There Was a [Youngish!] Woman Who Lived in a Shoe...

My Mum asked me the other day if I felt like the old woman who lived in a shoe and had so many children she didn't know what to do....today the answer to that question is an unequivocal, "yes!" And the sad thing is that technically we only spent most of the day time dealing with three of the children, but it was enough.

It all began with us coming off of a lovely weekend that we spent with some friends who drove down here for the sole purpose of hanging out with us. We had much fun, played many games, but sadly spent a number of late nights consoling Blueberry who had a cold and was having a rough time sleeping. So we came on shift a little bit on the tired side.

Well, that was highly unfortunately as our Monkey also had a severe cold and cough. Very severe. The nursing staff finally decided to set up a doctor appointment with her today when we had to go and get her early from daycare Monday because of how poorly Monkey was feeling. (think coughing so hard she's been throwing up).

Well poor little two and a half year old Monkey has had a slew of doctor's appointments the last few weeks--many of which included shots, stabs, or sucking out of the ears (disgusting!). She was not thrilled to see another doctor and screamed her way through much of the visit--basically any time any nurse or doctor came near to her to do anything--weigh her, measure her, take her blood pressure, check her lungs, you name it.

Final results was that she has RSV--oh yay. A highly contagious disease, particularly for Blueberry. Of course Monkey can't go to daycare for the rest of the week, and she has to be isolated in her room from the rest of the cottage (you try explaining to a two year old the concept of isolation!) to try to minimize the possibility of passing it on. The primary problem with this is that she is (a) two and a half and very high needs and (b) my own kid is not to thrilled with mommy have to spend a lot of time caring for another "baby" and so they spent the day taking turns demanding mommy's attention and (c) I'm of course getting coughed, snotted, and vomited on all day long, so spending time with my own kid is tricky when I'm trying to not make her sick!

I foresee a lot of showers, hand washing (my poor, already dried out hands), and extra laundry in my short future.

Oh, and of course I still have 5 other children who need me as well--fortunately they are in preschool/school for most of the day. Otherwise I really don't know what I would do!

It is now almost time for 4 of them to come back from church service. The two babies are in bed, sleeping (thank you Lord for small mercies!) and I'm watching our oldest (Mama Bear) play Plants vs. Zombies (love that game!). She stayed home from service to help me by watching Blueberry while I got Monkey to bed. She's very good with Blueberry and revels in helping, so it worked out well--and frankly I would not have been able to handle the two by myself tonight.

Back to my shoe...I mean dinner. Hope your week is going less overwhelming than mine.