Morning Report

That was a really nice long weekend.

Penny recently filled up a chore chart, so Friday morning I took her to the Yankee Candle Factory to peruse the toy store and pick out her reward. (She opted for a kitten instead of a dog, this time.)

That afternoon, Matt blew up our new kiddie pool and both kids had a blast playing in the water.

Saturday we had a bit of a hiccup -- Alex woke up with a rash on his thighs that looked like a bad mess of bug bites, but after his nap it had spread to his calves and was starting on his arms. Matt recalled signs up at the daycare saying that they'd had two confirmed cases of MRSA (a nasty staph variant), so he took Alex right over to the Urgent Care. It turned out not to the MRSA, but an allergic reaction to... something. So the good news is that he wasn't infected with a drug-resistant, flesh-eating disease, but the bad news is that we have no idea at all what he's reacting to. But at least he responded well to Benedryl -- an hour or so after dosing him, the rash was all but gone.

It keeps coming back when the Benedryl wears off, though, and I forgot to give him a dose this morning. Oops. I'd worry about it more except that he doesn't really seem bothered by it at all, and it does seem to be getting better with each round, so whatever it is obviously isn't a constant irritant, like his clothes or the cat. The more I think about it, the more I wonder if it's not a sensitivity to the preservatives on the pool -- we didn't think to rinse the plastic down before filling it with water. At this point, though, all we can do is wait and watch.

Anyhow, once that little adventure was over, we headed down to my brother's for the Fourth of July cookout. The kids were actually both quite fantastic for that, and we had a lovely time. (Even if I ate probably twice as much bacon as I'd budgeted for...) We even got to hang around for a while after dinner, which is a switch for us.

Eventually, though, we got the kids home and put Alex to bed. Penny got to stay up, though, and Matt took her off to watch fireworks. This was her first real exposure to them, and apparently she had a great time. Matt found a great spot for it, as well, so we'll keep that in mind for the future, when Alex is old enough to stay up late and we can all go as a family.

Sunday afternoon, my parents came over to watch the kids so that Matt and I could go see Much Ado About Nothing at the VA Shakespeare Festival with some friends. The show was really quite good -- very funny and with fantastic sets and props. We thought we might get to go out to dinner with the group afterward, but my parents wanted to head home by 6:30, and the dinner reservations weren't until 5:45, and there was no way that many people was going to be served that quickly.

So we took the kids out to La Tolteca instead, and then after the kids were in bed, Karen came over (yep, it's Summer Bash week!) and we sat around talking until 11:30 or so.

I'm tired this morning, but it was worth it. And the office is pretty quiet today (lots of people taking advantage of the long weekend to fit in their vacations) so that's not so bad. And I'm planning on taking Wednesday afternoon and all day Thursday off to hang out with Karen (and possibly K.T. and Kevin, though actual plans have not yet been made, and I have a doctor appointment to work around). So I'm looking forward to that.

All in all, not a bad way to start a week.