Remembering Easter and Dealing with Roseola

What a week we’ve had! It’s just been crazy, but more about that later. Right now I want to take a quick moment of reminiscing and think about our Easter with Josh. Mom and Bob came over the night before to watch Dylan so Josh and I could go to a River Bandits Game (the local minor league baseball team owned by the St. Louis Cardinals). Even though it was rainy and kind of chilly, we still had a really great time. We were even asked to participate in one of those between-inning games. We did a dizzy bat race against each other! And we got two free tickets to a future game. It was a fun night.

The next morning, Dylan and Josh woke up ready for their Easter Egg Hunt. The Easter Bunny had left over 50 eggs for them to find! Good thing he was kind enough to make it a toddler-level hunt. Dylan picked up quickly on how the game worked. He was a professional egg finder! He was running around the room saying, “More! More!” I think he had fun!

Then he got to open his basket that included a new refrigerator magnet game, space goldfish and some other goodies.

For the rest of the morning, I was busy getting the food ready for our Easter Lunch. We hosted the holiday at our house. It was the first (and maybe only) holiday we could host that included Josh. We had a lovely meal and then visited while Dylan entertained us all with his dancing skills and wild boy-ness.

He was even showing everyone what a bunny does. He scrunches up his nose. This photo doesn’t really give you the full effect of how cute it is though.

It was a really nice day, and we ended it by all three of us cuddling on the couch after everyone else left and watching the end of The Masters.

Now that I’ve gone over a happy recent memory…back to our ridiculous week! Josh has been gone for a week. Not only was it sad to see him go, we have had a heck of a time without him these past several days. Not a day went by where we didn’t have strange bug bites, illnesses, incredibly frustrating phone calls, and more! Absolutely crazy! I’ve been kind of MIA for the past few days because Dylan got sick starting last Thursday.

The beginning of the rash

It started with a mild fever and progressed from there. Just when I was getting excited because his fever finally broke, a rash broke out! It started on his belly and chest and started spreading. After much research and a conversation with one of mom’s Pedicatric Nurse friends, we determined that Dylan has Roseola.

Today, the rash is progressing. It has spread to his head and back, but it’s slowly disappearing from the origin point. So I think it’s just going to run its course. It’s also looking more like splotchy skin now. He’s almost back to his normal self again and his appetite has returned. After several days, my little man's personality has finally returned!

Even though it wasn't a serious illness, it's always scary when you see a rash all over your child's body. I will admit that I caved and let Dylan sleep in bed with me while he had his fever. It got up over 103 degrees in the middle of the night so we had to strip off the PJs and use some cool towels. Neither one of us was having a good time. We were both awake until almost 4:30am that night. He just laid there with his glassy eyes open and I dozed on and off, continually checking his temp. But we're back in our own beds now and both sleeping better. We're almost back to normal!

As soon as this rash is gone we can get back to normal...and we can just keep hoping for one nice, uncomplicated day. My fingers are crossed!

Easter Egg Scramble

Obviously, being a “single” mom when you have a husband is quite difficult. And moving halfway across the country without him was something I don’t ever want to do again! But after a few weeks of getting settled into our new home, and trying to get into our new routine, we got a temporary break from our separation. Between his training schools, we get Josh for 2.5 weeks! He got here late on Mar 28 and is staying until this coming Sunday morning.

We’ve been keeping busy while he’s here. Our first big event was going to an Easter Egg Hunt on his first Sunday here. The City of Moline was putting on an Egg Hunt for different age groups so we decided to go for the 2-yrs & under scramble. After a week of gorgeous weather, it had cooled off a bit, but we threw on our jackets and went looking for some eggs!

When we were all lined up, waiting for the whistle to blow, Dylan was really excited about the eggs! And he was awfully mad at his Mommy & Daddy for not letting him run out and grab them all before the other kids! By the time the whistle blew and there were people running all over the place, he was more interested in why everyone was rushing around. So there was more aimless running around than picking up eggs. Josh did manage to get Dylan to grab a few eggs. Josh did not, however, resort to what I saw some parents doing...shoveling as many eggs as they could into their kids baskets while the kids watched. Really? You need the one peppermint per egg so bad that you'll snatch eggs away from 1 year olds? Wow! But Dylan had fun...so that's all that matters. (Notice the cracker in his hand while egg hunting? I swear, we moms will do anything to keep our kids occupied!)

After carefully placing 9 eggs in his basket, Dylan was ready to meet the Easter Bunny. He spotted him from across the field and really wanted to go check him out. Lucky for us, Dylan wasn’t afraid of the bunny at all! He gave him high fives and posed for his photo.

I, on the other hand, was a little concerned that it was probably the worse Easter Bunny costume in the history of costumes! I’m glad Josh has a smile on his face and not the expression that I’m sure I was wearing while taking the photo.

After our photo with the scary Easter Bunny, we went over to check out the fire trucks. They were letting kids climb in them and sit in the front seat.

Overall, it was a pretty simple morning and we were back in our car in less than 45 minutes. But we had a good time and made some memories. That was the plan for the next two weeks…fill it full of memories.