Cold Spaghetti

Kate was still an incubating chick when my Dad started singing K-K-K-Katy at the mention of his coming granddaughter. Now, 5 months after her arrival, the omp-pah style song about the stuttering soldier and his only love, is Kate’s song. We all know it. We all sing it to her. Including Will.

(The song has had some lyric adjustment over time to be more forgiving of Jimmy’s awkwardness; but we sing the original🙂

CHORUS [sung twice after each verse]
“K-K-K-Katy, beautiful Katy,
You’re the only g-g-g-girl that I adore;
When the m-m-m-moon shines,
Over the cowshed,
I’’ll be waiting at the k-k-k-kitchen door.”

Will sings it here. Will and I sing it here. And here is just a minute of Paul and I playing with Kate after bedtime. (Note Will’s stuffy nose and Kate’s cough — poor kids!)

Status:
1. The Pediculus were a false alarm. No child in Will’s class had them. (There was a scare with an older sybling, but it was caught early and treated by a very concerned and proactive parent and did not spread.)
2. Will does not and did not have any bugs in his hair.
3. Even though we are quite clear on this fact, Will is now completely onboard with “washing buggies out of his hair” and shampoo’ed his head four times in tonight’s shower.

Things I’ve learned:
1. I over reacted. Understandable, but still, an over-reaction.
2. Next time, I’m trying the Whole Foods and homeopathic remedies first.
3. Lice isn’t as big a deal as I thought and I will probably have to deal with it in my house at least once as my kids get older.

This is a really great study regarding head lice; it helped me to take a step back and think.

We’ve heard of a few farms out in the bayou that have hayrides and other fall events, but for now, we’re making due with the neighborhood patch… the one 2 blocks away in front of Whole Foods.

Will seemed better this morning. No fever. Happy. Energetic. Cute. He asked to go to school. After some discussion, we obliged. Paul dropped him off and picked him up. I worked. Had meetings. Will came home and had a long nap. Cuddled with Kate. Went to the playground. Had tickle fights with me. Then, a few minutes before 5pm, school called.

“We had an incident with the preschoolers.”

Pediculus capitis. Head lice. Found on one of Will’s classmates, who shares the infestation with his or her older sybling, whose primary school noticed it earlier in the day. Oh. My. God. I looked down. Will was nose to nose with his sister, giving her butterfly kisses and making her giggle. With a deep breath, I bent down and parted his hair.

Were those brown specks… dirt??

We found this picture and thought it resembled the possible dirt. I freaked out, drove immediately to the Walgreens located roughly 500 yards from my house, picked up a three step treatment, and rushed home. Within 30 minutes of the phone call, Will was sitting with treatment shampoo on his head. Poor guy. He was afraid from the commotion, not entirely feeling well (he’d had a big day), and now was being subjected to hair combing. (Did I mention his hair is on the longish side because he needs a haircut?)

Am I going off the deep end?

Anyone out there have experience with headlice? And what do we do about the school? AAP and others recommend against “no nit” policies. But how do we prevent a repeat and make sure that this infestation dies off? I’m curious as to how other folks would feel in my shoes.

“Exploding Diarrhea, Vomit at the Dinner Table, Sucking out Bogeys and Other Parenting Fun“

The title also describes the last 48 hours of our lives.

The kids have been stuffy and snuffy for awhile (i.e. since the start of school). Kate started to turn first, having an out-of-sorts weekend. Tuesday night, fever hit hard. Wednesday night, Will joined in. I pushed back meetings and re-arranged scheduling to stay in Mobile longer — I didn’t think we could make the 2 hour trip back home without a major illness event. This morning, we woke up early and drove to NOLA for a 10am doctor visit.

Both kids have ear infections. No flying. Our travel plans for the weekend (visiting my Aunt, Uncle, Grandma, Cousin, Great Uncle, Great Aunt, and parents — and doing a ton of fun stuff including seeing Buzz Aldrin[!!]) cancelled.

Kate’s ear is actually not infected…yet. The doctor felt it was “going downhill” and would be joining her brother’s pussy, red status soon. She is still struggling with congestion and fever. This is the second time we’ve done this with Will (the first time was on his second birthday). Not fun.

Skip took some videos this weekend of the kids in action. They are all short (15 sec) clips.

Others of Will are here, here, here, and here. And one of a slightly feeling not-so-great Kate.

We (the kids and I) had a great visit with Skip and Emily earlier this week. The kids (Kate especially) were not feeling their best, but enjoyed everyone’s extra love and attention.They were in Mobile because Emily attended a regional International Reading Association conference. Her school selected her to represent them at a national meeting in Chicago earlier this year and she had the opportunity to attend the regional meeting as well. Emily is a first grade teacher extraordinaire… she’s so great that she was lured away from her previous school (with all sorts of perks including raises and signing bonuses) and now is teaching with a magnet school outside of Jacksonville. She also just found out that she has been nominated for Teacher of the Year!! We all know first hand how fantastic Emily is and we are so thrilled that her talent and dedication are getting noticed in such rewarding ways! Way to go, Emily!!!

There is a book I ran across online a few weeks ago… it was a favorite of mine when I was a child. I saw the cover, gasped at the memory of it, decided I had to find a copy for Will… and then got distracted and it was gone.

All I can remember is that the book had something to do with a boy and his pet?friend? dinosaur?monster?something? It is draw in a realistic cartoon-y style (not unlike Judith Viorst, but maybe with a little Mo Willems influence.) One thing I remember about the book is that the monster?dinosaur?thing? is very big — there is one part in the book where you have to turn the page to see the rest of it’s body.

It is driving me batty — I can’t remember it!! Can anyone help????

Joining our friend, Mr. Strongbad the spider, we now have a stinging caterpillar camped out on our front door. Unlike our web-clinging resident, this guy IS poisonous and, in the words of a wise Will, “gives big ouchies.”We’re not exactly sure what kind of caterpillar he is… buckmoth, perhaps?? Should you be the knowledgable one who can figure it out, please let us know!! We’d like to find photographs of him in his soon-in-coming butterfly stage and continue building on this impromtu educational experience.

On Saturday, the Louisiana Steam Train Association held “SteamFest” to honor the 50th anniversary of the donation of steam locomotive number 745 by the Southern Pacific Railroad to Audubon Park. For years, this train was held in the park. Many of our neighbors remember playing in and around it as kids. The weekend event was held on The Fly (the section of Riverside Park that is behind Audubon Zoo) and included tours of the train and boxcars, music, food, and train rides.
A bunch of the kids from Abeona came, too. We camped out on a blanket and watched the kids run around. Aya and Will were, as always, the day’s hot item.Will loved riding in the little Thomas Train.