Poor Baby

Saturday night, shortly after Shrike got home from work, Peeper woke and whined around a bit, while I waited to see if she'd go back to sleep on her own.  (She often does, so I tend to give her a minute or wait until I hear something that sound really awake-awake.)

Then called out with the most pathetic, hoarse, kind of creepy "Maaaamaaaa" you've ever heard.  When we went to check on her, she was sound asleep already (for the moment). It kind of freaked Shrike out, but I've seen her do it several times, so it didn't bother me.

But her voice, when she'd called for me did. As did the gurgling in her nose as I nursed her back to sleep.

Dammit.

I turned on the humidifier on my way out of the room, and hoped for the best.

After not one but two sheet changes overnight, we awoke to a very coughy, very hoarse and kind of congested kiddo. But sometimes that's as far as it gets and then she's fine, so we proceeded with our plans, shopping and cleaning up the house for a MOMS Club Mardi Gras party scheduled for this morning.

By bedtime, though, it wasn't looking too good. I thought she'd never get to sleep for more than ten minutes without coughing or snorting herself awake, and around 11:30, I just gave up and went on to sleep in her bed with her.

When she woke up this morning, not surprisingly, she was hot-hot-hot (about 101' according to the magic forehead thermometer) and obviously felt awful.

We immediately cancelled the party and dosed her up with some Tylenol.

An hour later, she was bouncing around, pretending to be Santa Claus. It's amazing what a differences just a couple of degrees of body temperature can make.

(Yes, yes, I know we're supposed to let her just have a mild fever to "burn out" the infection, but it makes her feel so awful. I can't just sit by and watch that, knowing that I can make her feel better so easily.)

In the night, we'd discovered that the saline spray and snot sucker were no longer usable (don't ask) so we planned a trip to the pharmacy to replace them.

One thing led to another, and there was a sale and coupons and $5 gift cards if you buy two packages . . . and Peeper and I ended up at Target with a list of about ten things we needed.

We usually do Target pretty well, as you know, but this trip was absolutely hellish.

She started whining to go home with about three things left on our list. Then I had to stop (with her parked a few feet away, looking awful but hopefully keeping her germs to herself) and give an impromptu sling tutorial to a very young mom of a four week old little girl, and her friend.

("Okay, first thing: You're wearing it backwards.")

When I came upon them, the one who turned out to be Mom was getting the baby set up with the friend wearing her, but she was way too low, too lose, scrunched up in a cradle position, completely covered in the padded-rail sling, which was being worn backwards, and therefore pretty much non-adjustable.

Just from the safety factors alone, I had to say something. I was very nice about it, "I'm sorry, but could I please help you? I sell slings and other baby carriers, so . . . ."

They seemed to appreciate it. I hope they weren't too freaked out.

Anyway, then we finally got to the checkout aisle, and as I started unloading, I remembered that I'd forgotten one of my "deals" so zipped back over to the feminine hygiene aisle for a couple of packages of pads.

Back to checkout, where everything scanned, and the guy gave me one gift card. I should have had three.

We figured out that I had one of the right paper towels and one wrong, so another guy ran off to switch those. Then I had the wrong size package of pads. Peeper and I took those back, and couldn't find the right size, but found out that we could get a gift card with three of the ones I had, so we grabbed another.

Back to check out, rescan everything, and pay.

Return cup holders (Does your Target have cupholders for Starbucks and the snackbar? Tell them to get them!) and I gave poor Peeper some of the Tylenol that we'd just bought.

Then, we still had to go to the pharmacy because - would you believe - Target doesn't have the good snot sucker.

As I'm looking for it, Peeper tells me that she needs to potty, so we run across the building (The pharmacy is in a doctors' office building - were her pediatrician used to be.) and take care of that.

Back to the pharmacy, and I have to get help finding what I'm looking for. First, she tells me they don't have any such thing, but could order it. Even though I know I bought it there. Then, on another aisle, she picks up a box and says "This isn't what you want, is it?"

YES! That is The Good Snot Sucker!

We have a quick consultation about possibly acceptable cold remedies for a three year old (Answer: Homeopathic stuff. Decided to pass on it.), then she's so pathetic she didn't even want to eat her free lollipop there, she said she'd just take it home.

When we got home, she did make pretty short work of it, and then we busted into the 70% off heart-shaped box full of Hershey's Pot of Gold Chocolate Truffles.

Pathetic, but chocolaty:

This was supposed to be a smile.

Later, as we sat down for dinner, she was looking aaalll around the table, obviously searching for something.

I asked, "What are you looking for?"

She said, "I wookin for da chocwate!"