Today

This morning, I took Max to the LPS central office to get his hearing and speech re-evaluated, since it's been almost 6 months since he got tubes put in, due to excess fluid behind his eardrums, which was causing hearing issues, and thusly, speech issues. His hearing is normal now, the tubes are still in place and open (not infected) and everything looks great there. His speech is also a lot better and he is right on track developmental-wise. The only thing the speech pathologist said we could work on is asking him to articulate when he uses 'gibberish', which is not nearly as often as it was before. Otherwise, she said he is doing great! That's awesome news, especially since I am apparently a huge fan of unfounded worrying. It's a good thing that the kids' doctor is a good friend of ours, or he probably would not be nearly as patient with me. :)

On the way out of the building, Gus got his left thumb smashed in between the heavy steel door and the door jamb. It is an automatic open/shut handicapped access type door, and Max had pushed the button to open the door, gone outside, and pushed the button again to close it. Gus reached up to push the button from the inside and got his thumb trapped. His thumb was flat when I got it out of the door, and immediately swelled up and started to bruise. He was screaming, obviously! I got him to the van, got all the boys buckled in, and went to the ER since it was close to where we were. We got checked in, as I was holding a thrashing, screaming Gus and a tired Sam. I then called Oly and asked him to meet us there. About 5 minutes before he arrived (10 or so minutes after I'd called him), Gus calmed down and was watching PBS and eating TicTacs. I always swore I wouldn't be That Mother, but desperate times call for desperate measures, surely. So Oly and I discussed and decided that it probably wasn't broken, since he was doing okay, and we went home. I took some photos and emailed them to Gus's doctor (our friend) and he wrote back, confirming that it most likely wasn't broken. So now Gus has a swollen, bruised thumb and is favoring it greatly. At least he's not crying anymore. :(

It's more bruised now than it was in these photos, but the swelling is about the same. Such is life with kids, especially 4 boys, eh?