April Fools 2014!

The boys and I had a little fun with a couple harmless April fools pranks this year! Here's what we did, so you can be prepared for next year!

It only took a quick trip to the grocery store to prepare for these fun little pranks.  First, we bought a leek and put it in the bathroom.  (And the boys learned what a leek was!)  When Daddy got home, the boys screamed, "Daddy!  There's a leek in the bathroom! You have to come fix it now!!)

"There's a LEEK in the bathroom!"

 He could tell something was up so that one didn't fool him, but did get a great laugh!!

For our next little prank, we actually did "get" daddy!!  We mixed up a bowl of candy that included m&m's, Reese's Pieces and Skittles!  We set it on the counter and it wasn't long before Daddy took a handful.  The first handful was just m&m's and Reese's, which isn't bad.  But the second helping had a Skittle or two, which totally messes with your taste buds! ;-)

Candy confusion!

This one didn't trick anyone because the boys have seen it before, but I thought that "dirt & worms" would be a fitting dessert with our dinner that night.  I made some Oreo pudding with a gummy worm hiding in each cup...

Dirt & Worms!!

 It was a fun day for the boys...the whole night they kept making up things to say. ("Mommy! All of your plants died! April fools! HAhahahah!") 

Last year we cut some letter E's out of brown paper, put them in a pan, and told Daddy that we made "brown-e's!"  A couple years ago Sam and I made a fake hot chocolate spill by mixing school glue with a little brown paint, pouring it on wax paper, sticking some marshmallows in it and letting it dry!  :-)

A Public Letter to "Mr. Samsky"

My 5th grade class photo! That's me in the front with the pink sweater and stone washed jeans, tightly rolled at the bottom... I remember thinking that fish necktie was SO cool...

Do you remember any of your teachers from as far back as elementary school?  I have several friends and family members who are teachers, and I can see how much they love and cherish letters from their past students.  So, it got me thinking about my elementary school past.  I remember two teachers well from my elementary school days...my first grade teacher Mr. Larson, and my 5th grade teacher Mr. Samsky.  So, I thought I'd make this post a public letter to Mr. Samsky.  Got a teacher that you remember from your past?  Look them up and send them an email!  It just might make them smile today.  :-)

My Yearbook! 5th grade was the only year I got a yearbook in elementary school.

Dear Mr. Samsky,

My name is Gretchen, and I'm not sure if you'll remember me, but I was in your 5th grade class at Woodland in  1989-1990.  My last name then was Brandt.

Me in 5th grade

I remember you telling us at the end of our school year that there was just one thing that you wanted us all to do.  When we graduated from high school, we were look you up in the phone book (you assured us you would be the only "Stu Samsky" listed in Eagan), call you up, and tell you, "I did it, Mr. Samsky."

It's been 24 years now, but I remember more about the 5th grade than I do about any other elementary school grade!

Mr Samsky in the schoolyard - taken outside with my first real camera! Remember when cameras required a commitment from your parents to buy film and develop it?  Thanks, Mom and Dad! ;-)

I remember that you recognized my talent for art, and weren't satisfied with how often we had art classes for me in 5th grade.  So, you arranged for me to have extra time with another teacher (or counselor?) who helped me to come up with my own special creative projects to work on.

I created my first claymation "movie," based on a book I chose from our library called "Hiccup."  I built little hippopotamuses out of clay, filmed each frame, and the whole class watched my little "production."  I apologize for how painfully slow it was...I think the woman working with me didn't realize that we did not need several second shots of each frame. ;-)

I remember you taught us the word "Tchotchke."

I remember that I dressed as a California Raisin that year for Halloween, and the 5th grade put on a Halloween "wax museum" where the school got to walk through and view all of us in our costumes, posing as statues.  The other kids had to partner with at least one other person to create their back drops.  But nobody else's costume really made sense with a California Raisin, and I wanted to paint my own back drop my way.  So, you bent the rules a little bit and allowed me to work on my own....thank you! (Trust me, I had more than my fill of group projects throughout the rest of my school and professional career, so this did not hurt me!) ;-)

My official bus patrol card, stapled in the back of my yearbook...this is serious business!

I remember how proud I was to be an official, card-carrying "bus patrol," and how seriously I took my duties!

Me sporting my Girl Scout vest, with my fellow bus patrols in the yearbook...

I remember how much you loved your hot pink and zebra striped "Zubas," although your wife was not so crazy about them.

Well heck, maybe you do remember me still...after all you did put it in writing that you would! Ha! ;-)

I remember how much you went out of your way for me, to help me stretch myself, and to let me know that I had something special. The confidence I gained in the 5th grade would later be a huge help as I moved, changed school districts, and went through some awful bullying in Junior High.  I never was one of the cool kids...always picked last for gym...yet I somehow became very popular when it came time to choose a group to work with on an art related school project!

I wanted you to know that I didn't forget that you wanted us to call you up after graduating high school...I think I was just still to shy and chicken to call you up at the time.  But, I wanted to let you know that I DID do it! 

Lakeville High school graduation, 1997

I graduated from Lakeville high school in 1997, having started earning college credits as a junior in the PSEO program at Inver Hills.  I went on to study Graphic Design at UW-Stout, got married, moved to Ohio, and then ultimately earned my bachelor's degree in Industrial Design from The Ohio State University.  During college I worked as an intern for the Scotts lawn care company, a design firm called Design Central, and two internships with Procter & Gamble in Cincinnatti.  I graduated from college in 2003, came back to MN, and went on to design retail fixtures for Best Buy at their corporate headquarters in Richfield for four years.  In 2007 I had my first baby boy, who is now in kindergarten!  I left Best Buy to become a partner in a small 3-person design firm, which was a great experience. 

Me and my high school sweetheart with our two little munchkins!

Today I have been happily married for almost 15 years and have two fabulous little boys.  I run several businesses from my home in Mound.  I still do freelance design: graphic, product, and retail fixture design.  (GretchenFleener.com)  I create and sell gifts made out of my recycled junk mail, which is carried in multiple retail stores around the globe (JunkMailGems.com).  I keep the most busy lately with my company Paintertainment, a children's party entertainment/talent agency representing multiple artists in the Twin Cities.  (Paintertainment.com) In addition to offering entertainment at parties, pregnant belly painting, and theater makeup sessions myself and for other artists, I also own and operate an online retail store.  In my store I sell face painting and balloon twisting supplies to artists all over the country, and have recently self-published my 4th book on the subject. 

Anyway, I just wanted to tell you, albeit 24 years LATE, that I did in fact graduate!  :-)  And the 5th grade in Mr Samsky's class brings me more happy memories than any other grade that I can remember.  Thank you!!  What you do makes a difference!  :-)

Sincerely,

Gretchen "Brandt" Fleener

DIY "Jake and the Neverland Pirates" Birthday Party!

Saturday we had a fun 4th birthday party for my little man!  The official theme was "Jake and the Neverland Pirates."  Here are some photos of what we did...

The invitation - I did this in Photoshop.

Balloons! I made a balloon column with a pirate ship on top (Toby is standing in front of it), and then a tabletop base to hold the Jake balloon which sat on the table.  I wanted to make that one float but my helium tank ran out on the ship!  Boo!  He loved them both though.  I realize everyone out there isn't also a professional balloon twister, but if you live near me you can certainly hire me to make you a balloon centerpiece, too!  ;-)  Here you can see he is wearing his Jake Halloween costume I made him!

 The cake was really fun.  I made a treasure chest and if you'd like to see every step of how I did it, check out my Snapguide!

See the steps to make this cake, here!

Rather than spend a ton of money on decorations, I usually try to work with what I have.  Since we gave him a couple Jake toys earlier in the day, I cut the pictures of the characters out of the boxes and used them in various places as decoration during the party, too.  I also took this white bowl and made it into a pirate-y skull with some black construction paper and tape:

We have this "FurReal" parrot that my parents gave us, and he made a fun decoration with an eye patch added!

Doing projects rather than coloring sheets was such a huge hit at our last Angry Bird party, I decided to go that route again for this party.  I put out supplies for the kids to make three things...a telescope, a treasure map, and a pirate flag!

Supplies in a divided food dish

The sample flag and telescope I made.  I spent $2 on four black t-shirts at the thrift store, and cut rectangles using my zig-zag scissors for the flags...no hems needed!  I then used some scrap felt that I had on hand to cut a few skull and bone shapes, and some noses/mouths.  The telescopes I cut from wrapping paper tubes and attached the red yarn.  The kids then could decorate them with colored tape, stampers, stickers, markers, etc.

The treasure maps were fun! I had a huge pile of this brown paper that was used as packing material from Amazon, which is where I ordered some of his birthday gifts.  I simply cut the paper into rectangles and they were perfect!  Looks like old, worn, wrinkly paper like an old map.

Goodie bags! I lucked out and happened to be in Target when they had only their pirate stuff on clearance.  I got the pirate hats for $0.60 cents, and wrote their names on them with t-shirt paints.  The package of pirate bags was $0.50 cents.  The filling I got mostly on Amazon....eye patches, stampers, tattoos and gold coins.  I also found Jake stickers on clearance at Target, and then added some Hershey nuggets and fruit snacks too.

The pinata was fun to make!  This one felt easy to me compared to others I've done because I didn't have to make any paper mache paste.  No mess, and no waiting for stuff to dry!  Just cardboard and tape, covered with paint.  Click here to see my Snapguide that shows all of the steps I took to make this pinata.

Being a balloon twister, I had to also make some balloon swords for all of the little pirates!  The boys had fun having (safe) sword fights!  I still have yet to ever do face painting or balloons at my own kids' parties...I'm always too busy hosting!  But, these I could make ahead of time so it worked out great!

I drew a few skulls and "4's" on the window with some window paint...a fun and quick way to add decorations without spending a lot of money or storing a lot of "stuff!" Our dollar store sells these window paints!

Overall it was a really fun party!  We did a baked potato bar for dinner which was yummy, plus some hot dogs for the kids.  Usually the kids have so much fun just playing, we don't try to cram a lot of games into our parties.  We put out some project stuff on the table which allows them to come and go as they please, and then the pinata is the perfect time to hand out goodie bags, which they then add to with their pinata "winnings!"  We do the pinata right before gifts, so then all the kids have their own "gifts" as they watch the birthday boy open his gifts.  It works well for us, anyway!  Have you hosted a pirate party?  If so, please feel free to post your own ideas in the comments!

Angry Birds Birthday Party!

My big boy just turned 6, and we had an Angry Bird party!  Here are some photos of what we did!

When possible, I like to just make my own decorations and save the cost of licensed character stuff.  I still do buy some things, but sometimes it's almost as easy to make your own....

I taped construction paper to our beverage tubs to make a pig and a yellow bird.

I got some little individually packaged pouches of Angry Birds cheese nips.  We had them out with the food and also put one in each of the kids' goodie bags.  But the box they came in had lots of pictures of the birds and pigs.  So, I cut them out and used them around the food tables as decorations...

Who needs to buy licensed character confetti when you can just cut the pictures out of your box of Angry Birds Cheese Nips?!

Okay, I know not everyone has the supplies or know-how to make balloon sculptures...but since I started adding balloon twisting to my Paintertainment party services, I had to make a balloon sculpture!

Green pig on a nest of eggs with birds swooping overhead!

I had purchased the actual character balloons for the red bird and pig, and the the other two latex balloons I just drew faces on with paint pens.  You could easily attach paper eyes and beaks to these too like I did to the beverage tubs. 

A couple other balloons I made and hung from the ceiling.

At all of our previous parties, I've always printed out coloring sheets that go with the party theme, and spread them out on the table with crayons.  However, I decided to change it up a bit this year for Sammy.  He is very much into "making projects"... cutting and gluing paper to make things.  So, this year I put together a "build-a-bird" station.  I pre-cut some body shapes out of construction paper, some beaks and black tufts of "hair."  Then I put out a bowl of google eyes, and some paper shreds from the dollar store.  (paper shreds to make nests!) 

Build

 Our dollar store had a bag of Easter foamie stickers, so I got a bag and picked out all of the foamy egg stickers.  They were perfect for making nests!  I put out a rack of fun edged scissors, some glue, more construction paper and tape. The kids really got into this and had fun making their own angry birds!!

Some of the birds made at the party! Note little brother Toby's "nest" on the right...we had to cut him off as he was using up all the eggs!  Ha!!

Sam holding up one of his birds, with his nest of eggs in the foreground

The cake...I baked a simple cake mix in a 9x13" pan.  We luckily already had an Angry Bird game which had some cute plastic birds, a slingshot, and pigs.  So, I utilized those.  I built up a "hill" for the sling shot to sit on using some brownie bites from the grocery store, and then frosted it all with green.  Next, I built a little nest (pretzel sticks with jellybean eggs), and the stack of "logs" that the pigs are on.  

I used frosting to glue the "logs" together.  That's a whopper on top, as a boulder.

These cookie stick thingies worked great for the green pig's "logs!"

I always make a pull-string pinata.  This year I made a green pig, which was made really similar to the Mickey Mouse pinata I did last year for Toby.  I just made the ears out of construction paper and glued them on.  

 The birthday boy pulled the first string, and happened to pull THE string, dumping the candy!  So, the pinata went really fast!!

 Usually I make my own "goodie bags" by decorating paper lunch bags...for their little prizes and to collect their pinata candy.  But, this summer I came across some nice re-useable Angry Bird bags on clearance at Michael's.  I think they were maybe $.75 cents tops.  They also had some other Angry Bird stuff on clearance so I got some bag fillers there too...little notebooks, markers, and stampers.  That was the day I made Sammy commit to his party theme, as I loaded up on these goodies!

The party went great and everyone had a fun time!  At least it sure beat last year, when the birthday boy spent most of his party throwing up into buckets that I was very busy rotating.  Poor guy.  This year everyone was healthy and a good time was had by all!

We are just a few weeks away from little brother Toby's party, and he will be having a Jake and the Neverland Pirates themed party.  So, you can probably imagine my excitement yesterday as I stumbled upon Target's birthday section, where they had only their pirate themed stuff on major clearance! Score!  I'll be sure to post pics of his party once it happens!!

I also hope to post pics of some of my homemade Christmas gifts that I gave this year pretty soon.  We still have one family Christmas gift exchange coming up on January 1st, so I can't spoil any gift surprises just yet!  But stay tuned for more posts in 2014!  :-)

ID Mommy Projects: DIY Jake and the Neverland Pirates Costume!

My 3 year old has really been into Jake and the Neverland Pirates this past year, so of course he wanted to be Jake for Halloween!  Here's what I came up with!  And like the Angry Bird costume, no sewing required, again!

Awwe!  Cute little pirate!

For his vest, I found a little boys' black suit coat for about $3-$4 at a thrift store.  It was a size too small, but that didn't matter because I cut the sleeves off anyway.  I was going to hem the sleeves, but then I thought the rough look seemed more pirate-y!  I then just glued some gold ribbon around the edges that I got at Michaels.

The first thing Toby wanted to be SURE I didn't forget was the shirt "with the X."  Funny what details little kids notice!  I found a plain, white t-shirt at a thrift store for a couple bucks, and simply cut a slit down the middle. Then I used my crop-o-dile to put four metal eyelets and strung through some brown shoelace string that I had on hand.  Voila!  The "X shirt!"

The shirt

 Jake has a little cummerbund thing and I had some blue fabric scrap on hand.  So, I ironed some pleats and glued them in place, then glued that piece right to the shirt.  This way I didn't have to worry about making something attach to his waist and stay there.

The boots I got for $4 at the thrift store.  Yes, they are girls' boots, but geeze, they look an awful lot like awesome pirate boots, don't they?!  You just don't find brown boots with heels for toddler boys.

So I just basically folded over the boots to get the big cuff, and then glued on the buckle and "J" with the same gold ribbon I trimmed the vest with.

For the headband and hair...

I found a brand new (tag still on it!) black stocking cap at a thrift store for $1.99!  I cut some zig-zaggy prickly hair spikes out of black felt and just glued them around the hat for his hair.  Then I glued some red felt around the hair for his headband.  Well, his head will be warm this Halloween!  I may have to put some long sleeves underneath his shirt this year though.

All in all I think it turned out pretty well!  In the pics he is holding his toy sword, however, he definitely wants me to make him a wood sword like Jake's. SO, I will be doing that this week and will be sure to post a finished costume pic on or after Halloween!

Hope this helps if you are looking for ideas!  It's not too late...you may have to hit a few thrift stores to find these thing, as I did collect them over time.  Good luck and have fun this Halloween!

ID Mommy Projects: DIY Angry Bird Halloween Costume

"Aaaah -he-yah!"

This year my 5 year old requested the green angry bird as his costume!  I was a little worried about how to pull this off but I think it turned out pretty well!  And there isn't a single stitch of sewing!

I went thrift store shopping (of course!) and found a green sweatshirt that was his size, and a bright green men's polo shirt.  I then cut the sleeves off of the polo shirt, put it over the kids' size sweatshirt, and then used a glue gun to seal the cut-off polo sleeves and the hem of the polo to the sweatshirt underneath...making sure to stuff it with pillow stuffing between the two shirts before totally sealing it off.

 I got a pair of giant google eyes at Michael's for $5 which were awesome!  The eyebrows and beak I cut out of felt and glued on with a glue gun, as well as the furry under belly.  Then I just outlined everything with black t-shirt paints which helped it look really cartoon-y.

I think he likes it!

I figure that between the sleeves, hood, and pillow stuffing, he should have no problem staying warm while trick-or-treating in Minnesota!  I'll of course paint his face as well because, well, that's what I do.

side view!

I used some black felt to cut out and attach the black tuft of hair to his hood, and the tail to the back...

Back view!

 ...all glue gun!  I spent maybe $10 on this for the eyes and two shirts...already had the felt, stuffing and glue! 

I'll be sure to come back and post a final photo of him in costume on Halloween as I'll have his face painted, but wanted to pass this on for anyone else looking for costume ideas in this final week before Halloween!

Stay tuned tomorrow for my 3 year old's "Jake & the Neverland Pirates" costume!!

My Todler Has Lyme Disease? No...really?!

I mentioned in my last post that we were the "good kind of busy" lately...okay this is not the good kind but here's one thing that kept me preoccupied this summer...my 3 year old having contracted Lyme Disease.

As a kid who grew up in the country and basically lived in the woods and tall grass, I had always been used to picking ticks off of myself every night as a kid.  I never saw a deer tick myself and figured that they are one of those things people worry too much about.  Plus I always wear bug spray anyway because mosquitoes LOVE me.

I know this post may be a bit lengthy and boring for my average reader, but I am posting a lot of detail for a couple reasons...1) just for my own records and 2) for anyone who may be google searching this stuff and could benefit from the post by identifying these symptoms on their own kids (or self)....hopefully saving them from the late stage horrors of Lyme's disease by catching it early.

DAY 1: So on Thursday July 25th Toby woke up from his nap with a high fever.  I did my usual "kid with a fever" routine...got out my "sick kid tote" which holds bottles of Tylenol, Ibuprofen, a thermometer, syringe for medicine, and a note pad to write down time, temps, and does given.

DAY 3: Saturday morning July 27th he still had a high fever (even while on medications, over 102).  So, we took him into our pediatrician's walk-in clinic (25 minutes from home).  There they did a throat culture (because he complained of his "chin hurting" while pointing to his throat), and told us "give it a couple days."

Monkey and two fingers...comfort...

DAY 5: A couple days later I made an appointment with our regular pediatrician (10 minutes from home) on Tuesday, July 30 because his fever was still going strong on day 5. Neither of my boys have had a fever that high for that long.

DAY 6: The doctor asked if he had any rashes, which he did not, and he just said to give it a couple days again. Or, if  were really worried, take him to urgent care for blood work.  He assured me that Toby was too hysterical for his nurses to hold him down and take blood at the clinic (he was terrified after the uncomfortable throat culture he had previously), that they don't have numbing cream like urgent care does for the needles (what?! It's a pediatrician's office!!), and that it would take days to get results back anyway.  So, since he was not concerned with 5 days of high fever, we waited. (In hindsight, we should have probably just taken him to urgent care! But even then they likely wouldn't have done the specific tests for Lyme.)

"Do I LOOK like I feel better?!??!"

During that time it was my mission to get him to pee at least 3 times a day which was hard.  He wasn't eating, and wasn't drinking.  I was lucky to see him pee once during an entire day, besides a wet diaper at night. I got him some Pedialyte and made him take tiny sips every few minutes and giving him freezer pops until he finally peed...YEAH!  Mini victory.  The nurses and doctors said we don't have to worry if he is peeing at least 3 times a day.  Aaah, false sense of security....

DAY 7: The next day, Wednesday July 31st I noticed a rash developing around Toby's eyes and on his chest.  It was no particular shape, but was red and I thought I'd better let the doc know because he had asked if Toby had any rashes previously.  I thought this might mean it was something else, and he said to call if I wanted to run anything by him and we could talk.  Never got ahold of the doctor but a triage nurse called back and said that since he was still peeing at least 3 times a day, the meds were lowering his fever, and the rash wasn't itching and bugging him, that I shouldn't worry and again, "give it a couple more days."

The face rash after it moved from around his eyes down to his nose and cheeks

DAY 9: Two days later, on Friday, August 2nd, the rash around his eyes had moved down to his cheeks, the one on his chest was staying the same, but more rashes started appearing all over his body...his back, his belly, his arms and legs.  These were a very uniform, round shape and got me worried.  He also was complaining that his arms and his legs hurt.  SO, I called the doctor and again was only able to talk to the triage nurse.  I described the rashes as being round and red on the edges, and purple in the center.  (Just completely forgot that this his exactly what the rashes are supposed to look like after a lyme infected deer tick bite) They were appearing all over his body and getting darker, and his arms and legs were hurting. I told her I had photos that I could email her of the rashes but she said they don't have email. (huh?!) Her reaction was .... guess what ... "give it another day or two.  Or maybe give it 3 days and then if the rashes haven't started to go away to bring him in for a look at the clinic.  (this is the point where I look back and get really angry...as I later learned that all of these symptoms are apparently CLASSIC lyme.)

DAY 12: On Monday Aug 5th when the rashes were not any better, I made an appointment for as soon as I could get in, the next morning (Tuesday).  But my plans for the day changed and I had to swap a Monday plan to Tuesday, so I figured I'd just take the trek back out to the walk-in clinic and wait it out so he could be seen right away that day.

Boy am I glad that my plans were messed up and we went in a day early! Had I waited until the next day, the rashes would have been almost gone, leaving nothing visual to diagnose...

The doctor who saw us that day knew her stuff and didn't try to pass everything off as "just some infection to wait out."  She immediately suspected Lyme's disease, and pulled up a photo on her tablet of the very rash Toby had.  Apparently we had not only not seen the tick that bit him, but he never had the original rash which (usually) develops at the bite site.  We were now on to later stages where the bite rash goes away (if there was one, which there isn't always), and other rashes appear on the rest of the body.

The second she said "Lyme" a chill ran through my body as I thought about our friend who was diagnosed VERY late and is suffering insanely from this horrific disease.  A few minutes later she brought in another doctor who confirmed her suspicions.  From there she had the nurses take a couple vials of blood for testing (this was awful for poor Toby...especially when I had told him they were only going to look at his rash!).  It took me and three nurses to hold him down to take blood.  :-(  The doc said it would take a couple days to get the blood tests back, but thought we should begin treating him "immediately."  She called in a prescription and we left.

Being that the plans with my boys had changed that day from lunch and playing at McDonald's Play Place to getting needles stuck in Toby's arm, I tried to salvage what was left of the morning by taking some Culver's from the drive-through over to a picnic table at a nearby playground.  While there I got calls from both the doctor and the pharmacist letting me know that they do not have the medication in stock, and no pharmacy around had it either.  It is apparently very rare and nobody carries it.  (Since Toby is allergic to penicillin he couldn't have the usual meds)  It would take another day to have it ordered in.  The pharmacist was SHOCKED that our insurance covered this medication, as most do not.  And I was slightly shocked to see that our share of the COVERED price was over $300.  But when you have priceless kids to treat, you whip out the credit card!!

DAY 13: The next day, Tuesday Aug 6th, his rashes started to go away.  At this point I'm just so glad that I had brought him in a day early so the doc could see the telltale rash!  I shudder to think that if I had listened to the triage nurse, I would have thought that everything was fine with the rashes going away and may have canceled the appointment!  Toby was complaining a lot of his knees hurting, so I called the pharmacist to see if I could give him Ibuprofen, if it would react with the meds he would hopefully be taking later in the day.  It was approved so that gave him a little relief.  His meds came in and the moment the pharmacist called I loaded the kids in the car and we had it in him within 20 minutes.  The medicine is thick, grainy, and while fruit flavored, Toby HATED it.

That afternoon after his nap things got bad.  He literally couldn't walk across his little bedroom, screaming and crying that his knees hurt. I carried him to the couch where he spent the rest of the day moaning, crying, shaking... and I pretty much did all the same things just from having to watch him.  I called the doctor's office to see if there was anything more I could give him for his pain (nope, Ibuprofen was it apparently).  They informed me that it was going to get worse before it gets better.  Well, at least I knew that it was supposed to be worse...

A friend suggested a warm epsom salt bath, so we tried that.  He was screaming so hard because he didn't want a bath, holding his legs up out of the water.  Eventually I got him to lie back for a few minutes, but you just can't explain to a hysterical toddler the benefits of relaxing in a hot tub! It's like explaining how good a nap will feel when they are over-tired!  Ugh...When I lifted him out of the tub and tried to stand him on the floor for a minute to dry him off his little legs just crumpled to the ground.  "I can't stand, it hurts Mommy!"

More of the horrible medicine he hated and off to bed.  For his story I picked a little Mickey Mouse board book that he loves and knows every word by heart.  Whenever we read it, I will start each sentence and he'll finish it.  Not tonight.  He seemed like his mind just wasn't there...he'd just shake his head and wouldn't speak.  I tried pointing to things in the pictures and asking him what color it was.  He'd stare blankly, then worriedly shake his head, and sometimes mutter "I don't know."  This stuff was really scary.  I pet his curly head, did his bedtime prayers for him, gave him tons of kisses, and let him rest.

A couple hours later he had a 104.5 temperature.  I gave him Ibuprofen and didn't sleep much but at least he finally did!

DAY 14: The next day (Wed, Aug 7) things started looking up...well, at least he wasn't screaming and howling in pain and didn't have a fever anymore.  I felt slightly better about having to leave for the day (my face painting "super bowl" as I painted at a county fair that week).  But from Daddy's reports he was able to go to the park playground (with lots of rests between walking), and spent a LOT of time playing games on my ipad.  He forced down the meds but didn't need any ibuprofen.

DAY 15:  On Thursday, Aug 8th I got to be home with the boys as my mom manned the fair booth.  I took the boys to visit the fair and for the first time in over a year we had to bring a stroller.  Toby loved the fair, but was pretty tired by the end and couldn't stand out of the stroller for too many minutes at a time.

The most likely place he could have been bitten was on a play date a couple weeks earlier where we were playing in tall grass and climbing trees.  It was totally my fault for not inspecting him for ticks afterwards.  Of course I doubt I would see a deer tick, most likely the nymph which is the size of a poppy seed, when I'm used to spotting larger wood ticks.  So, I TRY not to beat myself up too bad for it, but let's just say that on our family camping trip that followed, both boys were thoroughly bug-sprayed and tick-checked daily!!

Today you'd never know he had Lyme (thank you, GOD!!).  Luckily we caught it JUST in time.  I hear so many horror stories of people who have had it for years.  Now we just pray that he doesn't have any long term problems from this.  But, the lesson to be learned is this...be sure to use bug spray before and check your kiddos after playing a lot in the tall grass or woods.  And if your gut tells you something bigger is wrong with your kid, ignore the nurse on the phone and just take your child in to see a doctor!  I hope this post helps someone else to either identify the rash and symptoms, or encourage them to get a second opinion before it's too late!