Cripes!

Wink, wink!

Can you guess where this is going??


Probably not...brace yourselves!

CRIPES! 2 mosquito bites and this is what Karin looked like on Sunday. She got the mosquito bites on Friday at 5 PM, somewhere between the daycare and the Green Park, which is a 7 block bike ride. When I took her out of the Chariot, she had two bites on her right cheekbone, and I thought "Oh this is going to swell up"...but I had no idea! She is much improved now (Benadryl, Benadryl, Benadryl) - but her birthmark appears quite dark and dry...I'm thinking from the swelling/stretching of her skin. We'll see what happens with time.

This is Saturday morning....bad enough, but Sunday morning was the worst. New nicknames: Hugo, Lumpy, Taz (this one fits more because of the language she's been spouting lately...she sounds like the Tazmanian Devil from Bugs Bunny).

Improvement on eczema

Protopic. Exlixir of the gods, if you ask me. The first time I ever heard of Protopic was in a book about a new mom who was losing her marbles due to her colicky eczema-laden child. They had tried everything. And their kid was allergic to anything edible. At one point in the book she lists about 3 things that the kid can eat without going into a full body rash. Poor woman.

My second encounter with Protopic was when Chance had a pretty bad rash on top of his foot. The doctor gave us a sample of Protopic, a tiny tube that looked like toothpaste for a Barbie doll. I was skeptical. How was this tiny eensy bit of cream going to fix my son's raging red oozing foot? It did.

After dealing with Karin's eczema in her elbows for 4 months, I went in and asked for the Protopic. This stuff is Amazing (capital "A"). Tell your friends with rashy kids.

Day Zero. Poor little baby.

24 hours and two applications later.

48 hours and 4 applications later.

Day 4...almost gone!

So now it's about 2 weeks later and there is a small pink spot but it is all healed over and she can be left unsupervised in short sleeves or even shirtless without ripping her skin open with her sharp little fingernails. That's nice.

Little Miss Rashy and Flaky

Karin's really broken out in a head-to-toe rash...it's actually just dry chapped skin, Chance developed something similar around the same age. It is worse in her elbows and backs of her knees, as well as under her chin, where the skin rubs. She loves being in her bath, it must feel good on her skin but when we take her out we put a fragrance free kids' formula lotion specifically designed for skin prone to eczema and she just howls, it must sting. We'll try something else, as it obviously causes her pain -- I know that stingy feeling when my hands are dry, I can't imagine what it would feel like if it was my whole body. I am going to wash all her clothes in fragrance free soap, etc. and see if that helps. She is already using gentle baby wash, not even shampoo. We cut out using the lovely baby lotion given to her by her Auntie Rennal...Cam started using it as hand cream for himself and I told him to stop as I was leaking milk every time I caught a whiff of it!

On top of being rashy, she is flaky -- dandruff. I spend the good part of most nursings with a fine tooth comb picking out flakes from her hair, it makes me feel like a mama ape.


Chance also has a rash....but it's self-induced. Carpet burn above his left eyebrow, from tumbling down the last 2 steps as he as heading downstairs to look for a toy car. I half-suspect that he actually fell down on purpose, as he had been scolded for pestering me to find it for him. I ordered him to go downstairs, as I knew he had been playing with his cars down there, and said to go look for himself, I wasn't his slave. Now when he is going down the stairs he always gets a stern reminder to hang on to the railing, unless he wants another face rash.

March Catch-Up

Well March has been a real whirl-wind for us. I think we've all been sick at least once, some more often than others, just minor colds and coughs, nothing to worry about. We have been doing basement renovations and are nearly done, just a few more weekends.

Chance is potty training and frequently gets at least 1 gummy bear for doing the deed in the potty each day, sometimes he gets 2. He is asking to use the potty more and more often, but it is too late usually by the time we get there his diaper is full. We have switched him to cloth diapers to help him "get" the difference between wet and dry. For the most part he doesn't really care. Pull ups, Pampers, cloth diapers.....I don't think he gives a rip. Other than with the cloth diapers, he is "going" less frequently, so we only change him maybe 4x per day, usually one dirty and the others are wet. Before he might have 2 dirty diapers per day and 4 pees.

Cam and I enjoyed a nice dinner at home last weekend. I recreated a salad that I had for lunch a few weeks ago while out at a CSPG lunch talk -- feta and peach and sprout salad, I know, it sounds weird but it is really good. We also had pesto rice with a mediterranean crusted salmon. While I was fixing supper, I asked Cam to go pick out a bottle of wine from downstairs. We have taken to locking the wine cabinet as Chance has started taking an interest in it and rather than have him open the doors and maybe break a bottle of wine/fall down the stairs while trying to carry it up/pull the whole thing down on himself (boy, I am a worrier), we just opted to put a lock on the door. We put it on the ledge just next to the wine cabinet. Did I mention we've been painting?? And the basement is in shambles......do you think we could find that key??? NOPE! So here is a picture of Cam trying to cut through the lock with a hack saw. It didn't work. We ended up slurping down the last dregs of a bottle of wine that was in the back of the fridge. Not exactly your ideal wine pairing, but hey, it was a nice dinner at home. Cam bought a combination lock at Canadian Tire last weekend, along with a set of bolt cutters.

Here is Chance's foot, much improved. I think it was eczema caused by friction in his boots, hence the little pin-points. We used a cream called Protopic on it and it turned into a big blotchy-red/purple area, which we gradually worked down using hydrocortisone cream. In other foot news, tonight Chance sort of co-operated when it came to cutting his toenails. Sort of. As in, I was cutting my own toenails, and he ripped his socks off and thrust his feet at me. Then when I tried cutting his toenails he screeched and kicked and howled, same old Chance.

Name that rash!!

This showed up on Chance's foot mabye 3 weeks ago. Started out as pin-prick like rash maybe 20-30 spots and has morphed out to this blobby thing. Doctor said it didn't look contagious, and it really hasn't spread out that much either, but a small patch of it has cropped up on his bum cheek. Ranges in colour daily from barely pink to deep purple. Cortisone cream (ratio-ectosone/betamethasone nor emo-cortisone) doesn't cut it and neither does the other stuff we got, Protopic (tacrolimus ointment). Chance says it "hurts" every now and then and I see him rubbing/scratching it occasionally, but it doesn't seem to be crazy itchy. Will go see the doctor again Feb. 18th.

I am almost considering putting Windex on it (My Big Fat Greek Wedding)!