Just In Case You Were Wondering

You've probably noticed the complete stall out in blog posts. Well, my friends, that lack in interesting blog fodder is not without good reason. Here's a recap of our week:

- Shortlings show signs of impending sickness.
- 10 month old wakes every 2 hours as a result of this sickness
- 5 a.m. that same night/morning/who even remembers what day it is anyway at this point gets a bath to help bring down 103 fever
- 10 month old goes to doctor and is given an infection free bill of health. Diagnosis: suffer through it
- 10 month old wakes from nap with muscle spasms, delirium, moaning and chills. Fever 105. Call office for advice. Advice: go to ER.
- Call MIL who runs over (never seen Grandma take a corner like that before) to take care of sibling
- Other sibling is with a friend but will now be staying for dinner too. Oh, and the other shortling will be coming, too, and I know you're all alone now with 5 kids and can you feed them dinner too thank you very much (to which she replied "we're having fun!")
- ER draws blood, caths that baby (and why do they send the newbie to do baby work? They tried to get it right 4 times. FOUR. On a baby.), insert IV, fluids, lung xrays, tylenol and motrin and a little bit of antibiotic in the IV just for grins and giggles
- While the ER staff bumble around, I notice they aren't doing anything to actively help the fever. Baby is crying non-stop and beet red. So, I put her in the sink and give her a lukewarm bath and push fluids (1/2 tsp. via oral syringe every 10 minutes). To which I am told "Good job mom." Yeah, can you either pay me your salary or reduce my bill for taking care of it myself?
- Fever comes down. Go home.
- Say a prayer to let HF know that said friend should have guaranteed admittance to heaven for her service. Pretty sure that was approved.
- Did I mention it was Spiderman's birthday? Order take out. He hates it. Happy Birthday to you Spiderman.
- Holed up in the sick house near death.
- Four days later baby still has fever of 102.
- Spiderman installing hardwood all weekend so I'm on my own. (This was planned, but as you know, when it rains...)
- Take baby in again. RSV. Diagnosis: suffer through it.
- Bake 4 dozen cookies, a cookie cake and decorate cookie cake for Spidey birthday. (and shower and clean the whole downstairs and take baby over the hill to the doctor. yah. i was feeling kinda studly that day.)
- Family and friends are coming over for the birthday celebration. Only the most brave and stalwart of them will come as it's been made known of our highly infectious state. In fact, my nephew came to the event and as he was walking by me and the baby, takes a step away, looks over and says, "She's sick, huh? Um, I don't think I'll play with her today" and commences carrying the play garage to the other end of the house. Well played, nephew, well played.
- Oh, and this whole time, every time baby poops she explodes out of her diaper and ruins everything within a 10 mile radius. Laundry is spilling out of my ears.
- Middle child has butt zits. She's miserable and every time I try to look or change her diaper she scrunches her butt checks together like Nacho Libre in white polyester pants.
- Middle child, too, has RSV. Sounds like feeding time at the seal pen around here most of the day.
- Oldest child comes down with hives. Officially quarantine ourselves.
- Spiderman prints out boarding pass. Yes, he's leaving. Remember I said " when it rains, it pours"? I'm building an ark.

Here's the visuals:

Stocking up on pedialyte.

Miserable.

Can  you believe up to this point, in all 5 years of parenting, I'd never given any of my kids a bath in a sink before?

Poor little Emmy.

She pretty much cried the whole time. Didn't matter if she was sitting, standing, cuddling or just doing nothing at all.

Daddy was pretty concerned for the little one. I think they bonded during this time of suffering.

Lexi and her hives.

There's really no rhyme or reason.

No, she didn't eating anything different.

Or touch anything.

We didn't use different detergent.

Or shampoo. Or soap. Or anything.

And yes, we have given her Benadryl. Don't worry. We're seeing the allergist since this has happened before.