first day of school today! The both declared their teachers "the best ever!" and did lots of fun things. They can't wait to go back tomorrow - makes a momma feel good that they are in such good hands. Silas' first official day is not for a couple more weeks. Stayed tuned for pictures of the little man's first day!

Monday, August 8, 2011

A GREAT Day!

Today was HUGE for our family! It was even bigger for Caroline, specifically! She has been allergic to milk since she was an infant. She started out contact sensitive (if she touched dairy products she would react - scary). After 6 years, she is allergy free!!!!!!! She has slowly outgrown her other allergies, but dairy has remained. I'm not sure how many of you read labels, but dairy is in everything.

Caroline had passed her skin test and blood test and today was her food challenge. Very slowly, they increase the amount of milk she ingests to see if she reacts. She was nervous and so were we - we have seen her react to milk in the past. She did awesome and was so brave and she passed!!! She is so excited. This will change our life!

We want to thank all of our family and friends who have been with us on this food allergy journey. Thank you for making safe food for Caroline. Thank you for being extra careful when we have visited your homes and understanding what a big thing this was to our family. I believe her strict avoidance helped her outgrow her allergies and all of you played a part in that - thank you!

Enjoy these pictures of our GREAT day!