It all started Monday morning when Mason woke up at 1am screaming. I couldn't get him to tell me anything other than he had a nightmare, though he continued to scream and I could tell there was something else wrong. So, I called in reinforcements. Daddy managed to get him to say his ear hurt, and after some late night t.v., back to bed. When the sun rose, Fred took Mason to Patient First convinced he had yet another ear infection.
I called Mason in absent from school and waited to hear the diagnosis. About an hour later, Fred called. Mason's ears were so full of wax the doctors couldn't see his ear drums so they flushed out both his ears. Now, I have had this done to me (only one ear though) and it was one of the most uncomfortable, often painful, things I have been through. You bet I won't be volunteering for that again. So when I heard Mason was having it done, I cringed. But, true to form, Mason was a champ and handled it like the brave, strong, little man he is. After all that, the doctor said she saw no infection. However, she did notice a distinct heart murmur and referred us to a pediatric cardiologist.
My first thought was, didn't we go through all this three years ago? Knowing all this, we instead scheduled an appointment with our pediatrician for a second opinion. I just want to put it out there: having a good pediatrician makes ALL the difference. About 2 hours after his initial exam, Mason was in another doctors office, this time with all of us present. Knowing Mason is not one to complain or cry over nothing, our pediatrician decided to take another look at Mason's ears. Turns out there was still a significant amount of wax in his ears because the ear drum still was not visible. Mason, having had enough, was not too thrilled to have another doctor scraping out his ears. I felt for the boy, I really did. My heart broke with every tear that hit the floor. Despite the pain, I was glad we put him through it because as it turned out his ear was infected. Fred and I even got a chance to look through the otoscope to see the bright red ear drum. Kinda cool.
Next, we tackled the heart issue. Our pediatrician remembered the previous incident and pulled up the records from our trip to the pediatric cardiologist three years ago, which determined it was an innocent murmur, one all children have and eventually grow out of. Just out of playing it safe, our pediatrician checked his heart again. Determined there was nothing new and not to be concerned. Mason hasn't had any indication of having trouble breathing, nor has he been excessively winded when playing. So basically nothing to worry about. Just your standard case of an ear infection.
That long story said, we had planned to go see The Lorax on Monday, but after all the doctor visits, it didn't happen. On top of that, Mason missed his classroom Dr. Seuss celebration, which he'd been looking forward to all last week. To make up for it, we took the kids to IHOP for some Truffula Chip Pancakes and Rooty Tooty Bar-Ba-Looty Blueberry Cone Cake. I would have tried the Green Eggs and Ham if they had actually been green eggs and not spinach. Guess I'll have to try dying my own eggs next year. Mason can't wait to plant the seeds in our yard. He is convinced they will be "cotton candy trees" as he calls them. Suppose we will have to plant them and see. I'm actually curious myself as to what type of tree will grow.
OK, so no Lorax on Monday. We decided after a day of antibiotics in him, we would take the kids to see The Lorax on Tuesday after school instead. That didn't happen either. Tuesday morning we got a call from Fred's brother, who was in town for a conference. They screwed up his reservations at the hotel. Naturally we offered him our guest room and Fred picked him up that afternoon. It was great to for us and the kids to see him again, plus we got to go out to dinner with friends.
So, two days of planing to see this movie and two days of having to reschedule. This is life I tell you. Nothing goes according to plan. You just have to learn to go with the flow and not get so stressed about it. This is a work in progress for me. Anyway, back to the Lorax. It's Wednesday, Fred dropped his brother at the airport, I dropped Mason off at school, and we are looking at movie times. It was decided, we would make it to the movies today.
After picking up Mason from school and grabbing a quick lunch, we all piled in the car and headed to the new theatre in Leesburg, Cobb Village 12. Wow! This is now my new favorite theatre. They have a concierge desk, 3 VIP auditoriums with reserved seating, A FULL BAR (did you catch that? I'll say it again, A FULL BAR. And you can bring your drink back to your seat. Awesome!) with a full "chef inspired" menu and seating, a cafe style snack bar with all your movie theatre favorites along with a hot menu and self serve fro-yo. This pass-through style makes it so you don't have to wait in those annoying lines at the snack bar anymore. Does it get better than that? I'm thinking Girls Night!!
Anyway, after hitting up the snack bar for popcorn, drinks and some gummy bears we grabbed two of those boosters and headed to our seats. But not before noticing the party room and stating that I might just be hosting a party for myself this year. We sat at the very top of the stadium seating and settled down to wait for the movie to start.
I think this one really enjoyed the experience. This was her first "real" movie theatre experience. We've been to those free movies over the summer, where it's nothing but kids and no one cares if your child is running around or making noise because the whole theatre if full of children doing the same thing. This time though, we had to stay in our seats and be quiet. She did real well and mostly liked being able to hold the popcorn all by herself. She refused to let it go.
(Waiting for the movie to start.)
Faces glued to the screen, these two were heard giggling throughout the movie, especially when the quirky creatures of the Truffula forest were on screen. Sophie could be seen covering her ears every so often. I think it was a bit loud for her taste. She does only have 2.5 year old ears. When asked what was his favorite part of the movie, Mason said, "the part where they are going to kiss and she says we don't have time for that." Ha, ha. Of course, it is.
If you haven't already, go see The Lorax for yourself, with your family. It has a great, not so subtle message about environmental consequences to depleting our resources, destructing habitat , and causing pollution while the big corporations get rich. I really wonder why this story wasn't made a big screen movie until now, given our history with environmental issues.
Even though it felt like it took us forever to get there, I really enjoyed the movie as did the kids. This was a very nice family outing, something that was needed. I'm glad we did it and I really look forward to having more of these in the future.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment