Allergies and Cameras

It's time for an update. First about the dairy and allergies. It's been a week and a day now and I'd really like a big, tall glass of milk. I still don't know a whole lot, though. It seems like Celestes eczema is going away. However, she is still stuffy. She had a low grade fever on Wednesday so I'm not sure if she picked up another bug or what. My plan is to stay off the milk/dairy for another week and see what happens. I don't know what I'm doing and wonder if I'm doing more harm than good. Now is she not getting the calcium she needs? I just wish she could breathe clear for once! (It gets me frustrated, if you couldn't tell!)

Now about my digital photography class and cameras. Last Saturday was my first day of my photography class. I learned a lot about the settings on a camera, the aperture and shutter speed and what to set them at for different pictures, etc. I was excited to learn about that. However, I didn't learn much about what camera to buy. But I think I know what camera I want. The teacher of the class asked me if I was figuring out what I wanted to buy and started talking about the SLR cameras. (They are the ones that you have different lenses.) I told him I didn't think I needed one of those and he looked at me funny and said, "Well if so, you're the first one!" I just don't want to have to keep buying the lenses that zoom and they are as expensive as the camera. This is the camera I'm looking at. It's a Canon PowerShot SX10 IS. It is a new camera and released on October 15th. It has a large zoom and 10 MP so I can blow my pictures up. I think it will work well for me.

Now I want to know what camera you have, what you like about it or what you don't like about it or wished it had. So please tell me! And if you know anything about cameras I'd like to know!

Good Bye to Dairy Products

Sorry I haven't been very faithful at posting. There hasn't been too much happening in our home. Part of that is because Ryan hurt his back again a week ago and was moving slow all week long and then I got sick on Thursday. All is well now, though!

The real reason for this post is to give you an update with Celeste and our new plan. To fill you in, Celeste has had a stuffy nose since she was about 1 month old. I kept thinking it was just one cold after another but at times I wondered if it was allergies. My pediatrician told me at her 4 month check up that it is very uncommon for allergies this young, but it is possible and it'd be something she's getting through my milk. He asked if I eat a lot of dairy and yes, I do. Milk and eggs are most common food allergy for children. (And peanuts but I don't eat those very often at all.) I didn't think much of it and thought I'd just stick it out and hope the stuffiness would go away soon. So a week passed and Celeste got a cold. (I'm pretty sure it was a cold.) She had the green snot and a cough. However, when that cold passed, she went back to clear snot like she had before and has had all along. So I started really wondering if it was a food allergy. Celeste also has eczema, which is tied to food allergies. Now I'm not a doctor or any sort of medical professional, so I don't understand how a food allergy can cause a stuffy nose, but they say it does. After 4 months of a stuffy nose, I'm willing to give anything a shot. I've decided to go off dairy products (milk, cheese, and also eggs) for a couple weeks and see if there is any change in Celeste. If you know me well, you know I LOVE milk. This is going to be a real challenge for me, so hopefully I can make it! I have mixed feelings about it. I really want it to help her, yet I hope it doesn't. I want it to help so I can finally know why she is always so stuffy. However, I don't want her to have an allergy and I want to continue drinking milk! If she does have a milk allergy, the good thing is that it is one that a lot of children will outgrow. So wish me luck this week as I go without my milk. Today was my first day. I'll let you know how it goes. Also, if anyone has had any experiences with their children and allergies, please give me any information you know that may help me!

And, I had to add a couple of pictures of Celeste. She's almost sitting up on her own. The second picture she is falling over. These aren't great pictures like the last ones. They are just snapshots I took today.

Answers

I thought I'd do a quick post to answer all the questions I had about the pictures. So, the first question was what do I use as a backdrop? I dug through my mom's fabric stash and found big pieces of different fabric. So it is just a piece of fabric. I think a bed sheet would work great, too. The next question is where do I set up? It's different every time. I go where I have a lot of natural light. Some were taken in her room, others in my room. Now the lighting I'm not good at. You can't tell very well because of the dark background but there are shadows. People have told me natural light is the best and an overcast day outside is the best lighting. The pictures of Celeste in the purple top ere taken outside on my deck when it was overcast. That's why there aren't any shadows! The first pink picture Celeste is just on the floor, but the rest of them she's propped up on a boppe. The last question is about the camera. I was borrowing my friends nice camera to take these pictures. I was using a Canon Rebel XT. It is a nice SLC camera with 8 mega pixels. Now I don't know a lot about cameras but I think you can take these pictures with any camera, but the more mega pixels, the better they are going to blow up to an 8x10 or whatever.

Speaking of cameras, I'm looking into buying me a new camera. However, I don't know what to get or even look for in a new camera. Therefore, I am taking a digital photography class in a few weeks! It's just two different Saturdays for 4 hours each day. You are supposed to bring in your own digital camera to learn how to use it better and learn how to take better digital pictures. Since I don't have my own nice digital camera, I'm going to borrow my parents nice camera they just purchased. I'm hoping in this class I will learn a lot more and figure out what I want in my camera that I'm going to get someday. (Probably for Christmas...) I'm excited about it and will let you know how it goes! If you have any other questions, go ahead and ask me but I'm not a pro and really don't know much on this topic!

More Pictures

Poor Celeste, her crazy mom was at it again.....These pictures were taken yesterday.

This is the start of the pictures I took today.

Opps...had a blow out. Change of outfits!

I really want your opinion! Do you have a new favorite?

Family Members: Please let us know what picture(s) and size(s) you'd like. Note that Celeste had a runny nose while I took the pictures in the pink outfit. I'm afraid the snot will show up when I enlarge the pictures. Maybe not though, we'll see.

For April

This past summer, my little sister, April, was home from college. We had the opportunity to work together and had so much fun. Celeste loves her Aunt April! Thanks for all the fun times we had this summer and for watching Celeste for us when we needed it! We love you and miss you tons and hope you have a great year at BYU.

To everyone else, April has encouraged me to update my blog more often so that is why I've been posting so much! I'll try to continue to post often for you, April!

Our Camping Adventure

Friday night of Labor Day weekend, we went camping with a bunch of our friends. It was quite the experience, to say the least. To start off, let me tell you who was there. There was a total of five families, all with a child that's 1 year or younger, and two women who are pregnant. We had 12 kids there under 10 years of age and then a 13 year old. So, 13 kids to keep track of. I thought for sure one of the toddlers were going to fall into the fire, but thankfully, that didn't happen! Anyways, we started our adventure Friday after work and headed up the mountain around 5:45. Only one car got lost and one car got stuck, but that was nothing compared to the rest of the trip. Friday night, we're all hanging around the campfire, eating, chatting, and trying to calm down our babies. I don't think there was 10 minutes the whole night that one baby wasn't crying. At about 11 or so that night, one of the kids started throwing up. She made it out of the tent the first time, but not the second time. So now we are short a sleeping bag and it wasn't a warm night. We gathered blankets and everyone was okay. We all went to bed around 12:30 or 1 and personally, I slept pretty good. Celeste was a trooper and did awesome. She still slept great and stayed warm. Here is a picture of her sleeping. I had her bundled up pretty good!
So then morning came. Nebels made breakfast and it was fantastic. We just played and hung out all morning, ate lunch and waited for the babies to wake up from their naps so we could take a hike. Meanwhile, the 13 year old was playing, tripped, and started screaming. Everyone ran over to find the blood, but there was none. Instead of blood, they found an elbow that was out of socket. Luckily we had a dentist and a pharmacist amongst us who popped it back into the socket but thought he may have broken his arm also. After a blessing and pain drugs, this child's dad loaded him up to make the long ride to the hospital. However, he didn't want to go alone so Ryan was volunteered to go with him because none of the other wives wanted to be left alone with their three children. (They thought I could handle our one!) So they headed down the mountain and I was left alone. We all decided to still take our hike. It was a short, fun, pretty hike though. Here are a few pictures of the hike and the lake we hiked to.

See all the kids running around? I think Celeste quite enjoyed the hike.

When we got back from our hike, we started to pack up camp. All my great friends helped me take down our tent and pack up since I was alone and had Celeste to take care of also. We headed down the mountain to try to catch up with the men who made the hospital run and decided to do our dutch oven dinner at the bottom of the mountain. After everyone was back together and we heard the news his arm was broken, we started our dinner. However, we didn't make it too far when we realized we didn't have any charcoal fluid for the coals. We ended up going out for burgers that night. We were all exhausted and ready to be home. I was in bed by 9:30! Here are some other pictures of everyone that was there (minus the children...they were off playing in the trees!)

Our Happy Little Family

Here are the Petersons. Unfortunately, I didn't get a picture of them together.

This is Fowlers and Blacks

The Nebels

P.S. All the stories (getting lost, stuck, throwing up, and broken bone) happened to the Nebels. I think they had rotten luck this trip. I felt bad for them and hopefully the arm heals quickly. Even though it was an adventure, we all had a great time and glad we went. And yes, we probably will go camping again next year!

4 Month Check-Up

Celeste had her 4 month check-up today. She is doing great! She got pretty My Little Pony bandaids this time! Here are her stats (I can't remember the exact percentiles so these are abouts!):

Weight: 13 lbs 8 oz (60th percentile)

Height: 23 1/2 inches (30th percentile) (I don't believe this one. I measured her at 25 inches a few weeks ago. They always measure her shorter than I do.)

Head Circumference: 17 in (90th percentile)

She's been sleeping all evening after her shots. I don't remember her sleeping this much last time she got poked. The above picture she is just waking up.