The "everything you need to know if 5 minutes" post

Busy, busy, busy! And so many things to update that it'd take days to give you all the details so here's the Reader's Digest condensed version.

• Big M successfully completed his last semester as a Chemical Engineering Junior! YAY!! This is supposed to be the toughest semester of the entire curriculum so hopefully it's smooth sailing into this final year of school.
• He's still trying to find a summer internship. Oy.
• Little M wears Big Boy Underwear (tm) all the time except during naps and overnight. I'm so incredibly proud of his progress!
• Shaggy has an ear infection. We always get Augmentum because Amoxicillin doesn't work for her. After 48 hours on the meds, I have a suspicion that the drugstore gave her Amox. She can't fall asleep tonight and has lost her appetite. Ugh.
• I started a new site a month ago and it's kicking booty! I feel like the site is doing well with traffic but I need to be more organized about adding content. Phase 2 is big and will be the actual money maker. I can't wait to share details once everything is finalized!
• Because of Shaggy's ear infection and incessant waking during the night, my sleep schedule is really off -- which is why I was scrubbing my kitchen cabinet doors at 5 am. What else do you do at 5 am when your days and nights are all mixed up?
• I had my mom chop off all my hair. It's bobbed and my bangs are growing out. For the first time in.... gee.... wow... probably 25 years, I don't have bangs. I would tell you all about the traumatic forehead smacking that occurred in Jr./Sr. high school but honestly, it's not worth the time. It was funny and didn't really traumatize me. (I'm dramatic like that sometimes) LOL
• I keep forgetting to plan Shaggy's 2nd birthday party. Oops! Tomorrow, I promise!
• I had Little M's IEP review today with his school. This is to go over his goals for the year to help with his developmental delays and prepare him for kindergarten. I cannot express enough how stellar his teachers are. They amaze me. They really do. Short version: M still has delays but has made incredible progress. He'll remain in the PDD program next year, for which I am very grateful. We're on the waiting list for PDD summer school.

Caution: Spontaneously Erupting Children at Play

Two children, a vomit inducing virus and a whole heck of a lot of laundry.

First Little M had the bug and stayed out of school for a day. We had a whole day of no puking and I thought it was over until Shaggy started to erupt during her nap.

Poor baby, she was just covered in vomit for most of yesterday. I couldn't seem to keep up with her. So far, knock on wood, no vomit since around midnight but I keep looking over at her expecting the gurgle, whine, whimper and explosion.

Since becoming a mother, I have learned that I will, without hesitation, hold a slimy, vomit covered child close to me and not give a hoot about getting it on me if it means giving my child comfort. Four years ago, there's no way I'd do anything remotely related to that. Puke is gross and totally makes me gag (ha! I'm so 1984). But these children are the world to me and if cleaning up their puke is part of the job, I'm all in.

An Emotional Purge

For the past week, my daughter has been sick with rotavirus. What a nasty, nasty virus! At first, we thought maybe she was having diarrhea from teething -- she has at least three molars trying to break through along with a couple eye teeth. But she got worse and worse. She stopped eating and started sleeping more and more. The diarrhea was incessant.

By Wednesday, it was obvious that we needed immediate medical intervention. We headed up to the pediatrician who sent us to the ER for an IV of fluids. After two hours of fluids, she was still extremely lethargic and was admitted into the hospital. I spent the night with her in the hospital while Big M was at home with Little M. Bright Eyes would only sleep laying on my chest. Consequently, I only got about an hour or two of sleep.

She remained in the hospital until Friday afternoon. During that time, Big M and I switched off hospital duty and Little M duty. We were constantly TXTing each other with updates, trying to manage the logistics which parent was with which child, updating relatives and trying to take care of ourselves as well.

During all of this, Bright Eyes had a diaper rash so bad that even the nurses gasped at the sight of it. Most of her hiney was raw and bleeding. It was pitiful! They whipped up an amazing diaper rash cream that worked miracles which was a relief.

Through all of this, I held myself together and kept my cool. Inside, I wanted to scream every time they poked my baby for blood or woke her to take her blood pressure. I wanted to cry with her when changing her diaper made her scream in pain. I remained calm for her so she could rely on me for comfort and security. I held her and whispered in her ear that it would all right even as the scary nurses approached with the thermometer.

We got her home but had run out of magic diaper rash cream and didn't have it for two diaper changes. During that time, the rash came back with a vengeance. Someone had told me to give her a baking soda soak so I did. Then, my brain said, "Hrm. If a *soak* will help, why not just put some on the rash area?" And so I did. And she screamed. And screamed. And screamed. I rushed her into the bathroom and used the detachable shower head to rinse her off. I wrapped her in a fluffy towel and sat on the floor rocking her and trying to sing to her as I sobbed.

Big M arrived home during this. Once Bright Eyes was soothed and back in bed, I explained to him what happened and just poured out all my stress and fears and and and... and everything. All the emotions came pouring out of me. My heart healed a bit and my psyche pulled itself back together.

The Super Pooper of River City

I have changed my daughter's crib sheets three times already today. I've changed probably five insanely horrible poopy (well, diarrhea) diapers. Is it a virus? Is it teething? Either is a possibility. And honestly, does it really matter? I have a baby pooping water with the diaper rash from Hell. Who cares what's causing it? I just want it to stop!

But changing the crib sheets really isn't such a big deal. Since Bright Eyes is our second child, I've dealt with stomach bugs before and wowzers did I learn a lot. The best piece of advice I can give another parent when dealing with diarrhea and/or vomiting babies is this: layer, layer, layer. Layer that crib! Put down a waterproof mattress pad, a crib sheet, another waterproof mattress pad, another crib sheet, repeat until you have so many sheets on the bed that the mattress starts to curl up. This way, in the middle of the night, all you have to do is rip off a set and you're ready to put the baby back down.

I leave you with this thought to ponder: How is it possible for her to poop and have almost every bit of it miss the diaper entirely, land all over the crib and even three feet away on the floor?