virusland

Oof, what a week. Those eye boogers? viral, not very contagious, but just the advance signs of a Very Bad Cold that's had Sam feverish, snotty, coughing, cranky, and out-of-sorts all week. So, no daycare, no birthday parties, and no sleep for any of us-- he'd wake hourly, choking on mucus, and our efforts to help him breathe (propped on pillows and even, when we got desperate, in his carseat in the crib; humidifier running all night every night; Motrin, with or without decongestant; lots of fluids; warm baths; sitting on the edge of the tub with a hot shower steaming up the bathroom at 3AM; suctioning his nose; saline drops) weren't doing much. He'd nurse back to sleep then wake again an hour or less later, screaming in frustration. I haven't been this tired since he was a brand newborn. J. retired to the guest room because Sam just wanted to nurse when he woke, so there wasn't much J. could help with, and at least that way we weren't both psychotic with exhaustion. Last night was moderately better after an extended flush-and-suck session with the bulb syringe (the sight of which now makes Sam yell then bury his face somewhere out of reach, like his hands or my leg).

Snot is fascinating, eh? It's like the poop stories of the first few months.

Anyway, his fever is finally gone, but we're finishing up a course of antibiotics prescribed when Sam's lungs sounded a bit fluid-y on Thursday, and since he hasn't been eating or drinking well all weekend, I'm going to keep him home again tomorrow so he can get fortified before picking up the next nastybug at daycare. (Work? who needs to work? Grrr...) Fortunately, he doesn't have any clue that he missed two birthday parties this weekend.

Now I just have to figure out how to not get sick myself. At least when I have to flush out my own sinuses, I won't need someone to hold down my arms while a second person stabilizes my head with one arm while wielding the bulb with the other... I'm awaiting a call from CPS any day now when our (childless) upstairs neighbor can't take the howls of protest any more.

In non-bodily-fluid news, we picked up our locally-grown, pastured turkey today (from Stillman Farm), as well as groceries for our Thanksgiving meal. Sam's Grandma, Grandpa, and Aunt L. are flying up, and Aunt S. and Uncle D. are driving over on Thursday; my bro (Sam's Uncle M.) is coming up too.

eye boogers

Sam's long-running cold has morphed into a more aggressive upper resp infection; I was called to pick him up from daycare on Monday afternoon because his eye boogers (spreading up from infected sinuses) looked too much like conjunctivitis for them to risk contagion, and then last night he had a fever. So I'm home today; J. gave my exam to my class this morning while Sam and I saw his ped. (confirmed it's a likely viral infection, take it easy and warm compresses for the eyes); we then hung out and read books and watched Fantasia while I sorted 5 months worth of credit card receipts and did other general filing. Ugh. I love the feeling of having all my paper organized and neatly put away, but filing stuff like credit card statements and car insurance paperwork never seems high enough priority to make it to the top of the to-do list and it's too easy to let piles build up instead of staying on top of it, which would of course be more efficient. But I can't really work while hanging out with Sam when he's in a cuddly/cranky state, so whee, the piles are gone.

This is the second ped visit in as many weeks; last week he had a rash that showed up a day after I slathered him with a buttermilk-based 'sensitive skin' lotion. Though it might just be the (mild) fragrance he's allergic to, it might also confirm his suspected dairy allergy; in any case, we needed a note stating that _that_ wasn't contagious.

Between the goopy eyes and the rash, we have no new pics, but here's an old one from the new camera, from about a month ago when Sam was still in his hat-obsession phase (he still likes hats, but no longer puts anything on his head and announces "hat" the way he's doing in this pic):



Grandma, Grandpa, and Aunt L. visited last weekend for Uncle D's surprise birthday party and are coming again next week for Thanksgiving. I'm so, so glad that Sam is really getting to know his grandparents and aunts and uncles. I only know one grandmother out of all my grandparents, and though I know all my uncles and aunts, all of them live an ocean away in one direction or another, and so we very rarely get to share holidays and birthdays.

This past weekend we were uncharacteristically social: J. and I had a date on Saturday night, an early movie (Borat, our first dose of pop culture-while-it's-still-pop in years) and quick dinner while Sam played happily with his new babysitter. On Sunday we had our neighbors and another family over for brunch and lingered most enjoyably into the rainy afternoon talking with them. Then that evening we met another family with a toddler at a nearby restaurant which caters to the family-with-young-kid crowd with a stocked play area and kids' menu, but also has good food and a wine list. This coming weekend is Sam's social weekend, assuming he's all better by then: he's got the birthday party of one classmate on Saturday, and another on Sunday; he's also spending some time on Saturday morning with his babysitter while I participate in the semi-annual "parent work weekend," painting and renovating his daycare classroom.

Sammy Spider

Kind of hard to make out the details, but here's Sam in spider mode last night. We didn't go trick-or-treating, but visited our friends in the house next door. Sam totally got the idea of the costume, too, somewhat surprisingly ("Sam, what are you? What's Sammy?" "Pider. Sam pider.") I brought it to Costume Day at daycare today (they don't do holidays, but the kids could bring in costumes today for a parade and some trading-costumes dress-up time).