3 month old punishment - starting daycare tomorrow

Here is what these pictures are going to look like now I think.

 

Ben wants to be the focus of the pictures so is jumping in, and by the looks of the last picture Jimmy isn't having it.  He is huge (as a result of our recent medical misadventures found him to be 18.1 lbs or 98th percentile right now) and a delight.  He is ah-gooing and squealing and screaming and grabbing and smiling and eating and sleeping.  All things a little tyke should be.  He has maintained his cool as a cucumber attitude and is getting to be such a good sleeper that big mama is having go get up and pump at night because after a quick snack he wants to snooze a few more hours.  I won't complain, I have been completely negligent on storing milk this time around so better late than never.

In the last few weeks have have had several adventures - we went to Townsend and subsequently up to Iron River, MI to go skiing at Ski Brule.  Martin's first Midwest skiing adventure.  He was a sport and didn't complain.  I felt like a rock star after always being the worst skiier on our adventures in Maine and Colorado.  Carole Nana and Jimmy sat in the lodge for the day holding down a spot amongst the high school ski teams, Ben went to day care, and the rest of us hit the slopes.  Good times. 

Jimmy had his first day of daycare and was a little champ.  Nothing phases this kid.  I have been going on interviews and shadowing so while it isn't full employment yet, I am out of the house and other need to mind my chillins.  The day after his first full day of daycare, after having a cold for a week and a rough night of not being able to sleep because of post nasal drip we brought him to the doctor - mainly just to be sure there wasn't anything going around we needed to worry about - and ended up sitting in the ER for 6 hours.  Poor guy had a temperature at the doctor and they drew his blood and his cells were all off.  After tolerating a chest x-ray, a catheter and a blood draw from a vein the MDs couldn't find anything severe and we got to go home.  Thank goodness, because they said had he been one week younger he would have been admitted and gotten a spinal tap.  There is this weird "milestone" in treating kids which is three months.  When all of this happened Jimmy was 3 months 2 days, so not solidly in either category.  The doctors were scared to ignore the fever, even though he was technically over 3 months, because their immune systems are just not strong at this point and they can be really sick and just not act like it.
We had to follow up the next morning at our regular doctor, and all was well.  Then that afternoon we got a call that his urine culture grew something so we had to go back for another catheter to confirm whether or not there was a bladder or kidney infection.  Luckily we had a male doctor and Jimmy had been fever free for two days so he opted for a different collection route, which came back all clear.  But his doc found an ear infection and thought antibiotics were needed.  We asked for a shot and they didn't want to in case he had an allergic reaction, so here we are giving poor Jimmy oral amoxicillin for 10 days.  The kid is an angel, easy going, relaxed, but everyone has their limits and this pink sticky syrup is beyond his threshold.  Now I know what an angry Jimmy looks like.
I am now waiting to hear from one place then deciding where I am going to work, hopefully for the last time.

The Twin Cities Weather Service had the perfect graphic today summarizing this never ending cold we have endured this winter:

Anyway, I think I have mentioned before, but there are all sorts of indoor playgrounds to let the wee ones work off their steam.  We went to the one nearest here and Ben LOVED it.  Smart mommy didn't look to see where the toddler room was and beeline there, so Ben got to play with the big kids.  He did great, he was up in tunnels above me, there was no way I could get to him, and he didn't get scared or panic at all.  He took getting run over and trampled and new scary things in stride.  I couldn't actually see him the whole time, which gave me a fright when I was looking up above trying to see him and then glanced down to see him run past me to climb back up.  He is a brave little guy.

Ben has been really starting to dive into his imagination, he is always seeing dragons here or spiders there and is starting to talk for his toys.  He generally plays the "good guy bad guy" games and gives his mom or dad the assigned bad guy.  Bad guy could be a car, a batman figurine, a certain doggie.  He has voices too which crack me up.  His current high rotation toys are Batman, two toys from happy meals - a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle skateboarder and the boy from Adventure time.  If not those then it is dinosaurs or Lego cars.  Doggy is still always there, but he is finally letting go of his Pepe.  He only uses it in his crib at home and they have stopped giving it to him at daycare.  Thank goodness!!!