Or some tranquilizers.
I'm stressinggg. Winter is approaching...we have a new baby coming in roughly six weeks, and two very energetic little boys. We've been packing up a lot of excess clutter in preparation to list the house in February or March...mostly the clothes bins in the basement, books we don't read in the bedroom, kitchen appliances we don't use often but don't want to toss...and the toys that are in storage because they've been outgrown or aren't played with frequently. It's nice to declutter and make the house look nice, and I'm not too worried about missing this stuff when it's gone.
As far as toys, I've left out the classic favorites...blocks, cars, dinosaurs, tools, puzzles, and dress-up stuff (knight, explorer, builder). The bin rack has been moved up to Cameron's room so we can turn the downstairs playroom back into a dinette. The play kitchen and dress-up bins are still down here, but we will probably toss the kitchen at some point--we are hoping to make a smaller one for the new house. I've left some craft stuff unpacked...beads to string, construction paper and glue, markers (glitter fell into the 'too messy' category ;)). We have some playdough in the fridge and lots of books. Plus, Christmas is right around the corner, which will add a few new toys to the mix. There should be plenty of things to do, stuff to play with, this winter.
Problem is, sometimes these kids just need to run and climb. :/ Literally, they run laps around the downstairs on rainy days. Obviously that can continue, and I'm hoping this year at least Cameron will be willing to go out and play in the snow by himself for a bit (he is the one who really goes crazy inside/home for too long!), but I am still worried about cabin fever setting in and not going away until spring.
We have a couple of indoor play places we like to visit, but we can't get out too often for several reasons. Soon I will be gargantuan and sore and tired and probably won't really want to traipse across town in bad weather on icy roads to let them play at COSI for an hour. Then the baby will be here, and we are those weird 'keep the baby home for 6 weeks' kind of people...not that we haven't broken the rule once or twice, but it's just not my thing to go to a busy play place during snow-and-flu season with a newborn. I doubt we will make it to 6 weeks like we did with Cameron, but I also don't imagine we'll do much until he is at least a month or so old. I know we went out once with Fletcher around 3-4 weeks (to the Conservatory to see the almost-over butterfly exhibit), but it was summer so we worried a lot less about illness and the elements.
And, mainly, play places are dirty. I personally feel like COSI and Firefly (our two favorites, and pretty much the only ones we visit anymore) are pretty clean...we tend to go right when they open in the morning, and I know that COSI cleans daily and that Firefly cleans throughout the day with bleach. I use hand sanitizer when we leave and occasionally while they play--Cam is a thumb-sucker, and sometimes forgets the rule (which is, "no sucking your thumb at the play place"). I try to subtly steer them away from kids who have particularly grimy-sounding coughs. It also helps that we show up first thing in the morning, before there are a lot of other people around--we even upgraded our COSI membership to let us in at 9am, and we are usually the only people there for a full hour.
This all probably sounds pretty paranoid. I am generally not a germaphobe--my kids eat dirt and pick their noses and most evenings I forget to wash their hands before dinner. BUT, fall and winter really kick our butts in terms of illness, and I've become a lot more picky about where we play and how often we use hand sanitizer (which used to be never!). Cameron's allergies and asthma make him pick up every little respiratory virus that goes around, and he reacts badly to them, coughing and miserable for weeks.
Normally hand-washing would be fine (we never use antibacterial products at home, I do believe that limiting them is a good idea), but we're not always near a bathroom, or he doesn't want to stop playing to go wash up. And so, we use hand sanitizer at play places. (And on grocery carts--which I also never did until the first time I caught Cameron licking one when he was about 10 months old...within 24 hours he was puking and diarrheaing all over the place. YUCK! Only stomach bug he has EVER had...he may have crappy lungs but the rest of him seems healthy! LOL)
Still, even with the precautions, he gets sick. A lot. More than other kids, his doctor has confirmed. "Some kids just have crappy immune systems," he said. He believes we are doing everything we can--supplements, vitamins, a healthy diet, hand-washing. We just have to try our best to prevent illness, and hope that he outgrows these issues soon. This summer and fall he has had bronchitis (to be fair, it started as allergies when ragweed cropped up and turned to bronchitis because, as we've established, his lungs suck); a random virus, during which he exhibited no symptoms other than a ridiculously high (104-106 degree for days) fever; hand, foot and mouth (thankfully only had one blister on his palm and a couple of sore spots in his mouth, which led to a low-grade fever and decreased appetite); and croup (which, as usual, just plain stunk). Thankfully Fletcher only came down with the last ailment, so he does appear to be a little, mmm, hardier than Cam. Thank goodness!!
Really, we are worried that the problem is preschool. It's likely, and the pediatrician certainly believes it, but we don't want to. Cameron LOVES preschool. He goes two mornings per week, for 2.5 hours each session. It doesn't seem like much time--but with 14 kids in one classroom, touching things together and sneezing on each other and breathing the same air for 5 hours a week...well, it's not hard to imagine that germs spread well in that sort of environment. At preschool, I can't control how often he washes his hands or what kids he plays with. Besides, so many viruses are contagious when the child isn't even showing symptoms...like hand, foot and mouth, for example!
For lots of kids, the group environment is fine--they get a cold here and there, a runny nose and feel crappy for a day or two. I don't expect Cam to never get sick, I know it's good for his immune system to be exposed to germs. The reality is, he just gets hit harder. He gets the same virus as everyone else--it just manifests differently in him, and it makes him appear a lot sicker. We usually keep him home if he's coughing a lot, but send him once it calms down--his teachers and the administrators know that he tends to exhibit stronger symptoms than other kids because of his asthma issues, so they understand that he's not usually sicker than the other kids, even if he sounds it.
Still, the pediatrician recommended that we pull him out when the baby is born, even if just for January and February (once spring hits, Cam tends to do much better). It's something we're considering, but we're also considering pulling him out sooner if he gets sick again this fall. He has already missed four days of school; we pay by the month, so it's a lot of money down the drain when we have to pay tuition, and he doesn't attend, AND we have to pay for sick visits to the pediatrician and medicine. We really don't want to have to pull him out, but we also can't have him bringing home illness after illness and passing it on to Fletcher and, soon, to Bennett. One of those nasty colds for Cam could turn into something pretty scary for a newborn, and that's a risk we don't want to take.
So, we wait. And stress. It's barely mid-November and they are already wearing me out with the constant go-go-go. This morning we ran errands for an hour and came home to clean and pack some more...I sent them out back to play for a while, it's windy but 60+ degrees and we don't have many more warm days left! But as usual, they were just sort of wild...Cameron was stomping around smashing up old, broken terracotta pots, and Fletcher was getting soaked in random collections of water from this morning's rain. They made a big mess, came inside dirty, then needed lunch, and I've yet to get anything done. So it goes. :P
Normally I try to keep busy early in the week, since Thursday and Friday we have an extra kiddo in the house, and it's harder to get out and about. We go to the zoo, or to a playground, or maybe to Firefly. But today, it just wasn't meant to be...COSI is closed Mondays, the parks are wet, and it seems that Cam is getting a little big for Firefly (lots of 2-and-unders there lately). We could go out front to ride bikes and do chalk, but Fletcher has taken to running off down the sidewalk, and there's only so many times I am willing to chase him down and carry him back. It doesn't seem like much to ask--that they play out back contentedly for 10 minutes while I clean up the kitchen, but I guess my expectations are just set too high. ;) The house will remain a pigsty until naptime...no rest for me today.
I just hope we survive the winter. Soon we will have no choice but to stay home, or go out back to play. Of course we can go out in the snow, but it's not my favorite thing to do (especially with a new baby, I can't just leave him inside while we go out for 20 minutes!). Still, I know I will just have to suck it up this year and deal with the bundling-up, cold-wind, frozen-snot, wet-slushiness, just to get them out and let them burn off some energy.
I feel like we'll have a lot of fun things to do inside, but I know they will need the gross-motor activity, too...hopefully we can find a balance that allows us to stay home AND keep our sanity. I keep telling Mike we need to put a swing or rope ladder in the house, but he is reluctant to put holes in the ceiling, especially when we are hoping to sell the house in a few months. Can't say that I blame him. I do think we will move Cam's rope swing to the basement, at least...and I hope to find a little slide to put down there, or maybe a little trampoline if I can find one for cheap, or even a rope ladder I can sneak into a corner somewhere. And we will be having lots of lap-running races, I imagine. That will have to do!
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