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highs and lows

12 February 2015

Maybe it's just me but I feel like 96% of staying at home with smallish kids falls under the 'ordinary time' category. Things aren't boring or stagnant but things aren't terribly exciting either which is fine! Bring on the ordinary in the face of a whole host of potentially terrible scenarios!

allow Phoebe to illustrate ...

 
... like so. 

The other 4% is split between the actual terribly exciting events {Christmas morning, the first three minutes of a road trip before the reality of a road trip with children sets in, the first few days of spring/summer, etc} and then innocuous but inconvenient child illness. I'm sure I could break down the %'s better but me + math = match made in hell. You get the gist, I know you DO.

So the past few days we've been swimming in the deep end of that inconvenient illness %. I hope it goes without saying but I'll say it anyway that minor stomach bugs are noiseless blips compared to the myriad of serious suffering and illness going down around us today and always ... I know. I'm merely reporting the late breaking from the Camp because I know you like your perch seated in the front row. Don't shoot the scribe.

Anyway ... I'm still riding medium-high from our Floridian getaway so instead of pounding you with the vom diaries I thought I'd balance things out with the few glimmers of light.

Still .. let's record the lows lest the blog suddenly becomes completely unrecognizable ...

THE LOWS.


made tangible by Theo "cuz I'm saucy" Patton.

1. Sebastian started "spitting up"(as he and Julia call it) hours after Phoebe, Simon, and I got home this weekend.

2. Followed by Theo (a dream come true, though) the next night.

3. And a mere hours later ... Julia fell victim and was sure the whole house knew of her plight to the tune of 3:40 in the am even though she was hit with the shortest and kindest of the plague fairies, thankfully.

But look!

THE HIGHS.



1. Phoebe has gone unscathed. So far!!

2. When Sebastian first got sick he and Theo had just gotten out of the bath and were wrapped in towels and Sebastian ran to the trash can (how he has no problem spraying a clean load of laundry with an entire can of Pledge or the contents of his very full bladder but is thoughtful enough to throw up directly in the trash can ... a conundrum for the masses) while Theo followed the leader directly to the scene of the sick crime in true Theo fashion. In between bouts of Bash heaving, Theo took his hooded towel edge and wiped Sebastian's face and mouth clean and I'm not one for trite parenting clichés but it was one of the more endearing things I've seen in my parenting time.

3. Even though Sebastian has been hit the hardest (day 5, he's a soldier) he's still managed to keep up his pleasant demeanor (singing and dancing to, "Everything Is Awesome!" 56 seconds after getting super sick .... AGAIN ... while I look at him and wonder how we share DNA because ... too much happy) and insisting that he carry his neon green plastic puke bowl everywhere with him just in case. And he uses it .... even at 4am while he's 90% asleep. Hopefully I can remember his thoughtfulness next time I find him squeezing our last living bottle of shampoo into the toilet or waking "cheeky Phoebe" up from her much-needed nap, "just to say hi!"

4. I might be in the parenting minority but I'm a big advocate of encouraging and fostering independence at an early age around here so I have to mention that Phoebe has mastered using a straw ...



... the better to gulp down my mostly gross and mostly healthy smoothies with, m'dear. Next up: dressing herself and her helpless siblings.

I'd like to say something like this high was maybe grasping for straws BUT ... we all know I'm above that.

WAY above.

I do hope your week has been full of lots of highs ....



... and few (no?!) lows ...



... and Theo does too. Of course.

19 comments:

  1. The part about getting sick being a dream come true cracked me up! Thanks for the laugh! I needed it on a dreary Wednesday.

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  2. Bless their hearts. Hope the rest of you can avoid the plague!

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    1. oh thank you!!! yes - been SUPER lucky to avoid it thus far!!! Fingers crossed :)

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  3. We have passed the plague around in the past week. Son's friends got it first, son got it, pregnant daughter-in-law got it and ended up in the ER because baby was already small for gestational age and I felt bad for all of them... but then I GOT IT. While it's certainly an inconvenience for pregnant people and entire families and all that... I can't move as fast as I once could. Doing the Green Apple Trot at a limp creates a really inconvenient truth. I finally crashed on the bathroom floor and decided the fam could do whatever the wanted with the body in the morning. OF course, the up side of all of that is having the parents upstairs willing to tempt my appetite with homemade waffles once the bug had passed. Pity waffles are MUCH better than eggos, trust me! Hope the unafflicted half of the camp manage to side step this misery!

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  4. Ahh! Theo wiping Bash's face is too much to handle - that had to be the highest of highs in such a low situation!

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  5. your kids are so adorable! i hope the older sick kiddos get better soon!

    adoseofmoe.blogspot.com

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  6. I could be wrong, but...I think I spy a ginger in training in the first and second photos!

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  7. I've been "grasping at straws" for some highs this week too. Maybe Phoebe can teach me?

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  8. Oh my goodness, Theo has a heart of gold! I've had to hold hair back while people vomit and I'm just standing there trying not to hurl my own stomach contents!

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  9. lol I am all for that fostering independence! Go Pheobe!!!

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  10. The green plastic puke bowl... I think it's a universal necessity. I can't tell you how many people I've me that use the green one for puke. Get better soon, Pattons!

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  11. Go Phoebe! We have been sick here too now going on 11 days. Even with only one kid (just a respiratory virus) I am going crazy! Don't know how you do it! Highs and lows, amen!

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  12. Your Sebastion sounds just like my Isaiah, waking the baby up to say hi :)

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  13. Have you found the Everything is Awesome YouTube video that is oh about an hour long? Song. On. Repeat. Oh yes. We have been listening to it. Hope that nasty bug stays far far away from here on out! Have a great weekend!

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  14. Yuck! I'm so sorry the stomach bug hit you guys. It's amazing how much less awful it is once they're old enough to hit the bucket though!

    Random unrelated question - Is that tile on the floor that Phoebe is sitting on? I love it.

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  15. We all got it last week while my husband was across the country all week and had snow up to our eyeballs and school was cancelled two days in a row. I called it my Motherhood Olympics week, the gold medal is just survival. But there is nothing that pulls you out of self pity faster then little kids 'spitting up' because it is just so sad!

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  16. This was so sweet and true. I think with my boys being so close in age right now and little we have a sudden high then the next second total breakdown! Not sure that'll change as they get older or maybe it will? Anway- Phoebe is so cute!

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  17. Ugh being sick is the worst!! Sounds like most of your kids are handling it like champs though! (Good for them!!! I become the worst kind of distraught when I'm sick! Haha!) I remember my little mini had her first stomach bug when she was like 2 months old! Scariest moment of my life, but she didn't seem too shaken up! Haha! Hope you get feeling better!

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  18. That Phoebe! HOW does she manage to be so darned cute????

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