The time I dislocated your arm

My sweet baby girl, yesterday morning you and I were being lazy at home. I had canceled our park play date due to your very runny nose and the threatening skies. It was an uneventful morning. I let you watch lots of Dora (your new favorite) while I browsed the web, started laundry, and did dishes. Around 11 am I decided you and I should go run a few errands. You lay down on the ground when I told you it was time to go to your room to change, which was my cue to take your arms and start pulling you to your room. We had done this many times before. You were laughing. And then--

Crack.

It sounded like a knuckle cracking. I asked you if you were okay, and you started to cry. Oh, how you cried. I had been on the phone with Auntie Anna throughout this whole incident, and she could hear how upset you were. I hung up with her to calm you down, and you did calm down, but you wouldn't use your right arm at all. If I touched your elbow, or if you shifted your weight onto your right arm, you started to cry.

I started to panic. I called the pediatrician's office, and thankfully, the physcian's assistant agreed to see me on her lunch break. Everyone figured you had nursemaid elbow, otherwise known as a dislocated elbow, which is very common in kids your age. The PA tried four different times to put your elbow back in its place, but she said she actually thought it was already back in place, because she didn't hear the characteristic "click" of it popping back into position. She thought it was perhaps just sore, so she advised me to follow up in a day or two.

I took you home for a nap, but when you woke, you were miserable. All night, you would not use your right arm. It was the same thing when you woke up this morning. So, today, back to the pediatrician's office we went. You got x-rays, and the pediatrician couldn't see anything. So, after a nap, off to the orthopedist we went.

The orthopedist thinks that your elbow did, most likely, get dislocated. You might be having some residual soreness, or you might have a small fracture in your joint that is not visible on the x-rays. He advised that we put you in a cast for a week. The cast will prevent you (or me!) from re-injuring your elbow. It will give your ligament a chance to tighten. It will also give any possible fracture in there a chance to heal.

So far, you don't seem to mind your cast.

Baby Girl, I'm so sorry. I feel so badly that you were injured in my hands, that I caused your injury. I'm afraid the days of that little game are now over. I love you and would never purposely cause you harm. I guess this is just one more good story you can give me grief about in the years to come:

"Hey, Mom? Can I go to the dance? Before you answer, remember the time you ripped my arm out of the socket?"

The Dulles girls...and me!

My friend Melissa is a die-hard University of Alabama football fan. She went to college there and loved the south so much that she now lives in Georgia! She was fortunate enough to get tickets to the BCS Championship game, so she came out for her second visit in eleven months. This prompted a get-together with some high school friends. Actually, all of the girls went to Dulles Elementary except for me. :)

Me, Jenny, Karen, Melissa, and Paige (and baby Parker under the blanket)


Sara, Milo, and Drew were all born within about six weeks of each other


Here we all are in February 2009. What a difference a year makes!


Trying to capture eight kids in one frame can best be described as CHALLENGING!

Knott's Berry Farm

Tanja and I made a relatively last-minute decision to get annual passes to Knott's when we found out they were only $60. Tuesday was our first trip there with the kids, and they both had a ball!

Ryan laughed hysterically on this!


Sara LOVED the planes. She wanted to ride them over and over and over!


I took the kids on the balloon ride. I think they look like they could be siblings.


Thankfully the kids were big enough to ride this unattended. I'm pretty sure Tanja and I would have gotten sick on it!


One fun thing about Camp Snoopy at Knott's is that the kids can ride so many of the attractions by themselves! Sara is about an inch too short for many of them, but I'm sure she'll grow into those soon enough!

Sara loves Barney

This video is from Christmas night. Sara was watching her beloved Barney and dancing along, all the while pausing to give Daddy occasional cuddles.