I hate emergency rooms!

Saturday, Little Man wakes up with what feels like a fever. Unfortunately, we have a piece of crap ear thermometer. I thought it was cool when I purchased it because you could theoretically just point it at something and get an "accurate" temperature. Whatever. Every time I check Little Man's temp it says it's normal, but mother's intuition says otherwise.

We were able to make it through the morning routine miraculously because all Little Man wanted to do was walk around with mom with his head attached to my shoulder. He slept until 3:30pm for his nap, which really isn't all that unusual. When he wakes up though, he's not into eating for himself. I would hand him a yogurt covered pretzel and he would turn around and feed it to dad. Although dad was extremely appreciative, I was concerned that he was only wanting to drink juice or milk.

By this time, he felt even more warm to my touch. I called my mom and asked when I should begin acting worried. I double checked his temperature with a regular digital thermometer under his arm and it registered 101 degrees. I knew I really should be taking a rectal temperature, but I was not into torturing my child at that point. I had already given him 1/2 dose of Tylenol 30 minutes prior, so mom recommended to give him the other half of dose.

When I did, he started choking and eventually threw up ALL of his lunch (5 hours later) and anything else that happened to be in his stomach. I yelled down to hubby to say it was time to go to the emergency room.

Now, I know I'm probably throwing this way out of proportion, but I had this aching feeling something else was going on. First we had the problem with the UFR (Unidentifiable Freaking Rash), which we are still trying to get an referral appointment with a dermatologist. Lately it's been a horribly runny nose which I associated with his first molars emerging. I just felt like this could not wait until Monday morning.

When we get to DeWitt Hospital, I inform them of his symptoms (temperature, vomiting, not eating or drinking since noon - past 6 hours). Apparently, these symptoms were not urgent enough to the triage nurse because it was close to 2 hours later that we finally were called back to get his vitals. When she registered a temperature of 103 degrees, I about hit the roof! So, not only has my child not eaten or drank anything for now 8 hours, he has a fever. Can you say dehydrated??

I paced and paced over the next hour and half. We tried to get him to take some liquid Motrin, but that just upset him even more, so we had to give him a suppository of Tylenol to help break the fever. Thankfully, it worked and by the time we made it back to the emergency room, his temperature registered 100.4 degrees. So three hours after we first arrived, now we have to wait to be seen by a doctor.

I told hubby that I was giving them until 10pm to get a doctor or we were going home. Thankfully, Little Man was totally content to play with daddy's wedding ring, his phone, take tissue out of the box and watch it float to the floor. However, we're now 2 hours past his bedtime and he's starting to get cranky.

10pm comes and I address the nurse's station. "My son's temperature is down. He's no longer a priority to you anymore. Can we just go home?" Thankfully, one of the nurse's asked if he's been able to hold anything down. No one had offered him anything, we forgot his sippy cup at home and didn't have one in his emergency diaper bag in the truck (one will be going there now), and now he's just plain tired.

So they got him some Pedialyte and a popsicle to try and he didn't want anything to do with it. Apparently, now he's an urgent patient (not ingested anything in 10 hours!) and around the corner finally comes a doctor. Wouldn't you know it, one look in his ears and he had an ear infection. (rolling my eyes)

However, the doctor is extremely concerned that he's getting dehydrated (no duh!) so now comes the fun part. He's also concerned about RSV (Respiratory Syncytial Virus) and making sure there is no other underlying problem going on. Since he's not eating or drinking on his own, the fun part is an IV in his arm. I'm so sorry buddy.

The rest of the night is kind of a blur, but about midnight I'm about to pass out from lack of nourishment myself. Hubby visited the trusty venting machine and comes back with Cheetos. Little Man's favorite! At first he wasn't interested - said no to daddy when he asked if he wanted a Cheeto and pushed his hand away. But when he got a taste of the cheese, it was all up hill from there.

By the end of the night, he was finally sleeping (until of course they removed his IV and urine bag around his pee-pee (ouch!)) and we were heading home at 1:30am. I never want to do that again! I feel so sorry for parents who have children with repetitive ear infections (as a matter of fact, there was a mother there who knew her child had an ear infection and waited 2 hours without being seen by the triage nurse. She ended up going home and said she would be back tomorrow if it was worse). I feel even worse for parents who have to experience their children being hospitalized for any other reason at all. I consider myself to be a strong person (I listened to my child scream when they checked his temp rectally, tried to give him medicine orally when he couldn't breathe through any other opening than his mouth, and give him an IV and pump his arm to get one last drop of blood for a CBC), but I don't think I could handle my child being hospitalized for a serious illness.

Long story not short, he's doing better today. Although I'm trying to figure out how to not torture my child while giving his medicine (he didn't fall for it in his milk - in fact that made him even more upset last night). I'm going to try putting the grape flavored antibiotics since it's only 2ml in some yogurt. If he needs Motrin or Tylenol (5ml), I'm not sure what I'm going to do. Up until now, he had always just opened his mouth and seemed to like the taste of it. Not anymore.

On a good note: Stay tuned for tomorrow. We finished our bathroom project! Until then, tootles!

Karaoke anyone?

My dad found and brought Little Man A this radio/microphone while he was packing all of his dearly belongings to move to California last month. At first he was a little taken aback by it, but now he walks around the house with it saying, "do do dododo."

I know he's a little young to get started with stardom (or maybe not), but I'm sure this song will be a hit in no time. :)

Happy Birthday to me!

In case any of you read Wenderina's comment from yesterday's post, today is my birthday. Yup, I'm getting old. Although the funny thing is... I really don't feel like it. Nor do I really even think that I look like it either. But that's just my point of view. I'm sure if there was an 15-year old walking past me on the street while I was pushing my 18 month old son in the stroller they may think otherwise.

Anyway, although it didn't turn out exactly like hubby had planned (he didn't even tell me he was able to get the day off until this morning), I think it turned out to be a very nice day.

We started our day at Gymboree art class making a "ring of posies". Too bad Little Man is not entirely sure of what posies look like or even what they are for that matter. Alas, he did a great job painting inside the ring ... and all over the table.... and adding a little to his tongue for good measure. Unfortunately, hubby who was doing more observing than picture taking didn't get a shot of Little Man putting his masterpiece together. No worries. This time in art class play-doh was a hit! However, I think I'm going to leave play-doh and it's mess to Gymboree.


Since my camera decided to die halfway through Gymboree and I wasn't too sure what was in store for the day, we decided to run back home and get the reserve camera battery. Before we got home though I noticed that Little Man was really rubbing his eyes and they appeared red. So instead of hitting the road right away, we stayed home until after his nap. Once he woke up and had his snack we hit the road. Destination: Unknown.

I kind of had a feeling of where we were headed. I had only been hinting around about wanting Sonic for my birthday since I found out the closest one was just south of us in Fredericksberg, VA (about a 45 minute drive - if we're lucky). Well apparently we weren't lucky, because traffic - rather should I say, people of Virginia love to look at other people's mishaps therefore causing the road to back up about five miles or so. Although I'm sure that's the same anywhere else in the continental U.S.

Hubby had originally wanted to take us to a local winery for a tour and tasting session. Not only did they have a good record, although I had never heard of them, they have a child's play area where you can "drop them off" while you drink up. Unfortunately they close at 5pm and by the time we would have arrived, we would have been rushed through the tour. So we are going this weekend instead.

Instead, we found a local Petco and let Little Man run crazy stretch his legs and look at the animals. He loved to run up to the children in the store and point to whatever animal they were peering in at, like he was telling them all about that particular animal. The birds and the turtles were a favorite.


But we did make it to Sonic!!

We had our favorite: chicken finger dinner with a Route 44 Cherry Limeade. Little Man had the corn dog, although he wasn't too sure about the coating at first.

On top of that, hubby was super husband and ordered me flowers. And, a good friend of mine made me this :


Is that not a great birthday present?! Because of this, I am inspired to scrap more little moments of Little Man rather than trying to capture ALL of the moments and leave me feeling like I am so far behind in scrapping. So I am going to put together a small 8x8 album of "Little Special Moments". Also, instead of doing double page layouts, I've decided to try my hand at one page layouts highlighting only one or two photos. Now I just need to finish his first year album and Wenderina's wedding album.

All in all, it was a good birthday.

Always something...

So, this past weekend, hubby and I decide now is as good a time as any to start tackling our projects around the house. Namely, refinishing the bathrooms. We decided to begin with the downstairs bathroom since we don't really use it that much (hubby uses it mainly in the mornings after he goes for his morning run and to shave prior to leaving for work).

Since hubby had 4 days off for the Fourth weekend, we knew we could at least get things off the walls, patch decaying drywall, sand and paint them a fresh new color, clean the shower, and strip the floor of the god awful vinyl tile.

We? Actually accomplished all of the above mentioned! Now, hubby is working on tiling while I? Am sitting here on top of an ice pack. Why you ask? Because I decided it was a novel idea to fall off of our retaining wall yesterday.

Yes. You read that right. I tumbled off our retaining wall 5 feet or so after slipping on the wood because it had rained the night prior. Yes, I'm okay. Just a little bruised in the nether regions along with a bruised ego.

Thankfully, hubby was home yesterday. He was actually walking out back when he heard me screaming and Little Man A screaming. He knew right away that someone had taken a fall and was hoping and praying that it wasn't me WHILE I was holding Little Man. Thankfully, I was not. But, let me tell you. It's even more scary when you have a child screaming because you yourself are hurt. You can tell them that you're okay, but they just witnessed you vanish over the side of the cliff.

When we finally made it back inside, Little Man was calmed down and I was trying to catch my breath, do you know what my child did to me? He smiled and smacked my leg. As if to say "Mom! Didn't you tell me not to get too close to the edge?! Why'd you fall?!! Don't ever do that again!!"

I know it will take me while to recover, but hopefully he won't remember that moment his mom temporarily disappeared over the wall.

Little Man and trucks

Like every other little boy out there, Little Man loves trucks. But I'm not talking just loves. I mean L O V E S trucks. He even hears a truck or something that sounds like a truck, he stops what he's doing, points to the air, and grunts like a truck engine.

When he actually sees the truck... total trance.

So, when Pop-pop showed up with a big yellow truck that parked right in front of his house. Let's just say the little boy was in heaven.



I'm not sure what this child is going to do when he grows up, but I know it's going to include trucks, trains, rocks, sticks, and dirt. Does an engineer still fit in that description?? I want him to do something that makes money in the future.