Babyproofing

I have mixed feelings about babyproofing.  Obviously, I want Jack to be safe.  But both Chris and I feel that babyproofing every inch of the house is not a good idea.  How will a kid learn to interact with the real world if every sharp edge is dulled?  So we try to strike a balance.

The other day Jack was in his room, pulling himself up on his dresser.  He lost his balance and fell, hitting his mouth against one of the drawer pulls.  I picked him up and he was a little upset, but not really more than a normal tumble.  Then I saw the blood coming out his mouth.  !!!  I managed not to panic, and opened his mouth to try and determine where the blood was coming from.  Most of it seemed to be on his gums above the two middle teeth that are coming in.  I felt his teeth to see if they were loose, but they were fine.

And Jack seemed fine.  He went back to playing, and later ate his dinner and chewed on his sippy cup spout.  It bled for a little while, and I debated about calling the doctor, but in the end I didn’t.

Should we have removed all the drawer pulls from his room?  Even after this, I don’t think so.  I think that’s going down a road where every surface in the house is padded.  We’re still babyproofing the obvious things, of course; making sure he can’t pull his shelf out of the bookcase, putting fences in front of the fireplace, etc.  I hope this is the right way to go.  I guess we’ll find out.

You Give Me Fever

As I mentioned in a previous post, Jack had his first real illness on our UK trip.  He’s been sick before:  he had thrush for a while after he was born (though it never seemed to bother him); he had a fever a couple of times after his shots, but it lasted less than 24 hours; and he’s had five colds, which have all been fairly minor.

He was acting a bit tired and subdued on the last Tuesday we were there, and while Chris and I went out to the movies (Slumdog Millionare:  excellent!)  he went down for an early and very long nap.  He felt warm afterwards and I took his temperature (I’d brought his thermometer and some Children’s Tylenol) and he had a fever around 101.  We gave him some Tylenol, and the next morning it was normal again.  It started to rise again during the day, though, and he was definitely not himself.  He just wanted to sit in someone’s lap and play a little.  Usually he’s way too squirmy to sit in a lap.

By evening it was up to over 103, and I called our advice nurse in California, who said if it didn’t come down we might want to see someone.  His fever didn’t go below 103, so we ended up calling a National Health Service phone number (they have a centralized service) and they said a doctor would call us “in the next 4 hours”.  Next I called Chris’s brother and his wife, who are both doctors and have three kids, and they gave us some good advice.  The NHS doctor called back not too long after and advised we add children’s ibuprofen to the mix, so Chris went out and got that.  By this time his fever had reached 104.6 and I was feeling a little panicky.

We undressed him down to his onsesie and moved him into our bedroom which was cooler than his room, and thankfully his temp started to go down again.  He slept uneasily next to me for the night, and by the morning his temperature was normal again.  By Thursday afternoon he was almost his old self.

We thought that would be in the end of it, but on Saturday he broke out in a rash on his front and back, and we took him down to an NHS walk-in clinic.  We waited about an hour and then saw a nurse who checked him over and said it was a common reaction babies had to high fevers, and not to worry.  We didn’t have to fill out a single piece of paperwork, and it was free!

Jack had a cold right when we left for the trip, but it was extremely mild and disappeared quickly.  Last night he came down with his 6th cold, though, and is very stuffed up, poor guy.  Six colds in five months!  Sheesh.  I guess that’s life with a baby.

Even when he had his high fever though he was in pretty good spirits; he just needed a lot of extra cuddling.  But it was a little bit scary to have his first real illness so far from home.  Thankfully we were staying with family so that made it a lot easier.

Jet Lag

Jack has slowly been adjusting to being back at home.

First night: woke up at 12:30, fed him, back to sleep eventually.  Up again at 3:30, fed him, then rocked him til 5:00 when he went back to sleep til 6:45.

Second night: woke up at 1, fed him, back to sleep.  Up again at 3:30, fed him, rocked him back to sleep til 4:30.  Slept til 6:45.

Third night:  woke up at 4:15 but put himself back to sleep.  Woke up again at 5:15 for good!  He did take a two and a half hour nap in the morning though.. whoa.

Fourth night: slept til 5:40, woke up for good.

Anyway he’s getting there.

Back from the UK

We survived our first trip with Jack!  We spent two and a half weeks in England.  It was a lot of firsts for Jack:  first plane ride, first snow, first real illness.  I think there is some kind of law kids must get sick on vacation.

Despite that, the trip went very well.  We spent almost the whole time at Chris’s parents’ house near Nottingham (which is roughly in the center of England), apart from two nights in a hotel.  It was a very different kind of trip.  Usually we spend about half of the time with family, and half the time traipising around the country.  This was much mellower.

It also snowed, which pretty much shut down the whole country for a bit.  It was the worst snow in 18 years, which wasn’t actually that much snow; just more than the country is used to handling.

Chris and I got to go out to a movie on our own (Slumdog Millionare… excellent!) and out for dinner while his parents babysat, which was great.  We saw Jack’s great-grandmother, two great aunts, a great uncle, two uncles, an aunt, three cousins, and three of Chris’s cousins.

It took about 4 nights for Jack to get over his jet lag.  It might have gone quicker if we all hadn’t acidentally slept in til noon one day!  After that he slept very well (except when he was sick and when he was in the hotels).  He slept in the cot (that’s what they call a crib in the UK) that Chris and his brothers had slept in, and he went out in the pram that his younger brother Jon used 35 years ago!

The plane flights went ok.  We had a third seat thanks to frequent flier miles, and put his car seat there.  He slept a fair amount on the flight over, but did have a crying jag mid-flight.  We walked him around a while, and put him back in his seat and Chris got him to go back to sleep eventually.  After that he slept through the descent and all the way to customs.  The flight home had less crying, but it was tougher in some ways because he was awake much of the 10 and a half hours so we had to do a lot of entertaining.  I nursed him a lot on the plane, during takeoff and to try and help him get to sleep.

Overall he did a great job with being in a new place, meeting all sorts of new people, and generally being dragged around.  He started a couple of new teeth (now he has two bottom, two top, and two more coming in on the bottom) and likes to practice walking (with us holding his hands).

I was so glad he got to spend so much time with Chris’s parents.  They were wonderful with him.

I’ll probably write a separate post about Jack’s illness, but the short version is that he had a fever for a few days (104.6.. eek) and then got better, then broke out in a rash.  We visited a walk-in clinic which was FREE despite being visitors (thank you National Health Service!)

All in all a very good trip.  I’ll try and get the rest of the pictures on-line soon.