My Real Boy

Last Sunday we were introduced to life with having a boy.  Sure, he's 20 months old but so far it hasn't been all that different from having a girl.  It was early afternoon and the kids and I had been upstairs cleaning up while Duncan was recuperating from his 50 mile bike ride.  We came downstairs to get lunch but made a stop in my bedroom first to see Duncan.  While we lounged on the bed, Brady started acting all goofy, dancing around the room and singing in the way a small toddler does.  We even took a movie of it.  You can see it here.  Notice the offending curtain and end table near the end.  Well, a few minutes later the silliness progressed to him hiding in the curtains and the next thing you know, he's stumbling or falling or something, I don't know what, out of the curtains and into my end table.  That is, his face fell into my end table.  He let out a scream, of course, and I scooped him and quickly noticed the blood gushing out.  It took only a few seconds to realize that it was a deep cut and would require stitches.

I was not even dressed for the day so I had to quickly throw some clothes on and some deodorant and then jump in the car.  I was driving and Duncan held Brady on his lap in the back.  We weren't sure where the best place to go would be.  Clearly, we wanted to avoid the ER if possible.  We called one after hours pediatric place but it didn't take our insurance.  I called another, Night Light Pediatrics, and although they took our insurance, they said they wouldn't do stitches on the face because they were concerned about scarring.  That left us with Centra Care.  After a quick call to them and confirming they would do the stitches, we were off.  Thankfully, due to Duncan's connections, we were able to be seen immediately once we got there.  So nice!  The doctor looked at it and quickly determined that it would need two stitches.  There is a glue that can be used in place of stitches but due to the proximity of it to the mouth, she didn't think it would be a good idea.  At this point, the girls and I made a hasty exit to the waiting room while Duncan drew the short straw of having to accompany Brady to get the stitches.  Thank goodness for dads!  I really don't know if I could have handled that.

Right before the stitches.

 I could hear him screaming while we waited and I tried to block it out as best I could.  It probably took about 20 minutes.  Duncan reported to me that it was unbelievable how much strength such a little kid can have.  They put him in a pillow case to help with keeping his arms down.  At one point, Duncan was afraid the doctor was going to poke Brady in the eye with the needle since he was thrashing around so much.  They did give him a shot first to numb the area but that was very dramatic itself.  (I later found out from Shannon, an experienced ER nurse, that they put a numbing cream on it for 20 minutes before they begin but I guess they skipped this step in the interest of saving time).  The stitches got off to a bad start when Brady pulled the first one out.  But finally, it was done.  We were able to go back and see him and I cuddled him in my arms.  The bad part was all over.  We were in and out in just about an hour.  Incidentally, as far as the girls went, they were very calm about it all.  Aubree barely even looked at Brady.  At first Calleigh didn't want to see it at all but then later, right before he got the stitches, she did ask to see it.

All done.

Since the stitches, Brady has been completely unphased.  They put a bandaid on it for the first 24-hours and amazingly he never touched it or tried to pull it off or anything.  That evening we had to change it out, and he sat there so stoically while Duncan did it that the four others of us just died laughing.  It was so funny.  The next day when we changed it again, we took a video of it.  It wasn't as funny but we still chuckled at how still he just sits there.  You can see the video here.  On Tuesday we had an appointment with his primary care doctor just to see how it was going and the doc said it looked great and we could take the stitches out either Friday or Monday. I think he thought we were going to make an appointment to do it but Duncan is just going to do it himself tomorrow.  The doc also said we didn't need to continue the seven day supply of Amoxicillin that the Centra Care doc as prescribed.

We are glad this wasn't a more serious injury but we joked that Brady is now a real boy.  He's had his first wound requiring medical attention.  First of many?  We shall see.

Sunday evening we headed back to Winter Garden Village, where the Centra Care is, to eat at Macaroni Grill.  I didn't feel like cooking after the day's events and I had gotten a gift card for my birthday.  That worked out very nicely.  Speaking of Winter Garden Village, that reminds me of something Aubree said.  The Centra Care is located right next to the First Watch.  When Aubree was explaining to someone about Brady's injury, she told them that "we went to First Watch and he got stitches."  I guess she just associates the place with First Watch but it was a funny sounding statement.

Monday morning I had a dentist appointment so I took the kids over to Ron and Elaine's for them to work on some gardening.  All went well with the dentist.  On the way back, I made a stop at Burger King to get a veggie whopper.  I am really becoming disenfranchised with Burger King (not that we frequent fast food places very frequently but McDonald's just seems to have it together so much more than BK) but I still go there only because I like the veggie whopper.  For some odd reason, I seem to like them even more when pregnant.  I went through the drive through and made my usual order and after dealing with how much they wanted to charge me for it (which I won't get it into), I finally got my sandwich and took a much anticipated bite...only to spit it back out. I SWEAR they made it by just removing the burger.  It tasted exactly how a burger smells.  I didn't feel like dealing with that Burger King again so I made a stop at another one on my journey back, this time going in.  Of course, they forgot my cheese (which must happen at least 50% of the time) but it was a quick fix.  Seriously, I need to just stop eating this stuff.

Fooling around at Grandma and Grandpa's.  These are the flowers they helped plant.

Tuesday we had the doctor visit and hit up a consignment store near there.  Even though Brady is undersized, I really feel like he's growing.  He's now into size 18 month shirts and almost in it for pants.  Shorts, that's a different matter.  I still have him wearing size 6 months for some of them.

Wednesday was my doctor's visit but boy, was I really confused on all that.  For some unknown reason, I was thinking my appointment was on Thursday, the 13th and that Valentine's Day was Friday.  Even stranger, all day Tuesday I kept thinking the day was Wednesday instead of Tuesday and I even went to put my trash out for pick up the next morning (which happens on Thursday mornings).  That was at 12:30 am and I quickly noticed no one else had their trash out and I just shook my head at my utter confusion. Must be baby brain or something.  So Wednesday morning Duncan is leaving for work and says, "What time do you need me home?"  And I'm like "Why?"  Ahh yes, my appointment was on the 13th but the 13th was Wednesday.  Good thing Duncan had it on his calendar or I would have completely missed it.  Because I had been thinking it was Thursday, I had a bunch of work I needed to do and I would be gone for most of the afternoon so the morning was spent with me working and the kids entertaining themselves.  Duncan got home at 1:45 and I took off for the appointment.  It was to be an especially long one because I was going over all my medical history with them, having an ultrasound, blood work, and meeting with the doctor.

Everything went fine.  This ultrasound is to look for signs of Down's Syndrome and it looked fine.  As I've said before, even if the ultrasound showed signs of it, it's not like I would do anything any differently but it's nice to at least have some peace of mind about it (even though it's not 100% accurate, of course).  Based on my period, I am 11 weeks, 2 days pregnant (at this appointment) with a due date of 9/2 but based on the first ultrasound and this one, I was 12 weeks, 1 day so one of the people taking my history changed the due date to 8/28.  I asked the doctor if that meant we were officially changing the date to 8/28 but she said if the ultrasound shows a week or less of a difference as compared to the date based on your last period, than they don't change it.  This was good news because I'm hoping to do the c-section on 8/27 which was my grandmother's, Mimi's, birthday.  If it was changed to 8/28, it would have to be a week preceding that.  

Thursday we did our Costco run, where we did not get a flat tire this week, and that was really the excitement of yesterday.  Today was a major dud weather wise.  It didn't actually rain but people probably thought it was so there were hardly any yard sales and none that I was interested in going to.  Instead, we made a trip to ABC to pick up some food.  While there, I spotted the CD set called "The Bible in Living Sound." This was highly recommended by the Zbarschuks as Zachary really enjoys the CD's.  It's a rather pricey set but it's the whole Bible on CD and is 56 hours long.  It was $50 off and I had been thinking about getting it for awhile so I pulled the trigger.  We already have the Your Story Hour (Uncle Dan and Aunt Sue) CD's and although Calleigh has had some interest in those, I think these are more appealing.  One of the problems with Your Story Hour was that Aubree freaked out at the beginning about the snake from the Garden of Eden.  She said it sounded scary.  So that kind of put a lid on listening to those for now.  Anyway, I'm really, really excited about these.  They listened to the first two this evening and it went very well.

Yes please!

This afternoon Blake and Evan came over while Jennifer was busy setting up for an event she has on Sunday.  They get along very well (even when Calleigh is literally on Blake's back playing football outside).  Aubree followed Evan every where and informed me, as she had her hand resting on his back, that "We are best friends."  Later on they were sitting on the couch and I heard her say to him, "We love each other, right?"  The pity of it all is that when they get older, they'll all think of each other as brother and sister have no interest in each other romantically at all.  I know how it goes.

I can't think of too much other news.  Oh yes.  There is the news that Shannon had her 20-week ultrasound and she is having a boy...which is what she wanted!  That will make 7 girls and 7 boys for the cousins so we'll get to have the tie breaker (for now, at least!).

Have a very Happy Sabbath!

Playing dress up.  Even Brady got to be part of the festivities.

For some reason, this week they've started playing on the table.  Brady's next injury will probably be him falling off.

Calleigh has had pretty much no interest in watching football but I put the Bruins game on and she yelled "HOCKEY!!!" and sat down and watched the first period with me and only left because it was time for bed.  Go figure.  Must be the Canadian blood.