After The Tenth..... When The Fun Really Begins

From what I hear, it is bound to happen and we are probably lucky to have gone so long without it...and ER visit. But alas, our luck has run out and we've now been initiated into the "I rushed my child to the ER in the middle of the night" club. Everything is fine, but mean old daddy got everyone in the house sick.

Thanksgiving vacation I caught something and eventually passed it on to the girls who gave it to Annie. Strangely enough, we all reacted differently, but in the end we were all sick. (I got a sinus infection and had to rush to the doctor to get antibiotics, Macy seems to just have a runny nose and Annie doesn't have the runny nose but feels crappy nonetheles) Since Laney is the smallest, she seemed to take it the worst and developed croup. I've experienced few things scarier than listening to your almost 7 month old (I know....how could that be???) daughter wheeze as she struggles for air and then breaks into a fit of coughing which sounds like a seal is hanging out in the house. They say the croup cough is distinctive and who ever "they" may be, they are right on this one.

We are now a number of days sine our visit and she's still suffering, but the cough seems much more normal and the wheezing stopped. It all came on so quickly and the croup portion fortunately seemed to pass as quickly as well. Through the whole ordeal and between coughs, Laney seemed ok. I guess I should qualify that statement since I wasn't actually with her at the hospital. We had to make the tough choice to let Annie go with Laney while I stayed home with our sleeping Macy. It didn't seem fair to drag her out of bed just because I wanted to go with them.

Well all is not bad. While we were heading back to Florida at the end of the Thanksgiving vacation, Annie noticed that Laney had cut her first tooth! Go Laney...

This past week brought yet another reminder that our littlest little one is growing up. Till now, Laney's diet consisted of non-homogenized and non-pasteurized milk, but that is now ancient history.  It is now the start of the color wheel. You may remember that Macy's doctor had us introduce foods to her based upon their color and that her first vegetable was Rutabaga. (I'm still not certain how that happened and if you offered me a million dollars to identify one in Publix, I'd go home a poor man.) I can't officially declare that her unusual introduction to food choices is why she has such an adventurous palette, but I'd like to think so. (Just this afternoon Macy was chowing on ceviche and loving it.)

We decided to dial it back a notch with Laney and her introduction to non-dairy products was Butternut Squash. Based upon how things went, I would say that she was more than happy to broaden her palette. It is still early on, but I have to say that I'm amazed at how clean an eater she it. I seem to remember that after every meal, Macy had remnants in her hair and stuck to her eyelashes. I think Laney is just such a good eater and that she's afraid to be messy for fear that she won't have enough to eat. As it is, you'll notice that she's trying to supplement each meal with a healthy dose of toes and feet and you might have noticed but been too polite to mention that she's SOLID. I probably shouldn't be mentioning this, but even with almost a 17 month headstart, Laney is now wearing the same size diaper as Macy. It just doesn't seem right, but it does make changing them a bit easier.

Family dinners just got a whole lot more active. (You might notice a bow painted on Laney's forehead...just ignore it for now. I'll explain more in a few days)

While we are discussing another of Laney's firsts, I want to mention a "third." One of our most dedicated readers just recently welcomed home her latest grandchild, Matthew who joins his two brothers Gregory and Daniel. WOW...a real life "My Three Sons" Congratulation to Marc and Stacey and the rest of the family.

Hi, my name is Scott and I'm a sloppy blogger.

I'm guilty of slopping blogging, a new and  crippling phenomenon in my life. In my haste to get our Halloween post published, I ignored the fact that Annie and I had spent a perfectly good Sunday morning running around with the girls to get a pumpkin and to take some themed photos. So instead of having a nice post about how excited we were about the upcoming holiday and the cute photos we took during our photo shoot, and then providing some "night of" shots, I just blew past the first portion.

Not only am I guilty of bad blogging, but I'm also guilty of not paying attention to my surroundings. After we took the pictures you'll see below, we scoured the pumpkin piles for just the right pumpkin..one with a nice round shape, perfect for carving. Now there was nothing wrong with our pumpkin selection and there was still nothing wrong with having a few of the neighbors kids over to watch me carve out my carefully marked up Jack-O-Lantern. Macy even assisted in the scooping out of the seeds. Where I failed in this task was in overlooking that we live in balmy South Florida. Sunday morning we carved up the pumpkin and set it out for display; by Wednesday morning I was wearing kitchen gloves and holding my nose, as I scooped our now rotted pumpkin into a garbage bag. You'd think after 16 or so years down here that I would know that leaving a freshly punctured pumpkin outside in the elements was a recipe for disaster. By that Tuesday, Annie called me at work to tell me that the bugs had had such a feast with our offering that the rotten pumpkin flesh had caused our jagged tooth jack-o-lantern's mouth to close. I've since been told that I should have sprayed it with bug spray first, but I think next year we'll just keep it inside to enjoy.

I can't promise you more posts or even more timely posts, but I can promise you that I will try harder to provide you with more accurate informative posts that are occasionaly even interesting. It is the least I can do for you, my loyal readers.