Did you know that a fever in a baby less than 2 months old constitutes a medical emergency? Fortunately for us, I was practicing my smoker’s cough, so the physician seeing Rusty last night decided he probably just had a touch of whatever I had and let me take him home. I’d taken him to the doctor because of congestion and eye goop (is that a medical term?) and his temperature was about 100.4 – this caused concern. Well, I got to bring him home, after they drew some blood for a CBC and they collected a urine sample (very interesting, but not G-rated enough for my boys’ website), with the plan for me to monitor him closely and bring him back tonight for a recheck. All is well. His temperature was down all day and the goop is clearing and the physician was very pleased with the exam tonight. The biggest lesson I learned from this is that next time, I won’t mention to Kevin the words “medical emergency.” He is the worrier of the two of us and he probably would have had a more relaxed night if I hadn’t shared that with him!
I often think that my dad had some teaching moments with Billy in heaven before sending him down to us. The boy is just too much of a tease at such an early age to not have been schooled! Today, it was pretty much confirmed to me. Billy was standing on a chair demanding Pop Tarts this morning (man, he is a bossy thing, too) and I said, “what do you say, Billy?” We have this conversation a gazillion times a day and he always responds, in his low and gruff voice, “peas!” Well, this time I still got the low and gruff voice, but his response was, “NOW!” I asked again and again got “NOW!” I think it was the fifth or sixth time before I finally got him to say “peas.” For as long as I can remember, my oldest brother has responded to the question, “what do you say?” with NOW. Do I really think Billy, barely age 2, has just picked this up from the occasional Sunday dinner with Uncle Tim? Nope. Thanks a heap, Dad!
Ricky gets a cup of milk and a small snack each night before going to bed. Tonight was no different, but he did have to sit on a different bar stool (a dinner mishap had yet to be cleaned up under his usual stool). I was feeding Rusty and Kevin was working on some dishes. From my spot on the couch I heard several bumps and bangs and then Ricky crying. From Kevin’s spot by the sink, he saw Ricky’s milk cup flying and milk flying out of it as it flew through the air. We both went to comfort our little boy who had fallen off his stool and then had the stool fall down on him and Kevin asked where he was hurt. Ricky answered, “My blood went out.” So Kevin asked where his blood went out and Ricky showed him the spot on his chest (he’ll have a nice bruise tomorrow, but there was no blood-letting). Then Ricky informed us that “I’m dead.” We both felt so bad for him, but it was really hard not to laugh at his choice of words!