Friday night (August 12) Ethan continued to be extremely cranky, and feverish, and just generally unpleasant. That evening I mentioned that maybe on top of getting some kind of sickness, maybe he was getting a tooth, too. I wasn't really expecting any more teeth for a few weeks, though, because he was "up to date" and on track with all his teeth so far -- no more were to be expected for a month at least. But, lo and behold, late that night I peeked into his mouth, and there's tooth #7, on the right side bottom next to his middle teeth. Its match hasn't come through yet, but there's been lots of drool lately so it's not far behind. So, his fifth tooth came through a little early, just in time for his birthday.

On Saturday, his birthday, we made a visit to JC Penney for his one-year photos. We brought Photo Bear, even. Ethan was freshly bathed and combed (with his hair that's getting too long already) and dressed so cute. He wasn't acting like he was feeling great, but he wasn't too cranky. Just a little sullen, mostly. When we got there, he was playing, happy. Until we got back to the studio. Waaaaaaaaa! He screamed! Suddenly he wanted nothing more than to stay as close to me as possible. This was not going to be a very pleasant experience. Every time we tried putting him on the table, he would lunge off of it toward me as quickly as possible. The photographer did what she could, and even finally resorted to having me in every single shot, just so the boy would have a chance at a pleasant expression instead of a red, teary-eyed, terrified-looking baby. In every picture, I'm holding Ethan but being cleverly covered up by the backdrop fabric. We got a couple decent shots before we just abandoned the attempt. We did get one cute picture, the first one we took, actually, which was fine since we just did the big-package-for-cheap-price coupon deal. We just needed one picture anyway. They come back on September 1. The rest of the day we just hung out at home, because Ethan obviously wasn't feeling well, and I had to bake the cake for the next day anyway. We did get some of our own pictures later on. (One is on the picture of the day, below, and the other the final installment on Ethan's Growing Boy page!) He wasn't feeling that good all day, and his temperature stayed at around 102 most of the day, poor little guy. It's not fun being sick on your birthday!

On Sunday morning, Ethan went to church even though he was still sick, which was fine because I had nursery anyway (and I expected, and I was correct, that there would be no other babies in there with us). He just stayed in my arms, sleeping, the whole time. On Sunday afternoon we had Ethan's birthday party. I wasn't expecting too much excitement since he wasn't feeling great. All I was hoping for were no screaming fits. (And I was glad we had just decided on keeping it really small.) At first he was a little cranky and acted unsure about all the people in the house, but within just a few minutes he was actually much happier and smiling more than he had in a few days! We opened presents, which he actually did get into a little. Natalie "helped" a lot, of course, but Ethan did his share of paper-ripping too. He has played with all the new toys he got, but so far his favorites are a Leap Frog caterpillar that plays 26 different songs with each press of a foot (he loves music!) and a Little Tykes workbench. Grandma and Grandpa Hedrick got that for him because every time we go over to their house, he tries to fix Grandpa's reclining chair by putting the reclining handle back on where it has fallen off. 

Then we had the cake. (I made a 9x13 two-layer cake, frosted with a big blue "1" on the top, and filled with with blueberry creme filling.) I was hoping I'd finally have a kid who dug in, fingers first. Ethan did. At first he was a little apprehensive about it all. He stuck his finger into the icing and then tried to shake it off. When it didn't shake off, he tried smearing it off onto his tray. I stuck his finger into his mouth so he could taste it. He seemed to have a moment of realization. Yum! Not too much after that, he started digging in. We took about twenty pictures of the whole process. (I've included just a couple down below in the Picture of the Day.) He ended up with it all over his face, hands, and hair! Blue icing everywhere!  He did pretty good damage to the cake - not just the icing, but the cake, too. 

So that night, once everyone left, he started getting feverish and cranky again. (At least he was able to enjoy himself during the party.) The next day, his fever lasted all day even though we were giving him Advil, it didn't go down much. During dinner, when he, as had become the norm for the past several days, he picked at his food and was interested in none of it, I was looking over at him and noticed a rash developing on his forehead. We were a little concerned, but rashes come and go sometimes. That night we were over at my mom's so that Phil could work on his car (we've had only one car since May) with Brett. I took a peek down his shirt at one point, and noticed that the rash was all over his belly and back. My mom said right away, "Looks like roseola to me!" We looked it up online, and that looked to be what it was. The only thing that didn't match up with it was that with roseola, the fever is supposed to break before the rash comes out. His fever was still there. I took him to see Dr. Kern on Tuesday afternoon. Roseola was his diagnosis too, although there was some concern that it could be something else, since it was spreading out into his arms and hands and legs. Since Ethan hasn't been immunized against measles yet (it's given at 12 months, and he hasn't gotten that round yet), it was possible that it could have been that. Dr. Kern told me to watch it closely, and if the rash spread to his palms and soles, then it was measles. And it would have to be reported to the CDC -- the last reported outbreak was in Indiana! Well, it never went onto his palms and soles, even though it got very close by being on the backs of his hand and feet. Roseola isn't supposed to go any farther than the trunk. That doesn't mean that it couldn't though, we guess. The only part that still really bothers me is that he had a high fever throughout the whole thing. It never went away, and he was miserable. Wednesday night, I was staying home with the kids while Phil went to church (he's teaching on Wednesdays), and my friend April came over with her kids to watch the Passion of the Christ with me while the kids played. (If it was something worse than roseola, we weren't worried about giving it to her kids because they'd been immunized.) When April first came over, Ethan was still laying, miserable, in my arms. About an hour later, he SUDDENLY started acting better. He was playing around the living room with the other kids, even. It was a remarkable change. I took a look at his skin, and you could still see the rash but it wasn't bright pink and splotchy anymore. By the next day, it was completely gone! I kept meaning to take a picture of him when the rash was looking really bad, because it looked really, really, bad, but he was just feeling so yucky I couldn't bear to get out the camera. At one point, his whole head, neck and torso were one big pink, angry looking splotch. When it went away so quickly on Wednesday night, it went back to being light pink bumps again, before pretty much completely disappearing by Thursday morning.

So that pretty much brings us up to this week. I've been meaning to get on here and write ever since last week, but between Ethan's birthday, to the illness, and to a situation with my friend April, I just hadn't sat down to write. There's a whole story I want to write about concerning my friend, but that's going to be its own journal entry for another day, probably later this week.

There is one more thing I wanted to mention tonight, and it concerns something Natalie said the other day after talking about how "Ethan came out of my tummy one year ago!" She's lately been fascinated by stories about Ethan, and her, when they were babies and when they were in my tummy. She often says, "I want to tell you a story." (Usually when Phil or I are in the bathroom and she feels the need to relay a story to us through the bathroom door if we're lucky, but usually right there in person.) She's been telling the "story" lately, that goes like this: "A long, long time ago, when I was a baby, remember that? When I was a baby, a long, long time ago, I was a sheep." A sheep? we ask. Yep, she says she was a sheep. So anyway, the other day we were discussing how when she and Ethan were in my tummy, God made her and Ethan. Then later, out of the blue, she asks me, "Is God still in your tummy?" I looked at her funny, and she explained, "After God made us. Is he still in your tummy now?" Well... I guess, since God is in my heart, and God is everywhere, that means he's in my tummy too... but just how do you explain that one?

August 12, 2005
Whenever I haven't written for too long, the first thing I ask myself is, "where to start?"

Tomorrow is Ethan's first birthday. It's so hard to believe. A year ago today I was in labor, and if it hadn't have been for my doctor being in a C-section at an inopportune time (for me, anyway), this would have probably been his birthday. Instead, he came in on Friday the 13th, with Hurricane Charley, on the same day as the opening ceremony for the 2004 Summer Olympics in Greece. It was meant to be that way. I wonder if there's any way I can arrange for my future child(ren) -- IF there will be any, mind you -- to be born on the opening day of future Olympics. So far it's a trend among my kids.  

I have an appointment with JCPenney for tomorrow morning, to get his picture taken. I'm mostly hoping that he's going to be feeling up to it! He's been under the weather all week, as Natalie has been. My friend's kids got croup, and since we hang out a lot, of course Natalie got it too. Natalie has had the yucky, croupy cough. Ethan so far doesn't sound like he has it, but he's been acting like he doesn't feel well all week, and having a fever off and on. Mostly they are okay, but it gets worse at nights. Sleeping has not happened much around here lately!

The whatever-it-is sickness pretty much nixed all plans we had for our seventh anniversary, which was Monday. We had planned on leaving the kids with my friend and neighbor April, but since it is her kids who were sick, we couldn't do that.  They were really sick that night and we didn't know what it was yet. So then we were going to bring them to my mom's, but she wouldn't be home until about 8 pm. That wasn't a big deal; we just planned on going out to dinner with the kids, and then bringing them over to my mom's so that Phil and I could at least go get dessert by ourselves. Phil had a gift certificate for a sushi place, so we went there and had a really good meal. (They had things other than fish.) The kids did pretty well -- it wasn't a romantic anniversary dinner, but at least we got out. Ethan didn't eat much the whole time, which isn't unusual these days, but he was also acting like he wasn't feeling well, sort of spacing out and not even playing with his food. On the way to mom's house, Ethan threw up all over himself. We got him cleaned up when we got to my mom's, but that just ended any other plans for the evening. On the way home we stopped and got dessert to go from Appleby's, which they messed up. Ethan stayed asleep, though, so when we got Natalie into bed, Phil and I were able to spend some time alone and eat our less-than-spectacular desserts. And we watched our wedding video, so at least we got to do something anniversary related!

This week Ethan started making more strides (haha) toward walking, after about a month when he has acted like he'd just be content to crawl the rest of his life. He stands now for a long period of time, and even drinks from his sippy cup while standing all by himself. On Wednesday he was playing with Natalie's baby stroller, and he got himself up behind it and pushed the stroller across the entire living room, walking, and looking mighty pleased with himself. Maybe he'll take his first step at his birthday party too, like Natalie did. I don't know, though, he still seems much more content to crawl than to work on walking too much. 

We're going to be having Ethan's party on Sunday afternoon. It's going to be just family, so when plans started springing up for just about every member of my family for tomorrow, we decided to move it to Sunday afternoon. My sister Nan won't be able to come because she'd been planning on Saturday, and has to work on Sunday afternoon. We'll miss her. It's going to be a small party, which is all we really need to do for a first birthday party -- something I learned about last time! I'm making a cake, and today I got a balloon and a hat for Ethan that says "I'm one!" It's really cute. It's going to be a simple party, and especially since my kids aren't feeling all that great, that's for the best. I just hope he feels good enough to at least have a good day tomorrow! This evening Ethan's had a temperature of around 102, and that's with Advil in his system.

Well, I hope you have a happy first birthday, little guy! You're growing up so very, very fast. When I look at you lately, I see much more toddler than baby. How fast the time goes. One year ago tonight, our lives changed forever, all over again. Right after you were born I wrote (I only remember this because I went back and re-read August 2004 the other day) that looking at you, you were just a little stranger. We didn't know who you were or how you would fit into our lives. You turned our world upside down; you didn't fit into our lives -- you turned us into a new family just like your sister did before you. And now we have a few glimpses into who you are becoming. I love you at age one. Your personality is just starting to really emerge, and you love to show us how much you love us as well. One of your favorite things is to reach around our necks and give us tight hugs. You even pat your hand on our back and say "ohhhhh" as you hug. I never knew I would love a little baby boy so much. I even love it, when, like so often lately, you aren't feeling well and only "ma! ma! ma! ma!" will do. Ethan, we can't imagine life without you. We love you so much! 

August 1, 2005
Wow -- August already. Where has Ethan's first year gone? And seven days from now, Phil and I will be celebrating seven years of being married. I was reading through last year's August journal, just to see what was going on with the week or so before Ethan was born and then the first couple weeks. I'm so glad I have these things to go back and read, because even just from a year ago I'd forgotten so many things that went on. Now I need to get to work on putting the whole journal onto a CD, because I still haven't done that for anything other than my first pregnancy journal. It's all sitting on my hard drive, just asking for a computer crash...

Today's going to be some random notes.

Here are some of the latest cute Natalie-isms (for those who, like Phil, can't always translate as easily as me): "bite-ems" = vitamins ; "heli-popter" = helicopter ; "porridge" = porch, of course. That last one is so funny. She says "I want to play with my sandbox on the porridge." I ask her, "You mean on the porch?" "Yeah, on the porridge."

Ethan continues to show his musical bent. He dances all the time, whenever music plays anywhere, like I mentioned before. A week ago during Sunday morning service, he was with me during the singing time, he bopped back and forth during all the songs. During one of the pauses in between songs, he started signing "more", and continued until the next song started, when he went right back to dancing.  And now he's playing the recorder. Phil got me a plastic recorder in my stocking for Christmas this last year, which promptly went into Natalie's toy pit (after all, it was the "instrument" of choice for all those non-band people who were forced to take general music appreciation for their arts credit). It sometimes finds its way back out of the pit and circulates for a few days before making its way back into obscurity. But lately it's been making an extended appearance, because now Ethan and Natalie fight over playing with it, several times a day. At first Ethan was just sucking on it, but after only a couple tries he figured out how to blow out, and now he plays on it all the time. Though I have never loved the recorder, I am loving seeing the little guy play his first songs.

Ethan got his fifth tooth on Saturday and the sixth one is working its way out today. They are the two on top, next to his middle teeth. So far he's getting them in the typical order. He's had a fussy few days, but no gushing of blood like when the middle teeth popped through.

I forgot to mention last time one other noteworthy milestone -- Ethan is finally drinking from a straw. That makes dinner out much easier, because he wants to share in everything we eat these days, including our drinks.

He's gotten so picky with his food lately. I said he likes to share in everything we eat, but he doesn't necessarily eat it. He spits out a lot of stuff. He won't eat any baby food anymore, and very few things mushed at all, but he doesn't eat just about anything, like Natalie did. We were very spoiled by how non-picky she is. Ethan is a lot like me in many ways, so I shouldn't be surprised. Sometimes we go entire days and I'm just glad that Ethan is still nursing because at least I know he's getting something in his belly.  One thing he does like is peas, though. We had some tonight for dinner, and I'm quite sure that he ate three times as much as I did. He tries hard to eat just like we do, though, even if most of it comes back out in a disgusted, how-could-you-give-me-this? face. Tonight Ethan repeatedly spooned up some "food" from his tray, and offered the spoon to me to feed me, and smacked his lips just like I obviously do to him when feeding him the spoon. He's so cute.

Natalie has developed some new imaginary friends lately. This is not new, but before they were always tied to one of her toys. The newest two are just out of nowhere. One friend is called, as best as I can render it in print, "Sha-sha-la-sha". She talks to this friend all the time, especially in the car. The other friend developed just recently, when her friend Sarah had her aunt Erin (age 7, and therefore more of a cousin than an aunt) come to stay with her for a couple weeks. Natalie has obviously begun feeling a little neglected by her friend since Sarah is, of course, enamored with her aunt. Natalie started talking to "Allison" the other day.  I have a couple Allison friends -hi Allie- but I couldn't figure out how Natalie came up with this friend. When I asked her who Allison was, she said, "My aunt." I asked, "Your aunt? Your aunts are Aunt Nanny and Aunt Sarah." She said, "They're my real aunts. Allison is my silly aunt." She said that Allison is her age. So that's when the lightbulb went off in my head, that since Sarah suddenly wanted to play with Erin all the time instead of her, that Natalie would make up an aunt for her to play with too. That made me a little sad for her, but glad she has some coping mechanisms! The other day we were playing over at our playground, and Sarah and Erin were sitting together on a bench under the slide. Natalie went over to join them, and Sarah told her, in that sing-songy voice that brought painful childhood memories of exclusion back to me, "You can't sit here with us. Erin and me are here." I don't typically say things to reprimand other people's kids in front of their parents, but April missed the whole exchange and Natalie looked so crestfallen, so I said, "Girls, that wasn't nice. You can all sit there together." April and I decided soon after that that all the kids were tired and it was time to go home. The shine has started to come off of Sarah's favorite aunt, though, after she's now been there for going on two weeks. They are getting on each other's nerves, and yesterday Sarah decided she wanted to play with Natalie again, playing chalk outside.