I told you not to drink the water...

Well it's been awhile since any of us have been sick with fever/vomiting/etc. But after a day at the wading pool Monkey has come down with a medium-grade fever and has thrown up once. He's been on the couch in his bedroom all day and that is totally uncharacteristic for Monkey. He's gotten up a few times to play quietly on the floor and sit by me while I cleaned the kitchen after dinner. He's had no appetite. Also uncharacteristic. He's like a hobbit in that sense that he has a couple breakfasts, elevensies, lunch, mid-day snack, tea, dinner, dessert normally. During the morning he had a bite of cereal and half of a saltine cracker. I didn't know what to do with myself all morning not having to be in the kitchen. Mid-afternoon he had half an apple which he threw up a couple hours later. Through the evening he's eaten maybe 10 more saltines and a few bites of bread. I've also been giving him as much iced water as I can. Mainly he is just holding the sippy cup near his torso and it's probably helping him feel more comfortable.

It's funny because when he is well he wants medicine for all kinds of made up maladies. Just this week there was a "favor" aka fever that he told me started in his head but that it was at that time in his "ankle" aka his calf. Now that he has a real fever though he doesn't want anything. I don't push tylenol or ibuprofen because really it's just to help make him more comfortable. The whole reason for the fever is to trigger the immune system so if he can handle it then there's no reason to push the medicine.

I believe that all of this was caused by drinking water from the wading pool in Tower Grove Park. We went yesterday and spent a couple hours playing. I had brought little craft brushes for the boys to "paint" the planters. They did for at least an hour but I noticed that Monkey was sucking on one of them a few times. I warned him not to suck on the brush or to drink the water because it could make him sick. I always ask them if they want to throw up because neither of them have fond memories of throwing up. Who does? It didn't seem to really click with Monkey yesterday though. He, at one point, washed off a grape in the pool as well. YUCK!!! I really enjoy the wading pool and it's even nicer since they put in fountains, but my friend, AR, put it best, "It's really just a really big foot bath if you think about it." And that it really is. I was glad that I found a toy that would keep the boys occupied in the water and not just running around the fountain. Doing that Yellow Belt wiped out and scraped up half of his torso and his elbow. They did have a lot of fun despite the scrapes and sickness. I'm sure we'll go back. I'll have to reevaluate the craft brushes. It is free afterall. :D

Summer Snail Day...

I've been trying to occupy the days with water play, craft activities, and outside play. One day this week while playing outside in the water Yellow Belt found a worm and a snail. Monkey melted down because he didn't have any and Yellow Belt wasn't sharing. Dirty happened to call (to check in on how the day was going which was not so good at that point) and he let me in on the whereabouts of a snail habitat in our very own backyard with tons of snails. So we went back to the habitat and collected snails, after we created a snail sanctuary on the porch, played with the poor snails for a while, then released the snails back into their habitat (because we are all about animal conservation...just like the Irwins). We went in and had lunch where I thought about what kind of craft we could do to take up some time in the afternoon.

Originally I was going to just make a snail picture but our glue sources are low. Our tape sources are also slightly low so I remembered that we still have a ton of contact paper from a centerpiece that we did for Yellow Belts Blue and Gold Scout Banquet. It was perfect because the pieces of construction paper stick to the sheet of contact paper and you just layer another piece on top. This helps keep all of the construction paper in place in case it's not touching enough contact paper on one side it is on the other. I cut out the snail "shells" which were brown circles and blue snail "bodies" which were blue little finger looking things. I let the boys cut out their own grass and rip their own leaves. So then they put all of their leaves and grass on the contact paper and then placed their snails in and amongst the grass and leaves. After they finished I placed the top sheet of contact paper and cut a border around the sides. They really liked creating their new placemats.

Overall, it was a fun summer day. And now I have to top it. :D

Tricksey Little Hobbitses, Mildewy laundry, and Lord of the Rings marathon...

To start with tricksey little hobbitses...Tonight we had chicken enchiladas. This is not something the boys love (it's not dino chicken nuggets after all) but they ate it tonight without too much hassle. Monkey wasn't quite as hungry as usual what with the animal crackers/enough pepper cheese to constipate an elephant/a third of a peach/applesauce dipper/graham cracker sticks/apple juice/cut up tomato snack. So he didn't eat much of the dinner. I told him that in order to get dessert he needed to eat more...then I left to go talk to Dirty about what I spent at the grocery store today. That was a parenting mistake that I should have learned not to make by now. So Monkey took his adult sized plate, emptied it into the garbage disposal, rinsed his plate, then asked for dessert. When I went to see how much he'd eaten there was no plate because it was completely cleaned off in the sink. Do I tell him I don't believe that he ate the rest and not give him dessert? Do I give in because he did clear his place and clean off his plate? How can I verify that he did indeed eat his dinner? I didn't. I gave him the one flavor-ice that has frozen since we got home from the grocery store and a waffle cone bowl with some rainbow sherbet in it. Tricksey little hobbitses...

Mildewy laundry has to do with the fact that I am washing for the third time the same load of darks that I keep leaving either a.) in the washer until it mildews or b.) in the dryer not giving it more dry cycles (because it's a super large load) until it gets mildewy. I've spent more money on laundry detergent, water, and electricity with this one load of laundry than I cared to. I vow to get this load of darks through the entire laundry cycle instead of leaving it down in the basement to mildew once more.

And finally, our family has been having a Lord of the Rings marathon in all of our free tv watching time (LOTR for all of you lay-folk). In anywhere from 20 minutes to an hour or so we have been watching all three of the LOTRs...since last Friday. It's now Tuesday and we are finally on the final movie (Return of the King...again for all you that don't know much about LOTR) We have all three movies in extended versions. That adds on maybe 30 extra minutes or so of movie onto already pretty long movies. Don't tell Dirty but I actually enjoy all of these movies but love busting his chops about how I don't want to watch them. I don't really need a reason to watch Viggo Mortensen, Orlando Bloom, Elijah Wood, or Andy Serkis (hee hee hee for anyone that doesn't know he actually plays Gollum). My only problem with watching them this time is that Dirty has sub-dialogues of what the characters are thinking. For instance, when Eowyn is trying to convey to Aragorn that she wants to end up with him before the final battle because she loves him Dirty says, "Step up off my grill woman! I only dig elven women. Those pointy ears really do it for me. I don't want some human woman. I don't care if you can wield a sword." Other than that I do enjoy the movies and that is why I'm calling my three year old a tricksey little hobbitses.

Summer Vacation...

Summer vacation is officially here. I know that all of us that get to be more house-bound during the summer were looking forward to it. Of course we will be visiting all of the regular summer places around town but we get to do it when we want to do it whenever we want to do it. Last night Yellow Belt was upset that he had to go to late (7-8:15 p.m.) Tae Kwon Do until I reminded him that it didn't really matter that it was late night because he could stay up until I go to bed which would be at the very least 11 p.m. He perked up after that. I think the routines and schedules were really wearing on him.

Yesterday we had our first day of summer vacation. The boys woke up I think about 7. (I can't remember anymore since today Yellow Belt slept until 9 a.m. and Monkey slept until 10 a.m.) Yellow Belt didn't want to eat breakfast so I didn't push it. He ended up just eating lunch. The boys both stayed in their underwear until after lunch when we got sunblocked up and swimsuits on. We played in the sprinkler and baby pool. The boys like to dunk into the pool and it's the perfect size for that. After outside play we came in for "quiet time" so that I could work out. "Quiet time" didn't end up being very quiet because Monkey was too silly trying to entertain big brother. Afterwards I went to go clean the kitchen and start dinner. Yellow Belt and Monkey watched some tv and then Yellow Belt came in, at 4:30 p.m. no less, to inform me that Monkey was asleep. Yellow belt then demanded dino chicken nuggets for dinner because he DID NOT want salmon patties and he wasn't going to eat what I made. I informed him that I wasn't making anything else and he WAS going to eat the dinner I DID make. He disappeared the rest of the time that I prepared dinner. Once Dirty got home, about 5 p.m., I woke up Monkey who was surprisingly pleasant during dinner, we ate, had the discussion about not wanting to go to Tae Kwon Do, Yellow Belt decided once again (for the fifth time at least) that he does indeed like salmon patties, and Dirty and Yellow Belt left to go to class. They stopped to get milk and ice cream on the way home and the boys both stayed up until around 11 p.m. (the reason they slept late today).

I spent the entire day enjoying the moments and telling the boys how much I was enjoying spending time with them. I know that there will be a point during the summer when we're all going crazy and I'm counting down the days until school starts but for now I'm really enjoying our slow starts and being together all day long. Today Yellow Belt has a playdate and will be gone all afternoon until after dinner, but we got some quality time to watch Essence of Emeril together which we haven't done in a really long time.