Yelly and Purple

The title might suggest the new nicknames of each of my beloved. As I eluded to previously, there was a hint that a certain somebody whose name begins with and "L" and ends in "incoln" may have had a little bout of the yellies while we were at our parents' houses last weekend. (Seriously, it's a WEEK later and I'm finally getting around to this?)

The first of Lincoln's fussy fits began around 4 a.m. on Friday night with a familiar succession held the following night at 2 a.m. at my parents' house. We knew he had been working on cutting in both of his top row molars at the same time and I had packed nearly the whole medicine cabinet in preparation. We were almost out of Tylenol so I packed children's ibuprofen, which I considered to be the next best thing. Since he began fussing each night around bedtime and gnawing on his hands, we gave him some ibuprofen right at bedtime to insure a good night's rest for him, pain free. My comfort level of dispensing the children's dose of ibuprofen has only been recent since the ER doctor made the recommendation for the same upon Lincoln's last visit there for his high fever (months ago). In retrospect, I have a sneaky suspicion that it was this medicine that made my kid more hyped up that a bag of popcorn on a jet engine. He was absolutely! not! tired! And let me not fail to mention, completely screamy. Eric and I took shifts trying everything in the middle of the night to appease him to no avail. The kid finally surrendered to sleep between 8-10:00 a.m each day. Dear Lord! Until I find some time to do some further investigating the effects of ibuprofen, I think it's going to the top shelf, only used during daytime hours.

So if Lincoln was the yelly one, any guesses as to whom the purple one may have been?

Allow me to present: Article A

I'm not sure if I should blame it on poor decision making based on sleep deprivation or if I just really thought that looking extra cute would surely help her to be able to pick more blackberries. In any event, I was the village idiot paying dearly for my lack of judgment sending my kid off to the woods in clothes that I expected a repeat wear from. The last time Eric took Elaina into the woods to pick wild blackberries, she came home covered in mosquito bites. This time we were playing defense with long clothing and mosquito repellent. Smart thinking, huh? Nonetheless, Eric and Elaina yielded a substantial load of berries into their bowl and both had a good time. Eric was really impressed with Elaina saying what a good job she did picking off berries from the underside of the bushes that even he couldn't see. She was on her hands and knees harvesting the juicy ripe ones that even the birds couldn't get to. That may explain why she came home with little burs in her pig tails, while birds don't even ruffle a feather.

In case you have a bout of stupid, such as myself and find yourself covered in blackberry stains (even after I told you; bad idea), Borax was the only cleaning solution that completely removed all of the stains. That and some elbow grease. And cussing. And patience. All seemed helpful to me.