This past weekend was our niece and nephew’s double birthday party at my brother-in-law’s. Everything was going fine until Andrew nearly cut the tip of his finger off chopping scallions and everyone FREAKED OUT. Well, I exaggerate. My mother-in-law came over and with careful calmness told me that Andrew’s dad would be taking him to the hospital for stitches. I got up to investigate matters and found Andrew’s brother holding him up at the kitchen sink while water ran over his finger. There was also a bag of frozen vegetables on Andrew’s head because Andrew had almost passed out. Fingers, it seems, bleed a lot.
At any rate, my FIL took Andrew to the hospital, and they were back after only two hours with only four stitches. During the two hours, my MIL pretended to be totally cool and fine, but she was actually having a series of secret inner heart attacks because her child! Was at the hospital! I, on the other hand, was fine except that I felt guilty for not being more worried that my husband! Was at the hospital! Perhaps I would have been more upset had it been my 35-year-old son instead of my husband? But it’s just that… it was only his finger. In the absolute worst case, Andrew was going to lose a fingertip. Which, yes, would be awful and nasty, but not as though Andrew is a professional musician or something; he’d do just fine without a fingertip. Losing a fingertip is no day at the beach, but, you know, fingertip. There are worse things to lose.
The best part of this story is how my FIL brought my MIL’s phone with him, and her sister called while they were at the ER. I guess she started talking, and the nurses were yelling at my FIL for using a cell phone, so he just said, “I can’t talk; I’m at the hospital with Andrew,” and then he hung up. He hung up! And of all the people he could have said this to, Andrew’s aunt is among the most freak-out-able. I’m a little surprised she didn’t leap into her car and start driving. So Andrew’s poor aunt had to wait two hours to find out that he needed four stitches, and had not been in a terrible car accident or something.
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In other news, Temerity Jane has been writing a lot about cloth diapering her adorable baby Penny. TJ uses mostly fitteds, and they are adorable enough to be worthy of Penny. And now Amalah has gone and written a cloth diapering manifesto of her own (mine is linked in the sidebar), and SHE uses fitteds with fleece and wool covers!
Now when TJ first started showing us all the pictures of Penny’s diapers, I thought, “Yes, they are cute, but isn’t it annoying to have a bunch of different kinds? And also expensive? And also you have to keep shopping?” Because we have been CDing for almost five years now, and I tried a few kinds of diapers, but settled on BumGenius one-size. It’s simple. It’s streamlined. I don’t have to keep shopping. The aplix on ours got all curly and annoying, and some of the elastics wore out, but I paid someone to convert them to snaps and redo the elastics, and they’ve been working out mostly great. They don’t fit Nora as well now, but Nora is pretty close to being trained, so I wouldn’t dream of buying new diapers for her. Still, TJ and Amalah have somehow managed to convert me. I now covet adorable fitted diapers. I’m not going to purchase any, because adorable fitted diapers are just as pricey as the 24 pocket diapers I already own that work just fine. But I WANT adorable fitted diapers. Le sigh.
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I knew it was inevitable, but Jack no longer wants to use his pink accessories (water bottle, pencil case, etc.) that he specifically chose because he likes pink. It seems his friend laughed at his pink pencil case because pink is for girls. I am more annoyed by this than I expected to be. It would be one thing if Jack decided on his own that he doesn’t like pink anymore, but I fear he still does like it, he’s just embarrassed about it. And for crying out loud, it’s just a color. The kid should be free to use a pink water bottle if he wants to. Stupid peer pressure.
In all other ways, school is absolutely wonderful and he comes home simply brimming with songs and games and stories. I’m so glad we enrolled him even though it’s five full days (7:50-2:10). He is just thriving.
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Finally, I’m totally pregnant. Somewhere around 30 weeks if you can believe that. I can believe it because I have the heartburn to prove it. I find myself feeling like I’ve consumed two Thanksgiving dinners by 1:00 every afternoon, and then I get terrible heartburn which induces nausea and I can’t eat anything until 8:30 or so. The doctor actually gave me carte blanche to eat ice cream every night if I want to since I haven’t gained that much weight yet, but I can’t because of the stupid heartburn. Le sigh indeed.
As far as baby-readiness, we aren’t. We did finish painting the bunkbeds, but we haven’t put them together because Andrew was going to do that this week but then he nearly cut off his fingertip instead. And all other baby preparations hinge upon getting the bunkbeds set up, because that will mean moving the dresser which will affect where I put the baby’s clothes. And, actually, that’s all I really need to do I guess, so maybe we’re not in such terrible shape after all. We did already buy the minivan. It’s a 2005 Toyota Sienna, white. I’m pretty happy with it except for how it uses twice as much gas as my Civic Hybrid. Damn, but I miss my old gas mileage.
And on that completely boring note, I will sign off and perhaps take some antacid. My life is so filled with glamor and excitement.
