Truer words have never been spoken. Especially when it comes to the natural system of this house. Hahaha. To add to the already chaotic atmosphere of the after school crush today, I had to take a time out from making dinner/helping the girls make an FHE treat this evening to perform "surgery" on Alex's foot after he got shanked with a gnarly splinter from our back deck.
You would think he would have learned his lesson last week, after getting several (less severe) splinters while playing outside with no shoes on, but no. After taking a quick look at THIS splinter, I decided that trying to yank it out would probably hurt more and cause more damage, so I got an ice pack to numb up his foot, and went in search of something sharp enough to slice the splinter out. Grace suggested getting her Kindle Fire to help distract him, and ran upstairs to find it, while Sophie and Jane gathered around Alex on the couch to comfort him. The poor little guy kept crying {because it hurt} and telling me he was sorry for not wearing shoes. :( {Ethan, meanwhile, missed out on the whole drama completely -- he was ensconced in his room, completely caught up in the live-streaming of Apple's newest product reveal on his laptop.}
Once Grace came back down, the allure of the Kindle was pretty strong for everyone, seeing as to how I've grounded them all from electronics this week due to HORRENDOUS behavior yesterday. First during our special Stake Conference at church, where Elder Neil L. Andersen came to visit and speak to us, and then in an afternoon filled with terrible choice after terrible choice after terrible choice for EACH and every child {minus Isaac, of course}. I figured a little leeway was in order for the situation at hand, though, so while they watched Alex play, I set off to find some rubbing alcohol and something sharp to cut out the splinter.
In the end, I went through two different not-sharp-enough-knives before coming up with the perfect tool for the job! Who would have ever thought that my embroidery scissors would serve such a dual purpose? Hahaha. Thankfully, they were small enough and sharp enough to get in there and lance the splinter out without any further adieu. All in all, I think it MAY have been a slightly less painful procedure than my attempts to get his other splinters out last week with tweezers, when all was said and done.
After kicking them off the Kindle, Alex was happy to sit right in the middle of the kitchen floor, soaking his foot in some soapy water to clean it, while I finished getting dinner ready. It was to this happy scene that Scott came home, taking over dinner prep while I hydrogen peroxided, neosporin-ed, and bandaged Alex's foot up, as the standard programming chaos resumed in the background with the other kids. Ahhhhh, the sweet sounds of home -- doors slamming open and shut, Ethan pounding away on the piano as loudly as possible, Jane pointedly ignoring my injunction to get her chores done and clean up the family room, and the noisy hubbub of minor freak outs and fits from all of the kids as I corralled them inside to get them ready to eat. Hahaha.
All's well that ends well, and once Alex had his band-aid on with his Avengers socks, he was basically back to normal. Hopefully, this will be the LAST time I have to dig splinters out of his feet...
2 comments:
Yiiiiiikkkkkesssss! That thing was HUGE. I wouldn't even know what to do! Props to you for being such a good mama. I think I would have just cut his entire foot off.
every time i see that top photo it turns my stomach. i don't know how you handle these situations so responsibly - hahahahaha
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