Jacob

This morning started out like most Monday mornings. I got Jacob ready while John got himself ready, and they headed out the door on time. Then I got myself ready, worried about what I should wear, realized I forgot to do something that would "just take a minute", and put my coat on about 20 minutes later than I should have. Then the cell phone rings.

I call people all the time on my cell, but I rarely receive calls. Especially before 8:30 on a Monday morning.

"Is this Jacob's mom? Um, this is daycare. He fell and I thought you should know about it." My first thought was to wonder why they were calling me. Jacob falls all the time. He's a toddler, after all. Usually they just fill out an incident report and tell us about it when he gets picked up.

"When he fell, his face hit a chair and his tooth went through his lip. I don't think he needs stitches, but he might. There's just a hole in his lip right now." Ah. Good that they called. How is Jacob faring?

"His lip looks pretty bad, but he's eating breakfast without any problem right now." That's our boy! Jacob certainly isn't one to let a little hole in his face interfere with food!

So, instead of heading for work, I left for daycare. Jacob got a full 20 minutes with the pediatrician. We decided against stitches because it was a "clean" puncture, there appeared to be no nerve or muscle damage, and trying to hold Jacob still enough to get stitches made all our heads spin. It was bad enough restraining Jacob so that the doctor could look inside his mouth.

Turns out that Jacob also has puss in both of his ears. Nice. I was pleased that Jacob finally wheezed in the doctor's presence; the type of wheezing that you can feel if you put your hand on his back. Usually I just have to describe the symptoms after the fact.

We left with scripts for augmentin and albuterol, smarties, and a sticker. Jacob happily went back to daycare and I finally headed for work.

Only three hours late!

"Jacob, Stop! We do not bang cars into the wall. That hurts the wall."

Jacob stops banging the car into the wall. He walks away from the wall and ...

"Jacob, Stop! We do not bang cars into the fridge. That hurts the refrigerator."

Jacob considers a full-blown temper tantrum, makes a few weak cries, then is happily redirected to some blocks. Mom takes a deep breath and enjoys a sarcastic laugh because Jacob did follow directions, just not in the way that Mom intended for them to be followed.