Family Dialog

Danielle: “Aiden, say ‘I.’”

Aiden: “I”

Danielle: “Say ‘love.’”

Aiden: “Love”

Danielle: “Say ‘you.’”

Aiden: “Me.”

Danielle: “Aiden! Say ‘I.’”

Aiden: “I”

Danielle: “Love”

Aiden: “Love”

Danielle: “You”

Aiden: “Me”

This is where I decided to try to outsmart him.

Dan: “Aiden, say ‘I.’”

Aiden “I”

Dan: “Love”

Aiden: “Love”

Dan: “Me”

Aiden: “Me”

Danielle: “Aiden, what are you?”

Aiden (grinning): “Ornery.”

Natalie Take Up Ice Skating

Natalie's Mom-mom bought ice skating lessons for Natalie. She took to it very quickly and had a great time. Her instructor recommended helmets for the kids just in case.

Natalie Enjoys a S'more

Did you know that you can make s'mores in the microwave? Natalie knows.

Natalie's Cast

Ages ago I promised to post a picture of Natalie's cast. Here, at last, is a picture. You can see that her Uncle Jeremy has signed it, but it's hard to read. The cast comes off on December 16th. They'll use a saw to cut it off. It will be interesting to see how she reacts to that.

Natalie's cast

Natalie got a cast today. It was quite a hassle trying to get that arranged. Most doctors' offices seem to unable to return a phone call, probably because of the all the paperwork requirements of the insurance companies, which were the other half of this headache.

But enough complaining. The orthopedist said that the fracture was minor and did not involve the growth plate. She should heal and not have further problems.

The staff at the orthopedist office was very kind to Natalie and let her choose the color of the cast. She chose purple. I'll try to post a picture later.

Natalie has to wear the cast for 4 weeks, mainly as a precaution against re-injury. After that she'll get another x-ray and may have to wear a brace for two weeks as a further precaution.

A colleague of mine told me that his daughter had to get a cast when she was 4 years old, and she then got the chicken pox under the cast. These days, kids are vaccinated for chicken pox, so Natalie should only have to deal with a little itching from time to time.

Natalie's Arm: A Very Minor Fracture

Last night, Natalie fell at the play area at the mall (which our pediatrician calls "the germ pit"). It was a pretty minor fall. She was jumping off an object about 18 inches high, but didn't quite stick the landing and tripped, landing with her left arm extended. For the most part, she's as tough as nails, so when she wanted to climb into Mommy's lap and stay here, holding her wrist, we knew something was wrong. So we took her to a new urgent care center near the mall and found out that she had a very minor fracture near her left wrist. The x-ray below -- which the urgent care center gave to us on CD-ROM -- shows the fracture, called a "buckle" fracture. It appears in the x-ray as a little bump of the right edge of the bone. As the doctor explained it, kids' bones are pretty soft, and this is more like a crease than a crack. It should heal without any problem. We'll follow up with an orthopedist just to be sure.

Natalie has a splint on her arm now and may get a cast from the orthopedist. She woke up once last night crying, but with a little tylenol, she went right back to sleep. It's going to be interesting getting her through the basic daily routine with one arm. I'm not sure what we'll do about school on Monday if she can't figure out how to go to the bathroom independently.

The urgent care center, incidentally, was awesome. Our local emergency room is famous for 4-hour waits on Saturday nights, but the urgent care center got us registered, x-rayed, examined, splinted, re-examined and discharged in 30 minutes. And we didn't feel rushed at all; they just didn't waste any time. We were in the waiting room for about 2 minutes and went from there straight to x-ray. From x-ray we went to the exam room. The doctor walked in two minutes later and had already read the x-rays. And it went on like that, with each person being cheerful, empathetic to Natalie, and happy to answer questions. And it was a smaller co-pay than the Emergency Room!

Rollerskating

Danielle took Natalie to a birthday party at a roller skating rink today.  I have to admit that I thought this was not a great idea.  I mean, what 4-year-old knows how to roller skate?

Apparently Natalie does.  This came rather as a surpise to Danielle and me.  She's never been roller skating before.  But Danielle rented her a pair of skates that strap over her shoes, and she took to it like a duck to water.  Not just skating around, mind you, but spinning in circles and skating on one foot with the other foot up in the air!

Incredible.

Lesson learned:  kids can do more than you might expect.  Let them try.

I'm going to take her ice skating soon.  And this time I'll remember to bring the camera.