Easter and Rashes and Cross Dressing Nudity

It's been a busy past couple of days, I guess. Almost two weeks, really. The four of us have had strep throat (though the doctor never did a swab of the kids because their throats weren't that red, but they both had ear infections the same time that Libby and I had strep, so I don't see how it couldn't be related), then Norah started to get a rash, then Easter weekend, then Norah's rash got really bad, and then, this morning, Gabe put on Libby's wedges (I guess that's what they're called) while not wearing any pants and strutted around in my office. And I got pictures of it all. Let's start with Easter.

We haven't yet celebrated Easter here at home. There just hasn't been any real need yet. This year Gabe finally grasped the concept of egg hunting, and he's gotten pretty good about looking for them in actual hiding places and not just sitting out on a table or somewhere else obvious. But, as in years past, we went out to Cunningham and celebrated with family (my brother Ben and his wife Skye and their still in utero baby--who will likely either be named Patrick or Patricia, I'm betting--were visiting from Kentucky as well). While there, Gabe got to participate in three egg hunts, including the traditional "throw a few dumpsters full of candy on the football field and let the kids rush out there" event that the town throws. It's not so much an egg hunt as a free-for-all, but Gabe actually managed to rake in quite a haul this year, so I consider it a success even if all it required of him was an ability to walk at a brisk rate while bending over to pick up candy from the ground.

Another tradition--the wearing of the basket like a hat (with goddamn binky in mouth). Somehow we've managed to get a picture of Gabe doing this ever year. It's a little odd, really. He's still not much for hats. Besides his fireman hat, he really won't keep one on his head for more than a few seconds. Yet, every year, he will wear his Easter basket around until he has something to put in it.

We tried to get Norah to participate in the tradition, too, but she had a little trouble grasping the concept.

He kept it on pretty much right up to the time where they started running around, grabbing candy.

Look! Someone other than Gabe and Norah in a picture! Hurray!

After the big egg hunt, they did an inside the house egg hunt, and then, later in the day, Mom refilled the plastic eggs and they were hidden in the yard so the kids could find them one more time.

And Gabe had finally had enough of waiting to eat his candy. After gathering a healthy share, he started busting into them and stuffing the candy into his mouth as fast as he could before we could stop him. I'm reasonably sure that he didn't eat anything else the entire day. Just candy.

Norah on a tractor. Not relevant, really, but it was on the memory card so I included it.

And that was Easter. While we were out there, though, we noticed that the rash Norah had was starting to spread. It started out early last week as a few spots on her left leg, and it stayed like that for a few days, not really getting any worse and not spreading. But Saturday, it started to creep up her back. By Sunday afternoon, it had spread all over her body. But Monday morning, what started as some spots on her left leg had turned into a gigantic patch of dark, dark red--almost like a terrible burn. And the spots all over her body were spreading and growing darker, too.

We took her to our doctor and were told that it was a reaction to the penicillin she was taking for the ear infection. A pretty severe reaction. The doctor decided to list her as allergic to it in her file (though it's tough to say if it was that or simply a bad reaction to its first use--which often happens, apparently, though typically not as severely as it happened to her--as she has not had an antibiotic of any sort so far).

Only a few times did she act as though it was bothering her. She cringed and whinged a few times when it was at its worst, but, for the most part, she acted like it wasn't such a big thing. Except that, once we started "Poor babying" her because of it, she started to try and milk it for all it was worth. We tried to get a little video of her talking about "A rach" and rubbing her belly like she was miserable, but she kind of stopped before we got the camera around.

Still, there is a video of her pulling up her shirt and sticking her finger in her bellybutton. That's always entertaining.

The rash on her belly. What a belly. Built like a World's Strongest Man competitor.

The rash, very nearly at its worst on her leg. This was the only spot that got fire red like this. Gabe decided that Norah was a volcano after seeing it.

The weirdest part was that it took about six days from the start of the antibiotics for the rash to get bad. And then it was at its worse the twenty-four hours after she stopped taking it. But, it's lightening up now and she seems to be through the worst of it. Sadly, she got used to not sleeping well again and has been up three or four times every night for the past two weeks. Hopefully she'll realize soon that she doesn't have to start crying and waking up the entire household and can just, instead, go back to sleep when she wakes up in the middle of the night. How I long for that day. But, considering Gabe still doesn't do it very well, we've still got a few more years of never sleeping. By that point it will probably be something like six years without much decent sleep. It's no wonder parents always look so much older than people who never have kids of an equivalent age.

And, finally, this morning. From time to time, Gabe likes to run around the house without any pants on. I don't like it. If it's just me in the house, I always make him put pants on immediately. But Libby doesn't have a problem with little boy junk flopping around all over everything, and this morning I came down to see Gabe playing with his legos, legs spread wide open, without any pants on. Then, while Libby was getting ready for work, Gabe found her new pair of shoes and started walking around with them.

Here's what that looked like:

Awesome. I told him to turn just his head towards the camera and smile for me, but he couldn't do it without turning his whole body to the camera. Still, a pretty good blackmail picture should he decide to habitually break curfew in high school. We've got lots of those. Our kids better stay in line or they'll have all sorts of stuff to embarrass the hell out of them with their peers. Forward planning, that's what it's all about!