Happy Easter!

This was Zane's first Easter that he could have fun with. It took a bit of prompting, but he "found" some eggs. At first he was much more interested in playing with his new garbage truck. Later on we played with them some more, hiding eggs within eggs or other things in the eggs and finding them again.


Brady came for a short visit on the first nice day of the year. Zane and I had the day off since daycare was closed, so we got to have a lot of fabulous outdoor time. We played with sand, ran on the sidewalk, went for a long walk with Brady and then a bike ride to the beach. At the beach we threw stones in the water, touched puppies, saw ducks and sail surfers and a train. With the nice weather we're starting to reconnect with our neighbors, too, which is nice. Zane had fun with his Uncle Brady.

This week Zane got a fabulous new garbage truck, bringing his garbage truck collection to three. He has so many trucks I decided to even things out a bit with two dolls. One is an anatomically correct little boy who comes with a potty; it's funny that he has genitals and an anus, but no nipples. I also got a girl doll with zippers and buttons and snaps and the like for dressing practice.

The cut continues to heal nicely and seems to be getting shallower. These days I'm rubbing four different unguents on Zane for various ailments: Maderma on the cut for less of a scar, hydrocortisol on the hands for a tenacious itchy rash, athlete's foot creme on the back of his knees for a different tenacious rash I suspect to be a yeast infection like the one he had in his crotch a while back, and diaper cream to keep the jock itch from coming back. Sometimes I get the tubes mixed up, but it hasn't killed him yet.

Here's an Easter blast from the past.

Gapes

This morning Zane had a snack and an episode of Mighty Machines while I had my shower. He's been on a grapes kick ("gapes"), and here he is enjoying them while holding a bear and sitting in his own chair. Especially cute, I thought!

Not much to report this week, which is really nice! No falls, no colds, no teething pain (although he is still popping his fangs out). The cut is healing really nicely. Oh, there is one thing! He has finally learned to say "yes". I think he's known "no" for about 6 months, so it's about time.

Today we went out to breakfast and to the Ballard Farmers' Market. I think the last time we went may have been a month ago. Zane remembered the honey stand and went right in for a sample. Then, when we were watching some musicians, he demanded "Mama, wallet." I gave him a dollar and he trotted over and gave them a donation. I was pretty impressed that he remembered we had done that before!

Michael has saved an episode of Saturday Night Live where Katy Perry sings. For some reason Zane is absolutely mesmerized by it. It's kind of funny to watch him.

Scarface

The big news this week is getting Zane's stitches out and bandages off. It turned out to be complicated. We went in on Monday morning to have the stitches removed, but when the top three stitches came out the wound started opening up again. He quickly got the top taped up, and the bottom stitches were left in. On Thursday morning the rest of the stitches came out and he was taped up again for just a few days until the tape came off. We were pretty disappointed by all of this because we worry that the top of the wound will not have healed so nicely as it could have and the bottom of the wound might get the railroad look of stitches being left in too long. In the end, it looks like the wound is pretty evenly healed, so all will be well. For the next 8 weeks I'll be rubbing in some scar stuff four times a day. It will take years to fade and never go away completely. It's just part of the New Zane!

The weather in Seattle has really been depressing lately. Cold and rainy every blinkin' day. Wednesday we took another trip to the aquarium as Zane can never have enough of the fish. It turned out to be spring break this week, so it was full of kids. Zane actually likes that. He spends a lot of time peering at kids and silently playing with/near them. We burned off a lot of energy and got to see the otters and fur seals vigorously swimming. The river otters were awake for the first time ever, but for some reason Zane didn't want to see them. Thursday afternoon we were home after the doctor appointment and actually got some good half-sunshine time outside with Zane's bicycle and in the sandbox. Saturday was cold but not raining, so I bundled us up and we got on my bike (Big Bikecycle) and headed out to a park for some walking, airplane and boat spotting, and dog watching. We came home pretty chilled and I gave Zane his first hot (lukewarm) chocolate. He decided it was "gone" when the marshmallows were gone.

Zane is still having a growth spurt, and his brain has ramped up, too. This week we noticed he is really beginning to nail down his colors. We have a color coded shape sorter he hasn't used for a while, and Michael got it out today. Zane was a wiz at it all of a sudden. He has also started to understand counting and has correctly identified "two" of a few things without any prompting.
Today I showed him a picture of three apples and asked him how many -- I've never asked anything remotely like this, it was just an experiment. He pointed to each apple and said "One. One. One." I can't say he was wrong!

He's also been shouting in his dreams lately. One night I heard "Dolphin!", and another night he said "Airplane!" over and over until Michael said "Shhhh -- night night!" I don't think Zane was awake for either shout.

We've been battling a cold this weekend, and Zane has been tired and cranky but not at his worst. I need to sleep, though, as I feel like I'm fighting it off. Night night, sleep tight, snug as a bug in a rug, and sweet sweet dreams!

FrankenBaby

Short story: 6 stitches in the forehead, scar likely.

On Wednesday Grandpa was visiting and Michael was up in the living room, too. There was tickle play, and Zane was running away laughing, and he tripped and fell, whacking his forehead on the projecting corner of a wall by the stairs. He screamed, which didn’t surprise us since it sounded like a loud whack. I held him for a few seconds and then decided I’d better look to make sure he hadn’t hit his eyes or nose. I saw blood! I started to wipe it and there was a big deep vertical gash in his head! Aaaaaaaah! We ran to the bathroom and I wiped some blood but it was bleeding pretty fast. We hopped into my car with Michael driving and me in the back with Zane strapped into his car seat. I wasn’t sure at first if his head was cracked, but after a few minutes it was pretty clear that just his skin was split, but it was very deep and scary looking. After just a few minutes Zane stopped crying and started talking about the trucks he saw. The bleeding stopped actively gushing, too.

We got to the local Ballard Swedish emergency room, and by then he was only whimpering a little. He noticed a horse sculpture and said “horse” and whinnied, which charmed the receptionist. We ended up being there for three hours. He got some topical anesthetic on a pad which had to sit on the wound for a while to work its magic. Eventually when they were ready to stitch, he got another anesthetic up his nose which put him into a loopy stupor. He got wrapped up like a burrito, and then stitched up while I sat by him. He was so loopy he actually smiled at the women working on him. It took about 45 min for the stupor-stuff to wear off enough for us to go home. He was still quite silly for a while.

He gets stitches out Monday morning. Because it is a vertical gash the scar is more likely to be visible. It is about 1.5 inches long and sort of right of center over his eye. They said he could go to daycare, so the next day it was back to normal! We just have to disinfect and bandage and watch for infection.

Phew. We’re just very glad he’s OK and seems to be completely fine about it. Such a trooper! Several people have pointed out to me that he will have a Harry Potter scar, and it will be very distinguished, maybe even sexy. Tonight (Sunday) when I took the bandage off the skin all of a sudden looked really stitched together at the surface. The healing seems to be very even, and I really think that in a few years it could fade to a pretty thin scar. Fingers crossed!

Other stuff happened this week - Tuesday storytime was canceled so Zane and I went to the zoo instead. We spent time in the nice warm tropical house where the toucans were a favorite. We had our first carousel ride, and then picked up a monkey in the gift shop on the way home. Monkey has now become part of Zane's entourage. Zane had a fever Saturday and when he got up he camped out in the big chair for a while with Kitty and Foof on the left and Monkey and Bob on the right. They are all required for bedtime these days.

Later on in the week Zane got a digger (aka an excavator) from Daddy. When will the warmth and sunshine come back so we can dig sand? Meanwhile, I bought some polished rocks for playing with construction equipment in the kitchen. The rocks are easier to clean up than the orzo I was using earlier!