Ever since I discovered my love of blogging, I have people ask me if the stories I share are true. Yes people, amazingly I am not imaginative enough to come up with these things on my own. Believe me, I kind of wish I was so I didn't have to necessarily experience EVERY one.
Yesterday I had two occasions that brought tears to my eyes. Firsts that I won't soon forget, and I have the pictures to remind me of these moments when I get old and can't remember if my recliner or the porcelain throne is where I sit to pee.
My oldest baby had his first piano recital. His name was third on the program and when the second child finished up we cued the video recorder and camera and moved into the aisle eagerly awaiting our beaming child's face in the view finders. We waited, and we waited, and then we checked the program to make sure he really was next. Finally his teacher leaned across the aisle and reminded him that it was his turn. We heard an exclaimed "Oh!" before he catapulted on stage at a speed that was rather impressive. So focused was he on getting to the piano and keeping things moving, he forgot to pause and announce his name and song.
He opened his piano book and played "Jingle Bells" without missing a single key. The greatest part was, his eyes never even glanced at the page in front of him. He found our camera's and beamed his way through his memorized music, before launching himself back into his seat. I have never been prouder!
After the recital reception where one child wiped Christmas cookie frosting all over his daddy, and another sat down in the middle of the food line to scarf down chocolate fudge, and I embarrassed myself by asking a woman who ended up not being pregnant when she was due, we loaded our children and our lovely first impression into the car and headed home to create a ginger bread house.
At home, my three kids all crowded together on one 3 foot kitchen chair to be the first to get their hands on the gingerbread pieces. Of course some one got pushed and some one else hit back and some one else fell off the chair, smashing their face into the hard wood kitchen floor.
Well the one on the floor unfortunately happened to be the 1 year old. As Kevin held him and I tried to wipe the blood from him face, I realized part of his lip was not in the same place that it had previously been in. I started crying. Caleb had nothing on my wails. The other kids, convinced their brother must be dying judging from my body shaking sobs, joined in the chorus.
Kevin looked at me and said, "Hon, you have to calm down". With tears soaking my shirt and on a hiccup, I wailed, "this is calm!" We all climbed in the car and made our way to Urgent Care. The nurse who checked our drooling, bloodied, baby in, commented that she remembered taking care of Kyler when he had his toilet injury. Must they tell us that every time we come in??
The urgent care staff took one look at the lip and directed us to the ER. I think the only reason they did that was so they didn't have to deal with my hysterical hiccups and questions about life long scarring on my poor babies face.
The older two were wonderfully passed off to Grandma, and we made ourselves comfortable in the waiting room of an amazingly crazy Emergency Room. We were joined by these parents who came in and sat down across from us. Their teenage son had decided to take a spin on his motorcycle around the neighborhood, minus a helmut and wearing house slippers. The end result was a rather fun road rash and ankle injuries that required local anesthesia to fix. They didn't just talk about this incident though, no they felt the need to reminisce about all of his antics. By the time they were called back into their son's room, I was hyperventilating and with horror I squeaked to my husband, "How will we ever keep 4 boys alive????"
I have worried about the grocery bill once we have 4 teenage boys in the house. No longer does that keep me awake. How the heck will we afford 4 boys' emergency co-pays???
After a record setting wait, they gave my 18 month old versed, a drug that made him think he was a puppy, discover amazing new qualities in his toes, and caused rather drunk giggles at random moments, after loudly calling for his daddy. We left the ER at 1am with 4 stitches in his little lip. My sweet Caleb is definitely Kyler's brother.
And so we add stitches to our last three weeks of contractions, infections, stomach viruses, and dead guinea pigs. I came home and fell asleep around 2am. I dreamed that I disfigured my face, payback for letting my baby acquire life long marks on his perfect little lip.
