Monday, September 21, 2009

Chicks Dig Scars


If you've been keeping up with my blogs, this one will come as no surprise. Over the weekend John sliced his pinky toe open. We had company over during the day and I cooked steaks and chicken on the grill for everyone. There's a BBQ 'tool box' next to the grill that has steak knives, grilling tongs, wire brush for cleaning the rack, etc. There's also a large long handled knife to use to cut and check the center of the meat w/o putting your arm over the flame.

Fast forward to after our friends left to go home. Charlie went outside to cut the grass, Tabby and Jessi were in their room playing. I was on the front porch swing and John was coming in and going out of the house to the back deck. He often goes out on the deck and plays with his riding toys and the dog. After cooking on the grill I forgot to close the grilling 'tool box' and while John was outside he got hold of the long handled knife and sliced open his toe. I heard him fuss a little, but it didn't sound like a major injury cry. He came in the house looking for me and found me out front. He came outside and I saw all the blood. I sat him in the swing with me to get a better look and saw his pinky toe was split open from his toe nail to the joint. I told him to sit tight and I'd get something to clean his foot up. I saw a blood trail, so I cleaned it up on my way back outside to clean up the wound. The next time Charlie came around the front of the house on the tractor I got his attention and called him over. I couldn't take my hand off John's foot cuz every time he moved his toe it would start bleeding again. Charlie took John to the hospital to get stitches. (Did I mention it was 6:30 in the evening when this happened?). A simple band aid wasn't going to work to keep him from making a bloody mess in the car, so Charlie wrapped John's toes to the ball of his foot with a paper towel and painters tape. It was secure and immobilized good enough to get to the hospital.

Off they went. I stayed with the girls and waited for updates from Charlie. He was there for about 2 hours and had his own set of troubles while he was there. In the hustle to get to the hospital I forgot to send the diaper bag and John's social security number with Charlie. And of course, when the boys get there John had a load in his pull up and the nurses wouldn't get a fresh diaper for him until he go back into an exam room. Poor John had to sit in his stink for about 45 minutes. Since Charlie didn't know John's SS# the staff couldn't pull up John's name in their system, when they finally found it they turn to Charlie and ask if he's 'Jamie L. Simkins'. He said he wasn't and they asked who he was. He told them he's John's father and they gave him looks, as if they weren't sure to believe him. The doctor comes in and says his toe is too small to stitch so a nurse was gonna come in and use butterfly strips to close it up.

It's finally time to leave. Charlie stops by Walgreens to get an antibiotic for John (to prevent infection) and they head on home. Charlie said John was really good and hardly fussed at all at the hospital. Once John gets in the door he begins whimpering and reaching out for me, lol. I take him in my arms and sit on the couch and snuggle him. He stayed up about an hour longer and then I put him to bed and Charlie and I went to bed. It was about 11pm.

John's getting around just fine now. Aside from the butterfly strip and cut on his toe you'd never know he got hurt.

Friday, September 4, 2009

Never A Dull Moment At The Zoo!

The last blog I wrote about John was when he got into powdered cupcake mix and poured it all over the baby, himself and the girls bedroom. Well, he's gotten into LOTS of other little mishaps like that since then. Instead of writing about them each time, I've compiled them into one neat and tidy blog. You can't turn your back on the boy for a second or it's chaos! Here's why. . .
Some weeks ago, Charlie had just gotten home from work and I was plating up dinner. While Charlie was putting Jessi in her highchair he smelled an overwhelmingly strong scent of baby powder, within a couple seconds I, too, smelled the baby powder. We go into the living room and John had figured out how to open the baby powder and pour it ALL OVER the living room. All over the couch, chair and floor. This was all in a matter of about a minute and a half!!! I sent him straight to his room for 'time out' and while he was in his room I managed to get a few pictures of the baby powder mess. (I try not to take pictures of 'incidents' because I don't want him to think it's OK to do these things cuz 'mommy thinks it's funny and is gonna take pictures of it', so I don't always have a photo to go with the story) But he was in his room and I thought it was kinda funny. One picture has our dog's paw prints and John's footprints in the powder. I got all the baby powder vacuumed up, living room straightened back up and called John out from his room and we all sat down to our dinner.

August 15th Charlie spent the day at Bud's Creek watching his buddy drag race and I was invited out to celebrate a friend's birthday in the evening. My in-laws came over to watch the kids so I could go out. About an hour before I wanted to leave John had slipped out of our sight and went back into the bathroom in the girls room and turned on the sink faucet. It overflowed onto the bathroom floor. I was actually in the kitchen with my mother-in-law (who was feeding Jessi) while I was getting dinner cooked for her and the kids. When the pizza was in the oven and Jessi was done eating her food we went into the living room. I noticed John was soaking wet and I heard water running in the back bathroom. My first thought was he turned the shower on, not THAT big of a deal. I asked Tabytha to go turn the shower off while I cleaned Jessi up from her dinner and changed John's wet clothes. She comes running back up the hallway saying the bathroom's flooded! ARG!!!! I was in the middle of changing Jessi, so my mother-in-law went back to see how bad it was. She said there was water everywhere. I finished with Jessi and got all the towels out of the closet and Tabytha and my mother-in-law started cleaning up the water while I dealt with John. I disciplined him and had him go in the bathroom to help clean up. It was a mess, but it wasn't the end of the world. My father-in-law was the most upset, but no one was hurt, nothing was ruined and the water got cleaned up (about 15 bath towels later). I'm glad this happened before I left. It was handled and after the kids ate their dinner they went out back to play and I used that opportunity to head out for an evening free of the kids to hang out with a couple friends. It was great.

John's gotten into an odd habit of sleeping all over his room. Each night Charlie and I look in on him before we go to bed and find him in some of the most unusual places. He's been asleep beside his bed, in the middle of his room, at the doorway of his room. . .etc. . .Well, one night after I put Jessi in her crib for the night I looked into John's room to check on him and he was nowhere to be found. He wasn't in his bed, on the floor, behind his door, next to the closet. So, I go back into the girls room to see if he found his way in there and he wasn't anywhere to be seen. I looked all over the girls room. No John. I go into Charlie and my room. He's not in our bed, next to my side of the bed or Charlie's side of the bed, he's not even under our bed. I'm getting worried and a little panicky. I can't find John!!! There's no way he could have gotten past us in the living room before I put Jessi to bed. I go in his room again, this time I turn the ceiling fan light on and start checking under stuff and that's when I found him. He was in the far corner of his room, on the floor at the foot of his bed half hidden under a teddy bear. I breathed a sigh of relief and chuckled a little. I left his room to get the camera and show Charlie the boy's new sleeping spot. He got a chuckle out of it and I got a picture.

John's most recent escapade was this evening. Tabytha asked if she could make herself a peanut butter and marshmallow sandwich. I said she could. John saw her making her sandwich and she asked if she could make one for him, too. I said “yes”. She made him a sandwich and they sat at the table and ate. Well. Tabytha didn't put anything away after making the sandwiches. About half an hour after later, Tabytha's biological grandmother and aunt came to pick her up for the weekend. While I was in the living room inviting them in and saying hello, John comes running out of the kitchen to say 'hi'. (He likes Tabytha's biological Aunt). He looks like a ghost. He's covered in fluff!!! He's got it all over his face, up to his elbows, on his shirt and all in his hair. I wanted to cry. At first I had no idea what he had gotten into. I couldn't figure it out. So I went into the kitchen and there was fluff all over the counter and sink. He had been playing in it while I was distracted with our company at the door. I called Tabytha into the kitchen and had her clean up the mess and put everything away like she should have done when she was finished making the sandwiches. As soon as Tabytha left I put the boy in the shower. Thinking it was gonna be really hard to get the marshmallow out of his hair, but it was really easy. It washed right out of his hair and off his face, arms and hands.

He's quick and sometimes sneaky, but I love the boy. I'm going to have so many funny stories to tell him when he's all grown up.