Acker Family Love: The ins and outs of the past few months....

Where to begin? First of all, Lucius is fully potty trained!! Woot woot! We do have the occasional accident, but it is safe to say he poops and pees in the big potty. I never thought that teaching another person to use the facilities would make me feel so proud and accomplished! Since reaching this mile stone, he is now able to attend preschool! And starting in the fall he will be attending a part-time, co-op preschool. This means that 3 days a week, for 3 hours a day he'll be in school. And for one of those days I will be there, as a teaching aid/assistant helping out with activities. I am super stoked about it. Being involved in the boys' education is very important for me and on of the main perks for not working a conventional job. We will be applying for a summer program, but will have to wait to see if we get in.

As far as Owen goes, in the past month, we have discovered that he has a milk allergy. It manifested itself in the form of a horrible eczema skin rash on his cheeks, neck and armpits. Poor baby! Considering that he is breastfed, I have had to omit all types of dairy from my diet because the milk protein is carried through the breast milk. No cheese, milk, yogurt, milk chocolate, lattes, sour cream, hot dogs, and you 'd be surprised to fin how many other products contain whey, lactose or lactic acid. Fun, huh? It takes about 3 weeks for the milk protein to fully leave your system. So he is definitely looking and feeling better. It now makes sense as to why he cried and fussed more as an infant.

Lucius, Owen and I made a short trip to SoCal with Emily and had an unexpected adventure. It all began with me trying to convince Em not to drive down from Sacramento to Long Beach all by herself. She had no other options and I figured a one day visit with the WHOLE family (mine and Michael's included!) would be fun and well worth the trip. Well, after missing 2 turnoffs in less than an hour, we began to smell something burning. We took it to a shop and they told us that we'd be lucky to make it down, but couldn't use the air conditioner, heater or defrost. So, it was pay $700 and spend 4 hours to get it fixed, or rent a car. We rented. And that was just by chance as well! The person who had the reservation on the last car didn't show and we lucked out! If we had been paying attention to the road and not talking as much, chances are that we would have broken down on the 5, thirty five miles from a station, with 2 kids and no potty! It took us a total of 10 hours to make it down. I arrived to Patricia's home just as the family was arriving! We had a great time and I got to hold Leah, who is about 2 months younger than Owen. She is Michael's cousins baby.

The next day we got to visit with my side of the family and for the first time all 5 grand babies got together. If anyone knows how to get three 7month olds, a 2 year old and a 3 year old to sit for a picture, PLEASE let me know!!! Owen kept scratching Addison's face and Abi was a squirmy wormy! Too funny and too cute. It was a great time.

That evening, Lu and I had dinner with my cousin Dawn and her hubby, Randy. By 8 am the next day, we were back on the road ( the rental had to be back in Tracy @ 1pm!!!) We made it back in time and had a great trip! Whew! Will I ever do it again??? I don't think so :)