A hard week for Pete

Oh, poor Pete.  He's had a rough week.  For a week he had a low fever, about 100.5, small mouth sores and irritability so we just kept writing down his daily symptoms.  After two days of no fever I thought the flare was over but then it really hit with temps of 102 and 103 and the entire lining of his cheeks are covered in white sores, like canker sores.  I wanted to make sure we weren't ignoring something else while we assumed this was related to his ongoing problems so I took him to instacare who confirmed there was no ear infection or strep infection.  (I was really, really hoping for an ear infection). His throat was red and irritated (also a symptoms of PFAPA and other periodic fever syndromes) so they did send off for a throat culture. So he's been like that for three days now and we are hoping it is almost over.  It's been pretty sad to see him as he is just starting to be able to explain, albeit nonverbally that things are bothering him.  Last night he was so excited to see that pizza was for dinner.  We cut his pieces and I noticed on his first bite that he really winced when he swallowed.  He powered through a few more bites, occasionally pointing to his mouth and whining.  Eventually he just pointed to his mouth and started crying.  It was so sad.  He goes back and forth between who he wants to be with--me or Matt.  While Matt was mowing yesterday Pete really wanted to be with him.  So Matt carried him for a little bit.  I tried to entice Pete to come to me, but he kept waving me off.  I even brought over the stroller and offered to take him for a walk but he refused.  Then I told Matt that I would mow the lawn while he hung out with Pete, but as soon as we switched positions Pete wanted me to hold him while mowing.  I am not as talented at the one handed mowing so it was back to Matt holding Pete while mowing the lawn.  It was very sweet, though, how Pete just laid his head on his shoulder.

Hank bent his arm and pointed to his elbow and said his muscles were really big.  The kids tried to explain that those were his elbows but he refused to hear it.

Any time we tell Hank to pee he will stop, stand still, say, "Let me see if it's coming", pauses looks off into the distance quizzically, and then announces, "Oh, yeah, it coming!"

Hank has started saying "This is taking forever."  Only it sounds so adorable coming from him--"Dis is taking forEBer."  He went with me to the Instacare with Pete and as soon as we sat down in the room with the nurse Hank announced, "Dis is taking forEBer."

Hank had his 3 1/2 year birthday on Sunday so we made him a half cake.  He was pretty excited.  He's been insisting that his birthday is really soon even though it's still six months away.  I think Jack's birthday party was the first time Hank really learned what a birthday can really be.  He keeps talking about wanting a Star Wars party just like Jack's.

When Jack was investigating a birthday candle he told Jane, "Look, there's a wack".  Which is obviously the most sensible way to describe wax(singular).

Poor Jack has a pretty rough time with getting scared at night.  One night he came down and told me that every night he gets this picture in his head that is so scary.  He told me it was from a billboard that we pass every time we go to Sharon's.  I asked him all about it and found out that it was a man who had a gray face and a pointy tongue, as if the tongue wasn't even connected to his mouth, and that he didn't have a brain.  I asked how he knew he didn't have a brain and he said Jane said he wasn't very smart.  Then he said it was something like Frankenstein or something.  I asked if his face was green with bolts in his neck.  I kept saying it must be an advertisement for a pretend haunted house for adults or something.  So we went and asked Jane if she could solve the mystery.  I asked her if it had any words on it and she said it says, "As a student, he was no Einstein."  And then I started busting up laughing because I knew exactly the billboard in question.  I found it on my phone and then we looked at many other, less scary pictures of Albert Einstein.  I also explained that it was just a black-and-white picture, his tongue is actually connected, he does indeed have a brain AND was extremely smart.  :)

The kids brought in the little car this week and have been zooming around.  On this day I saw that Jack had gotten his goggles AND some awesome wrist bands made of toilet paper.

Jane is really the only one to notice that we aren't really doing anything fun this summer.  I feel (kind of) bad about it.  She's being a pretty good sport but she definitely has more of a desire to be out having fun.  We made a short, pretty easy list, of things we hope to squeeze in before summer comes to an end.

Here's a quick video of Pete playing baseball with Jack.