Easter Sunday - Early Style

Easter Sunday - Tempel Style

Easter Saturday

Sorry it has been so long...Ben started 2nd shift a few weeks back. We have been really busy!



As for Easter, we have to spread it out because we can't make 3 places in one day. Since Ben actually had this weekend off, we decided to do Easter Egg Hunts on Saturday morning and afternoon before heading to Carmi for my family's Easter dinner. We went to Gentryville and Owensboro on Sunday after church for Easter with both sides of Ben's family (that will be the next post).



The first Easter Egg Hunt that we went to we chose because it said that it had a food allergy friendly section. Drew had already said that he wanted to do Easter Egg Hunts this year even if he couldn't have the candy (he said that he wanted to give it to his mommy). We thought that we would give this one a try way out in German Township (the Northwest side of Vanderburgh County). The food allergy friendly section was only chocolate and peanut free...so, we opted for the age group hunt instead. This was hosted at a church that has a puppet group. They put on a show for the kids that were eating their egg cookies and drinking Capri-Sun. Drew was eating his Honey Bees and drinking water. Drew really enjoyed the show. After the show, we lined up for the Easter Egg Hunt. He really had a good time...even though he looks mad in the picture. It was just colder outside than we thought.



We moved up the the full winter coat before we went to the West Side Nut Club Easter Egg Hunt where Drew got to see the Easter Bunny and hunt the "millions" of eggs that were there (actually there were 12,000 - Drew just said that there were millions). This hunt only lasts a matter of seconds...but, it is a lot of fun.



After the 2nd hunt, we headed to Carmi for dinner with my family. We made Jello Jiggler Eggs, dyed eggs, and fixed two meals (one for Saturday night and one for Drew for Sunday). While we were gone to the nursing home to see Grandma Rosalene (my dad's mom that recently went in because she has two broken vertebrae), the Easter Bunny visited mom and dad's house and left a lot of eggs filled with money. Drew had a great time finding all of the eggs. He really liked cracking them open to find out what was inside, too.

Figuring out Food Allergies...

As many of you may know, we have been battling the question of food allergies for the past few months. Drew started breaking out in hives all over his body in October of last year. We started tracing it to certain foods by Thanksgiving. We started seeing an allergist just before Christmas. It has taken us a while to figure out what is causing the hives...but, we finally have an answer. We have known for a few weeks that he has a milk protein allergy. However, he was still breaking out quite a bit. This was compounded by the fact that the boys in Drew's preschool all came down with Fifth's Disease this winter which comes with an intermittent rash. After thinking that he was allergic to just about everything, we started tracing it to corn after a head to toe breakout from eating Oreos (they don't have milk in them). We were able to stay off of the allergy medicines for one week so that we could do skin tests rather than blood tests (which Drew hates with a passion). Dr. McLaughlin did a full complement of skin tests with corn as the replacement for the milk (as we already knew that he was allergic to milk). We weren't able to do all of the skin tests at the first appointment in December because he had a rash that morning. Anyway, the moral of the story is...Drew is also allergic to corn. This is the first true corn allergy that she has ever seen. Apparently, corn allergies are a pretty rare thing. Eliminating both corn and milk from Drew's diet has been pretty challenging (we are also avoiding bananas and vanilla). We are slowly adding colors back in by way of Jello. However, sugar-free boxed Jello contains maltodextrin (a corn product). We just have to be very careful! Lucky for us, Drew will eat a variety of fruits and vegetables which has made this so much easier. I can't imagine trying to do this if he was a picky eater.