making changes

There are lots of changes going on in the Shirley household...most of which pertain to The Mayor. The first change is his diet. The Mayor is now gluten-free. We made this change for two reasons: 1. The Mayor has had issues with his digestive system since he was 1 year old. He had unexplained fevers for the good portion of a year and test after test after test showed nothing. I linked the issue to dairy, I know think the issue is gluten. Which leads to reason number 2: his behavior. There is no doubt about The Mayor being a sugary-sweet boy; he loves to love and with that comes a passion that is fiery. The strong will that I sometimes battle with today will be one of the things I love most about him as he becomes a young man. All 3 year olds go through temper tantrums but The Mayor's were becoming a point of serious worry with D and myself. The Mayor would get so upset he would have a tantrum that would sometimes last 30 minutes, we couldn't snap him out of it, he would literally be dripping sweat after he finally did calm down and then he would almost pass out from pure exhaustion. It was becoming more than we could take. After a lot of prayers and conversations, we made the switch. It has been 2 1/2 weeks and he has not had one temper tantrum. Now I am not in any way saying he is the perfect child. He is still a 3 year old boy after all, who gets upset if he doesn't get his way, but his frustration is dialed down immensely and if he even looks like he is about to enter a tantrum, we can easily snap him out of it and distract him. It is an amazing transformation. We are happier but more importantly, he is happier. Almost immediately we saw a change in his behavior and his digestive issues. Who knows if this will be his forever diet, but it is for now.

Another big change is no more naps for The Mayor. He would still nap if I let him, but I am not letting him nap anymore. I know...crazy. What mother would give up 2 hours of peace every afternoon?! But bedtime was becoming such a daunting task and after several nights of hearing The Mayor still talking to himself at 9:40 at night, I knew something had to change. I tried cutting his nap time, but even with the limited nap, he just wasn't getting enough stimulation from nap time to bed time to wear himself out. D was spending upwards of 45 minutes to an hour getting The Mayor bathed and ready for bed. We were frustrated because he wouldn't go to sleep and The Mayor was frustrated because he didn't want to sleep. We are on day 5 of no naps and The Mayor has been asleep before 7:30 (as early as 7:00 if we are really on top of things) every night. Bedtime has been cut down to less than 15 minutes and everyone is happier.

Big changes happening here...and all for the better.

happy boy

happy girl

playing "tunnel"...he loves to crawl through our legs so he was trying to get Love Bug to crawl through his legs. She just laid there so he straddled her and walked over her while she cracked up...this went on for quite some time