Daisypath Wedding tickers

Sunday, June 20, 2010

Croup Was Not on the List

I just caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror and I have the biggest, puffiest, darkest circles under my eyes I think I've ever seen.  This will not do for wedding day pictures.

You see,  last week, The Wee One had this little fever.  Nothing to really worry about because it's happened a few times this spring already.  He sneezes a couple times, rubs his eyes, I break out the Benadryl and we're all good in a day or two.  But this time the fever came and went and came again. Then this cough.  Just a tickle at first, and then a gasping, wheezing, barking cough that got worse at night. I didn't need the pediatrician to tell me it was croup, but we went anyway, just to be on the safe side. 

Sure enough, a quick trip to the doc and two prescriptions later, we're home bound.  We've done all our puzzles and coloring books and stickers and markers and stamps and used up all our bubbles and tormented the dog and built a tent in the kitchen and made all the J-E-L-L-O we can stand and rocked and rocked and rocked and rocked and stood in the steamy bathroom and if I have to watch Mary Poppins one more time I'm going to lose it. Really and truly. (BTW, Redbox, you saved our weekend.)

I can't stand seeing my baby sick. No parent can; it just breaks your heart right down the middle. There is never a good time for a sick child.  No matter what the circumstances, it's exhausting. You're up and down all night: comforting, getting drinks of water, refilling the humidifier, administering medicine taking temperatures.  The fact that we are also trying to orchestrate a wedding and live our normal day to day lives has completely drained my reserves.  I'm depleted. Hence the bags.  Heck, the bags under my eyes have bags under them.

Since I can't his the pause button on life, we don't have any choice but to keep putting one foot in front of the other.  Today while our son napped I got as organized as humanly possible.  I have a To Do list broken down day by day until The Big Day.  Thankfully, starting Tuesday, help arrives.  And first on the roster: my parents.  My mom is pretty handy with a glue gun (That's a gross understatement by the way. With nothing more than a pile of Styrofoam peanuts and some floral wire my mom could pretty much reconstruct a life-size model of the Titanic. And do it better) and my dad is the type of guy that doesn't know what it means to put your feet up and relax.  

Next through the door will be my BFF of twenty-two years. That doesn't even seem possible, but we've both got the mortgages, kids and gray hairs to prove it.  She is my rock, my voice of reason, and my breath of fresh air, all rolled in one. She makes me laugh when no one else can, and laughs with me when no one else will. 

And last but certainly not least, my soon to be father-in-law will arrive, followed shortly by my soon to be mother-in-law and her BFF, a.k.a. 'the other mom'. Thankfully, they all already know their way around our house blindfolded, and are ready and willing to roll up their sleeves and help.  My mother in law cleaned our entire house, top to bottom when our son was born.  She vacuumed the base boards.  Not to mention the jillion loads of laundry and MONTHS worth of food she cooked and and froze for us.  In one weekend.  I will never forget that. 

We've got a LOT of ground to cover, a lot of yard to tidy up, a lot of lights to string and tables to set up and food to prepare. The next six days are going to be kind of nutty, but I am so, so looking forward to everyone that is so near and dear to us being here.  It isn't every day that family and friends come together like this, and I plan to soak in every minute of it.