Come, Mommy » illness

Thanksgiving?

lieslf — Sat, 28 Nov 2009 14:58:47 +0000

Well, let me tell you a little tale about a pair of anxious parents-to-be. They had waited months to see their sweet little baby boy, to count his toes, to count his fingers, and to gaze, enraptured, at the the thought that a tiny, tiny, bit of Mommy and a tiny, tiny, tiny, bit of Daddy had danced together and finally joined. And they had waited to see all these things as the tiny piece of Mommy+Daddy (that shall for our purposes hereonin be called “Liam”) grew and grew and grew and grew. Then one evening , after all those months of waiting, something happened.

With a splash and a shriek and a very confused look on his face, Liam emerged from his Mommy’s tummy, all cute, and shiny, and wet, and angry at having fallen out of his nice cozy dark watery world into this place the rest of us call “The Real World.”

Liam wasn’t angry for long though, because the friendly OB standing by Mommy’s feet caught him with warm strong hands, wrapped him up in a soft warm blanket, helped him expel some particularly bothersome strands of mucus and gunk, and then handed Liam to his Mommy, who promptly nursed him for the first time ever. Judging from the look on his face as the first squirts of warm colostrum slid down his throat, all of a sudden being ejected quite quickly from the only watery world he’d ever known did not seem to be such a bad thing after all.

All that took place on Thanksgiving Day 2003, and so for Liam’s proud parents, Thanksgiving took on a whole new richness since this wonderful little boy had come to live with them on Thanksgiving Day.

In Liam’s first years, we would celebrate Thanksgiving in NJ with GiGi, sometimes Uncle Bob, and Gran-Gran and Pop-Pop. It was fun-a typical American Thanksgiving complete with lots of food, hugs, football, chatting and sometimes even a long walk in the evening after the kitchen had been cleaned up.That was a lot of fun, and I will always treasure those memories.

But the times, they do change, and things happen and so sometimes even long-standing traditions have to change along with everything else. Almost three years ago, Gran-Gran and Pop-Pop moved to Texas. Since then, we who stayed behind in the Garden State slowly started doing some things on our own to build a new set of holiday traditions, but were largely unsuccessful, mostly because it’s hard to have a traditional feast with only Mommy, Daddy, and one, and then two, little boys.

This year, however we are doing things differently. Our plan was to have a nice Thanksgiving Dinner here at home, and then a long walk on the canal with friends. Then, over the weekend, we would head for the Poconos, where there is a lodge-style hotel complete with an indoor water park. We would drive up in the morning, play in the water all afternoon, and perhaps for a bit after dinner. Then we would go to our room for some reading or a movie. The next day we would splash away the morning, have a good lunch, and return home in time for bedtime and Liam’s birthday celebration at school on Monday.

Well. well, so the first part didn’t quite go as planned, but we are rallying and continuing on with the first year of of our new tradition. You see, I woke up Thanksgiving morning with a migraine headache. I haven’t had one in a couple of years. thankfully, but I was completely unprepared for this one to strike. By noon yesterday, Kevin and the boys were driving me to the ER. The helpful people there were able to get me some relief quite quickly, which was welcome, but because of all the H1N1 caution, the boys were not allowed to stay in the ER with me. So Kevin had to take them home. It was not the day I had envisioned where I would be cooking goodies for my family and playing with them. On the other hand, though, I did get some much-needed rest as I spent 4 hours waiting for the radiologist in Australia (certain services are outsourced on holidays, apparently) to read my perfectly normal CT scan. Kevin and the boys bounced back and forth between home and the hospital, and at one point one of the nurses came back to tell me that there were two cute boys sitting on the floor out front amusing the receptionist with knock-knock jokes and eating M&M’s. So apparently the boys had a decent time themselves. Poor Kevin, who had to manage these active little ones, was a bit the worse for wear as the hospital didn’t manage to release me for 6 hours.

However, I am proud to tell you that I was fine yesterday, fully functional, and was able to put together smaller version of Thanksgiving dinner. We did indeed take our walk on the canal and spied many treasures such as rocks, colored leaves, sea gulls, and a heron or two..We were accompanied by Liam’s friend K and her parents. K’s Mom and Dad and I first met singing in a local choir. K was born about a year after Liam, and has grown up with him. They are fast friends, and it was to our great surprise and honor that K was placed in Liam’s Kindergarten class this past September She is now one of Liam’s favorite Kindergarten classmates. We all went out to lunch, and then returned home.

While eating our delayed Thanksgiving dinner last evening, we announced our travel plans to the boys, who were very much in favor of the trip, as you might imagine. They had a bit of trouble getting to sleep last time as they are quite excited about our trip coming up in under two hours now.

I’m on my way to pack now, but I think that our trip today will be nothing less than wonderful. So with that, I bid you all good day and a happy weekend. The lodge does have wi-fi so if I have time I may post a few pictures and tell some funny stories.

Happy Thanksgiving weekend to my readers!

Back In Action

lieslf — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 01:57:22 +0000

I’ve been sick the last couple of weeks, so that’s behind the lack of cute kid stories over here. But I’m well and back to posting now, and hoping that the next bug gives us a bit of breathing room before invading. Nothing like back-to-back attacks of bronchitis to knock one out of everyday life for a while, and I’m hoping that it is good and gone and after two successive rounds of different antibiotics. I should be posting more regularly now! In the meantime, here are a couple of recent photos to hold down the page:

Kevin took the boys out to dinner one night last week, and they lucked out. Upon arriving at the restaurant, they discovered it was Family Night. Not only did the kids eat for free, but there was a balloon artist in the house, too. WooHoo!

That evening, I took Liam upstairs to tuck him in for the night. When I returned downstairs, I found this cozy trio asleep on the couch-tres cute!

See you in a couple of days with more Menagerie House news!

At Least It’s Not Swine Flu…

lieslf — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 03:13:24 +0000

…but it’s still a pretty nasty bug. I came down with it first, last weekend, and then Liam got it, and then Kiri. Thank goodness Kevin has managed to evade its evil clutches. We were down and out for most of this week – Liam missed four days of school, and Kevin stayed home from work for two days in order to take care of the rest of us. (Thank you, thank you, Dear Husband of Mine!). Several times Liam told me “Mommy? I wish I was a magician because if I was a magician I could turn myself into someone else and then I wouldn’t have this sore throat anymore!” The saving grace in all of this was that Gran-Gran was in town and was able to entertain sick children when the going got truly tough. Thank you, Gran-Gran!

Finally, this morning, Liam managed to make it back to school, Kieran and I made it to our parent-child class at Liam’s school, and Kevin returned to the salt mines of the pharmaceutical industry. After a long week of fevers, aching throats, coughing, and tummy troubles, I am happy to proclaim, “Thank Goodness it’s Friday!”

Icky-Ooky!

lieslf — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 03:24:46 +0000

Both of the boys have been sick over the weekend. Liam started with stuffiness on Friday during the daytime, and then went on to spend a lot of the night up and coughing from croup. At this point Liam is feeling well enough that he can return to school tomorrow. His poor brother, however, is a few days behind him and is just.plain.miserable. He started exhibiting the symptoms only yesterday, so if Liam is any guide, Kieran has a while to go yet. His eyes are oozing, his nose is running, and when he isn’t sneezing, he’s coughing. And his head hurts, and he’s a bit feverish. I thank the inventors of ibuprofen from the bottom of my heart, for a dose of that liquid gold will help him feel better for at least a couple of hours at a shot.

I was trying to sympathize with him this afternoon:

Me: “Kiri, I know it stinks to have a cold. It is hard to be sick, but it will get better.”

Kiri: “Hard, Bobby, hard. Also, too, Bobby…by dose is bwoke. Also icky-ooky, too!”

Translation: “Hard, Mommy, hard. Also, too, Mommy, my nose is broke. Also icky-ooky, too!”, meaning his nose so so stuffy it must be broken past the point of repair, and it’s oozing constantly.

I feel so sorry for him, but fortunately he is at the point where a lot of cuddling helps him feel better. I love being able to help by doing something so simple, and I know at some point he will present me with a problem that a little sympathy and hugs will not solve.

Slow down, boys, you needn’t grow so darn fast!