no snow for you

It seems our kids have taken a pact not to allow a quiet night on the premises until they all leave for college. Tonight, Secondo and Terzo were playing "hall football" upstairs—a game my husband and I have forbidden on numerous occasions, to obviously no avail. In a sequence of events that is still not entirely clear, Terzo became upset at Secondo, and in revenge, kicked one of the spindles on the hallway bannister so hard that he split the webbing between his fourth and pinkie toe.

It took him a little while to realize he was bleeding, but once he did, he began running in circles while I begged him to stand still. Primo finally caught him so my LSH could take a look—and when he mentioned the word "stitches" the poor kid lost it.

I was in charge of holding him down while they assessed the situation. (Primo was only too happy to assist. The kid has an ironclad stomach.) The dialogue went something like this:

Me: "Take deep breaths. Look at the ceiling. Don't look at your toe."

Terzo: "Help me Mommy, please. No stitches. Please no stitches."

Me: (heart breaking)

LSH: "Gauze please."

Terzo: "Gauze? What's gauze? Is that stitches?"

Me: "No, it's a bandage. Breathe deep. Hold still."

LSH: "Cotton swab."

Terzo: "What's that?"

Me: "A Q-Tip."

Terzo (in complete and total panic mode):  "A Q-Tip? What's that? Is that stitches?"

Me: "No. It's what you use to clean your ears. Breathe deep."

LSH: "Put this in the sharps container."

Terzo: "SHARPS??!?!?!?"

My LSH took pity on him, because who wants to stitch up their own kid if there is any way of avoiding it? (Though I should mention it wouldn't have been the first time.) He ended up sterilizing and taping the toes together, with strict instructions to keep weight off it and keep it elevated.

There will be plenty more tears tomorrow when it sinks in that this means he can't play in the first snowfall of the season.

In other "thank goodness that's over" news, a picture of Mr. Ethiopia and their project:

Amy's comment to yesterday's post was eerily omnisicent. The parents of one of Secondo's teammates thanked me today for "all I had done," noting that they had kept asking their own son what he was responsible for on the project. The response was always that my son was taking care of it. Unfortunately, my son failed to communicate that to me. In retrospect, I should have just called Amy.